Author: Sally

Writing

Water

Sally2 Comments

When I first saw the Stream of Consciousness prompt for today — water — I immediately thought about a quote that I had jotted in my journal a few days ago.

“Let us bless the humility of water
Always willing to take the shape
Of whatever otherness holds it.”
John O’Donohue

He also blessed

“The buoyancy of water,
Stronger than the deadening,
Downward drag of gravity”

I’ve always been a water person. Being in or near water is a happy place for me.

When I don’t feel well, I take a bath. One of the times I was in labor, I sat in jacuzzi to relax and almost didn’t make it out in time. Aches and pains seem to diminish in the shower.

I love to swim — for the exercise, the mental health, the solitude, the refreshingness of it.

I love to sit in the presence of water and hear the gentle lap of lake waves or the bigger crashes and rhythm of ocean surf.

I love to stand on a bridge and watch the water rush, flow, trickle — whatever that day brings — underneath. I love to drop a stick or a leaf or a flower in on one side, then watch it emerge on the other. Sometimes the object gets caught in an eddy and swirls in circles for a bit before moving on or under or off to the side.

Water supports me and yet offers resistance when I exercise in it.

If I could sing the praises of water, I would, but it would be a poor song in comparison to the song water sings itself. Murmurs, gurgles, steady streams, rain drops on windows or the roof.

Even the smell of rain is a wonder.

poetry

Fireflies

Sally12 Comments

At the first blink of a firefly in the backyard, we run outside. One blip is followed by two, then six. Soon the whole yard is a-twinkle with stringless winged fairy lights that we try to catch because surely a jarful would light up a whole room.

Such a plain beetle
Wings folded, frankly boring
Then magic begins

This is my response to the W3 prompt this week which is to write a haibun, use onomatopoeia three times, use the theme of “The Beauty of Night.”

A haibun is a new form for me. It combines prose and haiku. I’m not 100% sure I did it right.

Onomatopoeia — blink, blip, twinkle — I hope they count.

The Beauty of Night — bioluminescence is amazing and beautiful, right?

fiction

Lost

Sally5 Comments

“Found him!” cried Marco.

The search party had widened and widened their area, but no one expected him to be this far afield, or at the bottom of those overgrown stairs.

The old man studied Marco’s face. “You look so familiar,” he said.

“I’m your grandson,” Marco replied. “Marco. Jenny’s son.”

The old man just stared and shook his head. “How did I get here?” he finally asked.

Marco laughed. It was a friendly laugh, intended to put the old man at ease. “We were hoping you would tell us,” he said.

“Jenny,” the old man repeated, rolling the name around in his mind and occasionally repeating it. “Son, I don’t remember knowing any Jennys.”

“Jenny — your daughter, my mum!” he said. Then he added, “You always insisted on calling her Jennifer, remember?”

“Ah, Jennifer! Yes! She should be getting home from school any minute now,” he said, smiling.

He looking up the old tree-lined steps. “That’s a long set of steps. I don’t remember coming down them.”

Marco steadied the old man, slipping his arm under the man’s left arm and gripping his forearm. “Let’s find a place to sit for a minute,” he said, peering around the lower garden for a bench. “We’ll figure this out.”

“You look familiar,” said the old man.

“I’m Marco. Your grandson,” the younger replied.

“Grandson? I’m a grandfather?”

“I’m Jennifer’s son,” Marco replied.

“Jennifer should be getting home from school pretty soon,” the old man said. “How did I get here?”

This is my (late) submission for the Unicorn Challenge. The challenge is pretty simple — no more than 250 words, and use the photo as a prompt.

poetry

Sweet Dream

Sally8 Comments

If I
Can just be still
It’s possible I’ll have
The needed peace/quiet for a
Sweet dream

This is my response to the W3 prompt for this week — to write a Golden Shovel poem. A Golden Shovel requires that the end word of each line form another author’s poem or quote. In my case, this is a very well-known quote from Martin Luther King, Jr, from a speech he gave in August 1963 — his “I Have a Dream” speech.

He repeats those words seven times — I have a dream; I have a dream; I have a dream; I have a dream; I have a dream; I have a dream; I have a dream.

But he begins that segment of the speech with these words, “So even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.” I like the word “still” in there.

This is a Cinquain. Each line has a set syllable count: 2-4-6-8-2

The poem really has nothing to do with the quote.

poetry · Sermon Recap

Sermon Recap 06-09-24

Sally1 Comment

What is the will of God
With which we must align?
I so blithely say,
“Not my will, but thine.”

What is the will of God?
What Father preached was this —
That God’s will is known
Through knowing forgiveness

I have spent a lifetime
Unable to forgive
Things I did decades ago
Now it’s time to live

God has forgiven me —
Move on, my child, you’re free

fiction

Peasant Dreams

Sally10 Comments

“I’m going to live there,” he said, jabbing his dirty finger at the picture in the book.

The castle in the picture loomed high above the city.

“Ach, wee laddie, that’s nae place we will ever live,” said his mother.

“Not we. Me!”

His mother looked at his ragged dirty clothes and shook her head sadly.

“Mama,” he said, “someday I’m going to walk right up there and –“

“Nae, wee laddie. Ye cannae!”

“But I will,” he insisted. “I’m going to walk right up to the big gate.”

“Ye ken there’s a gatekeeper? He will nae let ye in,” she said, trying to be gentle with her words, but realistic for her son.

