And Sew...
Well, ladies and gents, I said I'd still be using this journal for stories and poems and maybe every now and then a good rant, so here we go, with a short story. Enjoy, or don't, it's all gravy, baby.
Before I was a writer, I was an artist. The flames against the sky have the highlights of thick layered oil paint on a canvas. And me, what’s left of my family--we’re black skeletons against the fire. Our stunned and charred shadows stretch across the street but we can‘t move.
The writing hasn’t been so good, not lately. Somewhere, without knowing, my inspiration slipped through a hole in my pocket and I obviously walked on. High and low, it was just gone. Inside, wads of stupid, in the form of discarded papers, lying all over my bedroom floor are feeding the thing eating my house.
My mother can’t look away from the sudden bloom of yellow and orange flowers pressed up against her bedroom window. Dad‘s crumpled-up like one of my bad ideas. His forehead’s pressed against a tree and his eyes are trained on the grain in front of him. He doesn’t want to watch reality burn.
Things have been grand for us, lately. I glided onto the Dean’s List, to their delight. Mom’s been promoted at work and Dad’s cut down the drinking. I used to be able to put my face against the living room walls and breath in Jack. Now the walls would reek of ash. If there are walls left to smell.
They don’t react to the sounds of sirens. The rush of shock must still ring in their ears too loud. It’s too late, we know.
What tale could I weave out of a sunny barbecue? Who would lose themselves in the riveting retelling of a kindergarten graduation? There is nothing fascinating in nightmare-less nights or macaroni valentines or homemade Halloween costumes.
My heart’s up in my throat, and it’s covered in the soot I sucked down. But I know my lack of breath is not from crawling through clouds settling in my hallway. The streaks of fire smeared over the stars and sky. The charcoal smudge of smoke. It’s beautiful.
The alien-looking firemen in their future suits rush towards the wreck, the thing I already think of as nothing. Can they go back in time in those suits and bring back the burning memories? My parents and I, we all manage to stay on our own far away planets while futility is investigated.
What matters is beauty and pain, that hold hands so often. Why we watch holocaust documentaries and films fantasizing the end of the world and get soaked up in books about tormented and torrid loves. Why we go “oh” at explosions on screen and slow down at accident sites and don’t turn away from blood dripping off televised operations. We love the pain.
She’s crisp and smoking in there, a smoldering angel accidentally in hell. They must have told mom she couldn’t be saved, because the calm and gentle woman swings and screams and her hatred and anguish pounds against me. I don’t know where Dad is. And now, I have no little sister.
The house looks human, with deep, sunken and dark window-eyes, and dry lips gasping in air through the smoldering door. Someone’s bashed the skull in cruelly, and a smoky mind slowly pours over the concrete alley street of the night sky. They are all so far away, and it’s only me and this broken house, staring at each other. We know each other’s secrets.
Tears streak me, because I just can’t contain how much I love this. The screams and sirens and smoke have filled me, completing the absence left by my wayward muse. Just think of the things I can tell the world now. I am the victim of a hideous fire that turned my home to hell before my agonized eyes. I am the older sibling left with only a pile of ashes to adore. And millions of eyes will savor the searing anguish I cry out in words. They will use me as a door to their own cut off or deep-buried tragedy or to save their atrophying empathy. Oh,yes, the story I can tell now, and the story they will read…
And just think of the story I’ll have when they find out I did it, that I set my life on fire.
And, if you forgot you were interested, my new lj is still toldthestars. Thanx for reading or not reading, and have a super day.
Before I was a writer, I was an artist. The flames against the sky have the highlights of thick layered oil paint on a canvas. And me, what’s left of my family--we’re black skeletons against the fire. Our stunned and charred shadows stretch across the street but we can‘t move.
The writing hasn’t been so good, not lately. Somewhere, without knowing, my inspiration slipped through a hole in my pocket and I obviously walked on. High and low, it was just gone. Inside, wads of stupid, in the form of discarded papers, lying all over my bedroom floor are feeding the thing eating my house.
My mother can’t look away from the sudden bloom of yellow and orange flowers pressed up against her bedroom window. Dad‘s crumpled-up like one of my bad ideas. His forehead’s pressed against a tree and his eyes are trained on the grain in front of him. He doesn’t want to watch reality burn.
Things have been grand for us, lately. I glided onto the Dean’s List, to their delight. Mom’s been promoted at work and Dad’s cut down the drinking. I used to be able to put my face against the living room walls and breath in Jack. Now the walls would reek of ash. If there are walls left to smell.
They don’t react to the sounds of sirens. The rush of shock must still ring in their ears too loud. It’s too late, we know.
What tale could I weave out of a sunny barbecue? Who would lose themselves in the riveting retelling of a kindergarten graduation? There is nothing fascinating in nightmare-less nights or macaroni valentines or homemade Halloween costumes.
My heart’s up in my throat, and it’s covered in the soot I sucked down. But I know my lack of breath is not from crawling through clouds settling in my hallway. The streaks of fire smeared over the stars and sky. The charcoal smudge of smoke. It’s beautiful.
The alien-looking firemen in their future suits rush towards the wreck, the thing I already think of as nothing. Can they go back in time in those suits and bring back the burning memories? My parents and I, we all manage to stay on our own far away planets while futility is investigated.
What matters is beauty and pain, that hold hands so often. Why we watch holocaust documentaries and films fantasizing the end of the world and get soaked up in books about tormented and torrid loves. Why we go “oh” at explosions on screen and slow down at accident sites and don’t turn away from blood dripping off televised operations. We love the pain.
She’s crisp and smoking in there, a smoldering angel accidentally in hell. They must have told mom she couldn’t be saved, because the calm and gentle woman swings and screams and her hatred and anguish pounds against me. I don’t know where Dad is. And now, I have no little sister.
The house looks human, with deep, sunken and dark window-eyes, and dry lips gasping in air through the smoldering door. Someone’s bashed the skull in cruelly, and a smoky mind slowly pours over the concrete alley street of the night sky. They are all so far away, and it’s only me and this broken house, staring at each other. We know each other’s secrets.
Tears streak me, because I just can’t contain how much I love this. The screams and sirens and smoke have filled me, completing the absence left by my wayward muse. Just think of the things I can tell the world now. I am the victim of a hideous fire that turned my home to hell before my agonized eyes. I am the older sibling left with only a pile of ashes to adore. And millions of eyes will savor the searing anguish I cry out in words. They will use me as a door to their own cut off or deep-buried tragedy or to save their atrophying empathy. Oh,yes, the story I can tell now, and the story they will read…
And just think of the story I’ll have when they find out I did it, that I set my life on fire.
And, if you forgot you were interested, my new lj is still toldthestars. Thanx for reading or not reading, and have a super day.