Month: March 2019

OLWG#95- Loisada

On By tnkerrIn OLWG, writing8 Comments

 Written for OLWG#95

When I moved to New York, I had it in my head that I needed to live in that neighbourhood because… well because I was a big fan of David Peel and The Lower East Side Band. I used to go outside and walk the streets communing with the ghosts of all the famous people who had grown up there. The neighbourhood is ripe with spirits. People like The Marx Brothers, Eddie Cantor, Al Jolson, The Gershwins, and Jimmy Durante; to name a few.

My mother had been born somewhere below Delancey, and I saw her once. It was late on a spring afternoon, right before dinner time. I was walking near the corner of Broome and Orchard. Mom was younger than she had ever been when I knew her; she was maybe sixteen or seventeen years old. She was smoking. I don’t know for sure that she saw me, but I think she must have.

She did a double take, reddened, and flipped her cigarette into the street with a practised hand then looked into my eyes and mouthed my name, “TN?”

I greeted her politely then watched as her smile turned over and her eyes glaze. She shook her head, glanced up and down the street a few times, perplexed; then she too vanished in the dusky, fading light. I’ve gone back a few times but I’ve never seen her again.

This week’s prompts were:

  1. outside
  2. just ice
  3. Hi, Mom

Ashes of the Truth

On By tnkerrIn Carrot Ranch, Poetry, writing10 Comments

  I wrote this for the March 21st Flash Fiction Challenge

Kenny hitched his trousers up and plopped on the front porch couch. A cloud of red dust rose up; some settled back on his Momma’s old Chesterfield, while the rest got picked up by the breeze and carried away.

He sat for a while watching the clouds roll in. When he was sure it was gonna rain he went and fetched the old galvanized bucket with the broken bail from beneath the sink. He sat the bucket in the bedroom directly below the ceiling stain.

Tonight he would say his prayers and ask for cash to fix the roof.

The prompt and instructions were:

In 99 words (no more, no less) write a story that features a bucket of water. What is the condition of the water and what is the bucket for? Drop deep into the well and draw from where the prompt leads!

Kenny’s bucket is currently empty, no water. There should be water tonight though. Should be water tonight.

The Fisherman

On By tnkerrIn Carrot Ranch, Poetry, writing8 Comments

  I wrote this for the March 14: Flash Fiction Challenge

My father was an artist; a sculptor, usually working in clay or stone. One day he, and six of his drinking buddies, brought a large stone and sat it in the centre of his studio.
 
“What are you going to make from that, Papa?” I asked.
 
“I won’t make anything from it,” he said, “I think I can find something.”
 
He told me that he believed a fisherman was hiding in the stone. That he would find the fisherman by knocking off small bits and pieces. He promised he’d take care not to cut the fisherman with his chisel.

 

The prompt and instructions were:

In 99 words (no more, no less) write a story that includes a chisel. Use chisel as a noun or a verb. Think about what might be chiseled, who is chiseling. Be the chisel. Go where the prompt leads!

OLWG#93- You Have Nothing to Do?

On By tnkerrIn OLWG, writing3 Comments

Inspired tonight by Dr. Theodor Geisel to whom I deeply apologize

Written for OLWG#93

I went to the closet
but the closet was
locked. There wasn’t a bell so
I knocked and I knocked.

As I waited I danced
to the song in my head. Kind of regretting
some things that I’ve said. But soon, I
was tripping a light so fantastic, that
the time, it would seem, became quite elastic
I forgot who I was, and what I was doing,
then finally I stopped and I just stood there stewing.

Why wouldn’t anyone
answer the door? Am I so
unwelcome? Am I such a bore?
Maybe they’re out, and no
one’s at home? Should I come back
later or just leave them alone?

I turned from the closet, I turned on my heel
and as soon as I did, I heard someone squeal,
“You can’t leave
that way, no you can’t leave like that.”

I turned back around and I spotted a cat;
who grinned like a Cheshire with a red
and white hat. He scratched his head,
then he looked at his shoe then he asked me,
“Don’t stand there like you’ve nothing to do?
Did you come to hang out? Have some tea and a chat?
Are you just going to leave? Just going to scat?”

This week’s prompts were:

  1. Should I come back later
  2. The closet was locked
  3. Time becomes elastic

Seashore

On By tnkerrIn writingLeave a comment

 

It was early summer, 1969 when your mother and I visited the seashore in Blackpool. We had been married awhile and didn’t think we’d ever have children of our own.

That was OK though, we were researching the adoption process.

There was carousel at North Pier.

We spread a blanket on the sand.

You came along, nine months later.

OLWG#92- 蝴蝶双刀

On By tnkerrIn OLWG, writing3 Comments

I thought about this one for several days before beginning to write. The prompts were tough this week.

Written for OLWG#92

Black Heart Harriet and Maleficent Meg stood toe to toe, weapons drawn, nerves on edge. Neither trusted the other as far as they could spit. It was midnight and dark at the crossroads where they stood. A torch burning in the snow provided meager illumination.

Harriet was holding her heavy cutlass in both hands. It was pointed low as she waved it in a figure eight pattern. She carried her ‘Hikari’ fighting knife concealed in the folds of her white, organic cotton blouse. The blouse with the lantern sleeves. Harriet looked for an opening.

Meg began to move. The leather bandoliers that she wore crossed across her red Angola sweater moved from side to side, as she circled to her left. She held her Dao with the wickedly curved tip at eye level; higher than Harriet held her weapon. She carried a pair of butterfly swords tucked in at her back and a pistol in her belt.

“Did you bring your Hikari, Harriet?”

“What do you think, Meg?”

“I think that it’ll be mine when we’re done here. It’s a unique blade but it won’t do you any good today.”

Harriet laughed and backhandedly flicked her sabre to test her opponent. Meg leaned back, then and returned the move with her Dao. Harriet stepped to the side and hacked at Meg with her cutlass once again.

This week’s prompts were:

  1. my outfit is entirely vegan
  2. it had to come to this
  3. unique isn’t always useful