“Ah, but he will Mama! I am sure!” he said, so earnestly that she felt her heart breaking as she looked into his face. “My hands and face will be clean! I will scrub them!”

“Aye, but yer clothes, wee laddie,” she said.

“My clothes will be new. I will work hard for them!”

“Aye, I ken you will, but –“

“Mama, listen. I will walk to the gate with clean hands, clean face, new clothes. The gatekeeper will look at me, and maybe he’ll growl.”

“Aye, he will most definitely growl.”

“‘State yer business,’ he’ll say.”

His mother nodded.

“I’ll smile up at him and say, ‘”‘Sir, my mama is the best cook in the land. She taught me how. I want to work in your kitchen.’ He’ll let me in.”

She hugged him and cried.

This is my response to the Unicorn Challenge: base the writing on the photo, no more than 250 words.

It feels slightly audacious to try to write a brogue I’ve only read. How’d I do?

Blather

Questionable Plans

Sally7 Comments

What should I do today?

It’s gray out, or, I suppose, grey if I lived in Scotland, where I think it’s often gray/grey.

Is Canada gray or grey? Now there‘s an important question, right?

I mean, they do add those extra “u”s as in favour, colour, and honour. Is that their French influence?

But back to the question at hand — what to do today? The weather looks less than inviting which is where I was going with that other word that we won’t debate the spelling of right now.

It’s been such a long week work-wise. I kind of don’t want to use my brain for the indoor paperworky sort of work that needs to happen. Can I just veg out? Will people judge me if I do that?

A friend recommended a rom-com to me — Falling for Figaro — because it’s set in Scotland. They knew I love Scotland even though I’ve never been there. Even though the weather is often gr–, um, overcast.

I suppose I could snuggle up under a blanket with a bowl of popcorn and watch that movie.

Should I?

That’s really the question, you know.

Time is this commodity that we can’t put a price on. We can’t hold it. We can’t really save it. We can’t do anything but use it. I want to use it wisely because I know I’ve wasted so much in my life.

So, I ask you — What should I do today?

This is my response to Linda Hill’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt: “start with a question.” Begin your post with the first question that comes to mind when you sit down to write your post.

What are you going to do today?

poetry

Musings on a Spiral

Sally11 Comments

who
can
resist
a spiral
laid in the pavement!
To walk heel-toe heel-toe around
the pattern carefully laid in brick in the courtyard

in
my
mind, it
was spiral —
faulty memory
that I have — when I looked it up
It was a mere labyrinth (as if that could be mere)

which
one
would prove
the harder
to build? A spiral?
Or a labyrinth? I would guess
The harder one to spell is the easier to build

This is my response to this week’s W3 Challenge which is:

  • FORM: Compose a ‘Fib’ poem(created by Gregory K. Pincus), which is a six-line poem of 1,1,2,3,5,8 syllables).
    • VARIATIONS:
      1. Write as few or as many lines as you wish, as long as your syllable count is based upon the Fibonacci Sequence (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, etc.).
      2. You may write more than one stanza, repeating the amount of lines of your first stanza.
  • THEME: Write about a spiral; spiral shapes in nature or art, or perhaps a more figurative or metaphorical spiral.

I was thinking about when I had been in Bayeux, France in 2017. One day, I had gone for a walk with my brother and sister. We found this labryinth:

It’s where my mind went when I read the prompt — but it’s clearly NOT a Fibonacci spiral.

Faith · Sermon Recap

Sermon Recap 06.02.24

Sally3 Comments

Preaching from Mark 2:23-3:6

“What does the human heart need? Grace.”

Of course, Fr. N’s answer listed other things.

Of course, he expounded on it all.

Of course, I was semi-exhausted and kept dozing off while he was preaching. (I must cut back somewhere in my life!)

But that was the one coherent line that I had scribbled in my bulletin. And, if you think about it, it says a lot.

fiction · Grief

Reminders

Sally10 Comments

It made her sad. That shoe in the gutter.

When she saw it, she thought of that other shoe in the gutter.

The shoe after the accident.

When her sister had been killed.

Of course, this shoe looked nothing like her sister’s shoe.

Her sister’s was an old Nike. It sat in the gutter long after they had cleared the car parts and broken glass, like an unclaimed prop from Cinderella.

At times, it had been covered with leaves and granola bar wrappers and the detritus of city living. Then, one day, it was gone.

Had it been reclaimed as evidence from her accident? Or, had the street cleaners finally picked it up and tossed it in the garbage.

The shoe was still there when she walked home from work.

No, this wasn’t left from an accident. No skid marks. No police tape or traffic cones marking off the area like there had been back then. It had probably fallen out of a gym bag or something, she decided.

It was there the next morning and she started to cry.

She had been too angry to cry after her sister’s death. Now the sadness was overwhelming her.

On her way home in the evening, she stopped to pick up the shoe. She started to cry again. She wept through the task of digging a hole in the garden.

“Thank you for your service,” she whispered, channeling Marie Kondo.

Still weeping, she placed it in the hole and buried it.

This is my response to this week’s Unicorn Challenge. The Unicorn Challenge’s rules are so simple: no more than 250 words based on the photo prompt.

For the record, I have yet to read a single Marie Kondo book. She is the queen of decluttering, so I really should.

However, when I throw things away these days, I do thank them for their service, a Marie Kondo concept. It involves gratitude and acknowledgement of the purpose an object has served.