Photo: Atara Katz
Listen up
Little fluff
There’ll be no mischief
And stuff.
Best make sure
That you stay
In the shallows,
If you don’t
Wish to meet
Claws as gallows.
There will be no
Dissent
Till wings let you
Ascend.
So since you are yet
To create
Actual feathers,
You will heed
Pond-time rules
By your elders.
For Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Feathers
Photo: SeaReeds on Pixabay
“Is it a mongoose?” Molly squinted.
“Kind of cat.” Alfred raised his camera.
“No cat nor mongoose. It’s a Fossa. Belongs to the Viverrids.” Know-it-All Natalie noted, head-to-toe in expensive expedition gear.
“Vye-ve-whats?” Molly blurted.
Alfred shot Molly a warning glance, but it was too late.
“Viverrids. Civets. Genets. Or, if you need the very basics: Mammals. Endemic to Madagascar. Carnivorous. Eat lemurs, mostly, though they won’t turn their nose at lizards or birds or tenrecs.”
Alfred sighed. There’d be no stopping the Nataliepedia now. The woman was the bane of their group. He eyed the animal. Vye-ve whatever. Looked like dorky cougar to him.
“Nice fur,” he tried.
“You better not even think of it,” Natalie admonished, delighted. “They’re protected by fady. That’s local for taboo, in case you didn’t know that, either.”
Bet you aren’t, Alfred grumbled internally. Are fossa too fussy to have YOU for lunch?
For What Pegman Saw: Madagascar
Photo: Amitai Asif
A warm dinner.
A choice.
Wood enough for warmth
And cooking.
Decent clothes.
Shelter.
Water.
What millions would call
The very lap of
Luxury.
For Kate’s Friday Foto Fun: Luxury
Photo: Na’ama Yehuda
Feel the midday
Glow expand
Sense the gently
Heated sand.
Dampened clothes,
Digging hands,
China they’re intent
To find.
Make the most
Of wonderland.
It previews warmth
So close behind.
For Terri’s Sunday Stills Challenge: Warmth
Photo: Yael Yehuda
There stands the empty crib
The room that will not hear
The sounds of cries or coos or laughter.
There are the walls,
Fresh paint
Fresh pain
For the awaited,
For a broken chapter.
A heart
Missing
Breast and breath
For an eternity of loss,
Till the hereafter.
Note: Dedicated with love to all empty-armed mothers (in all their manifestations and realities and outward presentations), on this Mother’s Day.
For Debbie’s One Word Sunday: Missing
Photo: Inbar Asif
Listen to the sound
Of children
Playing
Under the careful
Eye
Of matriarchs,
And the friable
Hold
Of the world suspended
By a thread.
Perhaps there is no
Safer
Sentinel
Than a wise grandmother’s trunk
Lifting
The future
Over her head.
For the Lens-Artists Challenge: Street Art
Photo: stevepb-282134 on Pixabay
“He’d never do that.”
“But he’s such a nice guy!”
“She’s lying or she’d have complained sooner.”
“He’s a pillar of the community.”
“Why ruin a man’s name?”
“I’ve never seen him do anything.”
“He said he didn’t do it. What else do you want?”
“Kids are unreliable.”
“Women lie about this stuff all the time.”
Even when videos surfaced following one victim’s suicide. Even after he was convicted. Some kept claiming he’d been the one wronged.
For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Denial in 77 words
Most had left already. Evacuation was taken seriously after the previous storm had wiped out a dozen residents and many homes. Sam stayed. Life couldn’t get much grayer with Meg having drowned. He’d survive or join her. Either way was okay.
“Meet me by The Intertwined tonight,” the note said.
Nate trembled. He fingered the rough edge of the faded construction paper and the sensation lifted him into memories filled with the scent of glue and the sounds of children.
It’s been how many years since? Thirty. At least.
He inspected the note again, as if expecting more words to appear among the scrawled letters on the hand-torn bit of yellowed-green. None did.
It was not signed, but even after all this time there would be no mistaking it. Not by him.
Elinor.
Kindergarten sweetheart and schoolyard tormentor, both.
What did she want? Where had she been? Why write him now? Why him? Why this way?
Tears pressed behind his eyes and he was surprised by their intensity. The last time he’d felt that way (well, the last time he consciously admitted to it being so), was when he’d seen that ad, twelve years ago. The image of it unfurled behind his mind’s eye, never really forgotten: “Missing. Elinor Bricks. Age 23. Long dark curly hair. Blue eyes. Medium height and built. Last seen walking into the woods south of Sparrow Street, wearing blue pants, gray jacket, sneakers, and a brown messenger bag.”
Two weeks of searching before the police had folded their tents and left the flyers for the wind and squirrels.
Three months before he could sleep.
Four years before he let himself date anyone. Two more before he married. Five before he lost Marianne and little Morris as the baby tried and could not be born.
Could that have been only last year?
His heart had been hollow. Since.
Now this.
“Meet me by The Intertwined tonight,” the note said.
Their ancestors had planted those trees over a century ago. Hers and his. Far apart enough to stand alone. Close enough to weave together roots and canopy. They were a symbol of connection. The place where marriage took place and funerals left from. Where roots spread fingers to hold on even as they reached to grip new spaces. It was the very place where past and present, love and life and loss and longing intertwined.
His fingers spread over the bit of paper, reaching to embrace it, and interlacing words with the unknown.
He trembled.
His heart thundered.
“I’m sorry, Marianne.”
For Sue Vincent’s WritePhoto Prompt: Rooted
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