Category: Fireblossom
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2 April: for Shay’s Word Garden and RDP “Influencer”
Under the Influence I.The weather has a temper, the way two crows quarrel over a piece of flesh. It’s the way of things, Solomon might’ve said, and I think I’m watching religion, or maybe I’m under the influence of weather. II. Radio reception’s gone again.It sounds like six shades of blizzard.Or cats and clowns hissing…
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25 March: for Shay’s Word Garden
Proud Crowns and Coronets The daffodils and tulipsgyre and dance in the garden.Spritely. Nimble as if ageless, swoop, swirl in March’s wind.They’re a gold-sugared colourof proud crowns and coronets. It’s not arty or experimentalor nouveau, this garden, sameblooms, spring yellows, bluebells, and bright globe-shaped tulipswith nebulous streaks like viralred galaxies straight from Hades. The genius…
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23 March: for Word Garden
BACK THEN WHEN The last cigarette I ever smokedwas outside a used car showroom.It was the hottest day of that particular summer, and thinking back, it should’ve beena reflective moment, reflectingback on that dizzying first breath. A sorry time, my late teen years, smoking below the 12th Street bridgewith two friends. And nowadays if I…
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12 March: Her Shadows
HER SHADOWS His mother leaned overto give him a kiss, her lipsthe colour of ruby jewellery.He ducked, luckily missed her red smear across his face.She had this marvellous way of leaving a room. Her intensesummer perfume hangingpregnant and pretty in the air.Fading like a photo. A shiver.And he remembers two menwearing tang-colour uniforms, they carried…
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12 February: A Wolf’s Catechism
“…. his grizzled hair hanging…” by Charles Dickens, The Haunted Man and the Ghost’s Bargain Everyone said so. He was a plaything for the green phantoms of Absinthe. A sleeping delirium, a flame in a hallucination. Grim and low voiced, like a melody in a hollow grave. He was seasonal, slipping in and out, shedding…
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28 January: for Fireblossom’s Word List
This Isn’t About Trains or Armadillos That starched ribbon in her hair,its of dubious use. Absurd to thinkit can tie smoke, or restrain hairthat’s the colour of Moroccan wind. And she leans over the jukebox,f-me boots up to her anymores. She’s a superstar Wurlitzer genius, a mix of nightbird, and tar soap. This society girl…
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23 January: for Fireblossom Wordgarden
Her Dotage some memorieslike airyou can’t hold on to themsome remainas lucid as the scent ofnewly mown grass I grew foxgloves last yearand when they bloomedI could hear Dad’s voice – Find me foxgloves, and I’ll show you blackberries. Mum wanted a magnoliasaid it reminded her ofher father’s accent – Straight off the Florida panhandle,…
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13 January: For Fireblossom
A Wounded Pilgrim The flame flickers, and goes out, the candle smokes with wisps like cottonwood. An angel’s wings, or was it a divine gust. A woman rushes her rosary, fingers the beads, movement like cogs in a gear, sounds, razor sharp fall from her lips. She buzzes like a bee. A pious woman, a…
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