Category: prose
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6 December: Somewhere There’s Always Chocolate
Somewhere near the equator, my youngest son is explaining to his daughter of nearly 6 years why she can’t have chocolate for breakfast, in much the same way that I explained to him when he was 6, why he couldn’t eat chocolate for breakfast, and much like my mum explained to me that eating chocolate…
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5 December: dVerse Prosery
I Was Where I Am I was standing at the kitchen sink, the cold tap turned on just enough to slide the egg and bacon fat off the plates. Standing there, staring down the street toward the old oak tree that nearly burnt when the pub had that kitchen fire a few years ago. Thinking…
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27 November: Journal
27 November:It’s still morning. Time slows when there’s no external noise. No radio. No telly. No talking. No music … except for the shallow sound of his breathing as he reads the Sunday’s paper. Sunday always becomes Monday, if you judge the date by a newspaper. Saturday is thicker than weekdays. Sundays less so than…
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26 November: Journal
25 November:I’m sitting in my chair. Reclined. Fingers locked across my lap. Eyes closed, and headphones isolating me from vague noise. I’m listening to I Walk With Ghosts by Scott Buckley. Violins in deep centred waves. Spiral rebirth – I fall into a shallow sleep. A shallow breath. Strings drawing out my every thought into…
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19 November: She Without Name
She Without Name You know that time between dreaming and waking, when you roll over and your dyne starts for floor, but there’s still enough covering your legs to keep yourself on the side of being covered … Well, that’s when she arrived. She’s white as northern new snow that sparkles like laughing stars, and…
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4 November: Twenty-Two Seconds in 1974
Twenty-Two Seconds in 1974 Wake up, he whispers in her ear.She turns over, her eyes unwilling to release the last dusting of sleep.Those brown eyes of his; those brown eyes.And he says “Do you trust me?”“Do I trust the man who drugged me last night? No.” she says.And then she grins that sort of grin…
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4 November: The Suitcase
Mum thought it was a suitcase, but then she didn’t open it up to look, because that would mean spending more time in the charity shop than she wanted to do, just in case some neighbour walked by and saw her – in a charity shop for fig’s sake, so she bought it for a…
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8 September: for Ragtag Daily Prompt
A Short-lived Conversation About Skulls I have half an ear open, and Mum says, “Don’t underestimate the trouble you can find yourself in.” And I’m watching a bee bump its head against the window, over and over and over again, and I say, “It’s weird, a skull always seems to smile, but a skull needs…
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16 August: dVerse Prosery
Vanished She’s learning about sound barriers at school. Sound. Speed. Aeroplanes. Red lights on the left. Green lights on the right. Like Christmas lanterns flashing on steel wings. “Flash. Flash. Flash,” she calls out to the hundreds of faces up there. People flying through rain coloured clouds, over roads and Tobermory-colour houses. She watches the…
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24 June: Off Beachy Head
Off Beachy Head The sea is glassy and warm as if its skin’s been peeled away, and we stand at the top of a hill overlooking the sea. The winds of the world rock us as if a song is working its way out of our ears, some song that would stop us rocking, stop…
It's Still Life 