It's Still Life

When Ink Stops, the Pen Goes Dry

October is pouring itself away.

Rain sharp as swords that utter their own words, and then reel out of the gutters icy-loud … (leaf mould blocking the downspouts again).

I buried another pigeon, the second in a week – it died, wrapped in a towel while I held it on my lap. Its eyes closing as if to leave, and then suddenly rushing open (that’s how pain feels) … and I spoke to it, hummed songs. No being should die alone … or without music.

The air smells of last gasps and slow abscission, like an empty house with its fistful of memories, those lost words once owned by its occupants, and I clothe myself in shrouded webs of wool for my patient winter repose.

There’s a small girl named Brigid at the door with a magic wand in one hand, a plastic pumpkin with lacy spider webs in the other, and wearing a limp-pointy witchy hat.

“Trick or Treat,” she smiles.

“You’re early,” says her grandmother. She’s tempted to tell Brigid to come back next week.

Lucky for her, Grandmother is a sucker for baby witches.

So she gives her two fistfuls of sweets and a white feather, and they wish each other Happy Oíche Shamhna.

I’m in from the garden.

Spidery webs in my hair, my boots are cast in mud and left outside, only the soil under my fingernails follow me indoors. Along with an apple in my pocket from the neighbour’s overhanging tree.

I wash my hands, soap lathering like sea foam that drowns in warm water.

And I hear his voice in my head “Moisturise your hands,” … something I always forget to do.

It makes me smile – every single time.

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Written for Denise’s Six Sentence Story including the word “web”. Oíche Shamhna (Gaelic) is known as Samhain in North America and is pronounced SOW-in (it means Halloween). 

Some artwork is created using Midjourney AI, and is identified as such in the ALT text or captioned. Images are copyright and not to used without permission, which I willingly give when asked, and when not for commercial use. Imagery and poems/prose ©Misky 2006-2024.