Here’s my latest offering for Anonymous Legacy‘s photo-inspired prompt, VisDare. This week’s prompt word is ‘Ephemeral’. The rules are simple:
150 words – or less.
Post entry to your blog and “link in”.
(Please – no erotica or graphic violence.)
DON’T FORGET to read and comment on others’ entries!!
The photo is below, and my piece follows. Let me know what you think, and give it a go yourself, why not?
– Y Diflannu –
I told them, over and over again ‘Don’t go down Glyndwr Street’. What a fool I was.
It was the summer holidays, a delightful oasis for them, a seemingly endless trial for me. I had run out of patience and shouted at them to get out of my hair.
The peace and quiet was such a relief.
Until they didn’t come back at tea-time, ransacking the kitchen cupboards for biscuits, crisps and orange squash.
I knew.
I ran as if wings had sprouted from my feet. I got there just in time to see them skipping off into the distance, holding hands. I stared as their shadows grew dark, as my darling girls faded and disappeared.
There they are now, forever embedded in the paving stones, together with remnants of the other careless souls.
Sometimes, I want to join them.
*****
**** Y Diflannu – The Disappeared
This piece has a haunting theme Freya. I like the sense of wistfulness that you create in the story. Very well written.
Thank you! As you can tell, my holiday in Wales has left lasting impressions on me. I’m very glad you enjoyed it.
nice use of image and words to express a particular emotion that says you care and are involved…
Thank you, Jacqueline. Indeed, I do care – I have a very soft spot for this part of the country.
I like the emotion depicted…the pain of the words chosen.
Thank you, Lorri.
I like the line “I ran as if wings had sprouted from my feet.”
I didn’t quite get what happened to them though.
Thank you, Nada. The children were swallowed into the pavement, so that only their shadows remained. A mysterious effect of Glyndwr Street….
I enjoyed ready through your posts. Reading this one my interpretation was it was the children’s nativity and child ways that had disappeared with their new found freedom of playing alone. That’s what I love about stories…open to interpretation 🙂
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this post, plus others, and comment as well! I love your interpretation of this piece – how wonderful 🙂
I am not sure the Welsh board of tourism should hire you for promotion. A very good story though.
I think they would disagree – the area is full of sites like these and the history is fully embraced by the Government of Wales. They leave the sites to erode and return to the landscape for a reason! Lots of people visit them, without rose-tinted spectacles 🙂
Thank you for the compliment 🙂
Not sure you allure people by telling them they will disappear! Just a thought. 🙂
Tell someone not to do something…. A sad tale well told.
Indeed! And we keep repeating that error, over and over 🙂
I’m pleased you enjoyed it.
Excellent hook! This, to me, reads like the opening lines of crisp novelette, a fairy tale for grownups. Would love to see more. Thank you for such a great VisDare!!
Thank you, Angela. Perhaps I should add it to my list of ‘for further development’ 🙂