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Rubicon – dVerse Open Link Week 122

freyathewriter 16 Comments

Here’s my latest entry into the dVerse Open Link – why not take a look at all of the other wonderful responses?

Please don’t panic – despite the tone of the poem, it isn’t a reflection of how I feel. Offline, I am writing dystopian fiction, so I was pondering how a particular set of characters might feel in this world that I have created for them. This piece came from there, nowhere else.

Let me know what you think…

*****

– Rubicon –

Render me empty,
Sackclothed and dull
Darker than ditchwater
Coated in oil, rainbow-hued surface
Hidden depths that boil,
As I blunder, lamed, from crisis to fall
Render me empty
Sackclothed and dull

Render me hollow,
Empty my skull
Vacuous, ransacked
Littered with spoil, nutrients stolen
My still waters roil
As I falter, blinded, beleaguered, I fall
Render me hollow,
Empty my skull

Render me soulless,
Eviscerated, null
Grey, empty, mourning
Exhausted with toil, eyes bloodshot red
From life, I recoil
As I stumble, burdened and buried, I fall
Render me soulless
Eviscerated, null

Cold – VisDare 43

freyathewriter 10 Comments

Here’s my latest offering for Anonymous Legacy‘s photo-inspired prompt, VisDare. This week’s prompt word is ‘Memory’. 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?

– Cold – 

“What is it?”

“They called it a butterfly.”

“And what did it do?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, everything must have a use.”

“Is that what you’ve been learning in classes?”

“Everything in this life must have at least one purpose.”

“… Because that is what went wrong before? Is that what they taught you today?”

“Yes, Mother. We have learned from our mistakes.”

I take one final look at the etching before closing the book – a remnant of times past. I should be pleased that my daughter is such a good student. And yet…

“Mother?”

“Yes, Lucy?”

“I will call you by your first name from now on. Sentimentality serves no purpose. Not in these times.”

“As you wish.”

I hold the book close, yearning to feel the whisper of butterfly wings on my face, just one more time.

My daughter is as cold and hard as stone.

anonymous-legacy-160x160-black

What Lies Beneath – Alastair’s Photo Fiction

freyathewriter 14 Comments

Here is my offering for Alastair’s Photo Fiction this week, inspired by the photo below.  Why not take part? And why not visit his photography and writing blog to take a look at his other photos…?

Copyright - Kattermonran

Copyright – Kattermonran

– What Lies Beneath –

The four seasons are a distant memory – those days are long gone. Now we have The Dry and The Wet. I miss the crunch of autumn leaves underfoot, the mists hanging in the valleys at sunrise.

The onslaught of rain is tough at first. One day, the sun is high and fierce enough to leave us all parched at each ragged breath, the next the air is heavy, clouds low and pregnant with water. After a few weeks, the downpour ceases for a while, puddles lie still. It is this time that will find me, toes touching the very edge of one of these glistening pools, watching, waiting, staring.

“Alison? Alison! I’m here.”

The voice is faint, as if my imagination is playing cruel tricks. But this is real, agonisingly so.

The Washed Away, they call them. Most believe that they were drowned in the Flood Times, when the heavens opened for four long years. But I know the truth. Yes, they were washed away, but not drowned. Just taken down; down to The Below.

“Mother! It’s so good to see you!”

We smile, making do. It’s all we have.