writer, storyteller, veteran (see BirchBark Editing.com and MaxieJaneFrazier.com for more)
Quivering desire, every fiber of your being longs to touch me. Trembling to contact, ecstatic connection.
I whisper, “Get off the couch.”
The NaPoWriMo prompt today asked us to rebel in some way. We could choose something as simple as writing out of our usual style. I typically avoid humor and stuck to traditional form with longer, more narrative-based ideas.
Tunnel ends lightly.
Muted waterfalls, hope waits.
Foresight in 20/20
The world is hard-shell icing around my house. The snow sparkles in the thin light and single-digit temperatures make me think about untenable environments. There are moments in our lives when we are breaking through the candied snowscape, up to our knees with the crust scraping our shins. Each step herculean, we have to remind ourselves that things might get better soon—the snow will melt one day.
The other day a fox hopped up on a rock outside my kitchen window. Remaining in taut, watchful motion, he leapt up through the air to earn the perfect arc and dove nose first into the crusty snow. Up he came with a vole.
I’m sympathetic to both sides of this situation.
Under the crusty snow, voles and other small creatures can live in relative comfort because the temperature remains around 32 degrees, thanks to that shell and the inches of insulation between the frigid outside air and the tunnels at ground level.
Back to untenable environments. The fox trots so lightly that he skips across the crust. The vole tunnels underneath and is warm where it appears cold. It makes me think about how we navigate difficulties. Sometimes we are all brute strength and ignorance, plowing through the obvious obstacle. And sometimes we should remember to tread lightly, immerse ourselves in the environment, or wait awhile to step into it at all.
Even so, sometimes the fox will get the vole. Sometimes we break through the snow. Always, the season shifts, the leaves come out, and there is an opportunity to try again.
A mermaid stretches across my mountains
Her fiery belly making coral.
Of cliff faces iced and drifting snow,
My world suddenly under the sea.
Each morning when
Pyrois, the fiery one,
Surges next to Eous, Aethon, and Phlegon,
Mountains kneel before their magic.
Centuries of human musing
Bows before human experience
Prostrates under coral coated clouds
Yet again failing to evoke the sunrise.
And me:
Coffee, dogs, warm lamp,
Pen in hand,
Joining the legions in wordless wonder.
Put Out to Pasture 