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The day dawned beneath frigid skies in what counts for normal now. My friend stops for coffee stays for lunch. I call to my daughter to buy bread – she comes for some change, and goes. We talk of scarcity and recipes not minding the clock, sirens an accustomed distant background A rap at the […]
From a Vineyard shop of long ago, this cover (soft with amber leather) holds pages worn in edge and ink. “… last night beneath the Milky Way we swam in the lagoon. Water slid like silk against my skin, phosphorescence swirled about…” Each day was huge – aglow or gloom: strident […]
Life has its seasons. Friendships ebb and flow. Close ties can be stretched to breaking by busyness, distance, time. All the masks we wear to survive our lives keep others at arm’s length – build inner walls in layers by years. Time moves on, leaves gaps in its pattern where friends should be. Wounds of […]
Lord I don’t know how to handle this. The whorls of circumstance now turn, entwine, spin tight – spiral down to the unknown deep into dismay. How do I reach You in these darkened days? Questions veer and multiply – where do I begin? I look down into the endless depth from a high stretched […]
Long shadows from the probing moon stretch across the kitchen floor. In the silent house, an abandoned meal lies on the table. The phone stays mute. She gazes at the snowfield pressed against the still, black edge of forest and silence spreads beyond the horizon – wider deeper than she can reach. — Christine […]
As the long, lavish day expires, a streetlamp stammers against encroaching gloom. The chill wind slices through all confidence, drives the day’s news along an empty street into shadows thronged by phantoms. A concrete wall, graffitied with fear obstructs the feeble light intensifies the dark. For these uneasy hours sanity is eclipsed, optimism blinded in […]
I miss the changing view outside my window; how each new day discovered a new place, and the slow blossoming of days that felt like two. As I travelled I had bed and galley with me, saw friends each place I went, other boaters who waved, and easy chats by the lock side. Gone is […]
As the autumn day awakes, she wraps her son in the soft routines of morning, and time is still. The phone shrills on the wall – his voice fragments – “darling … a hijack… I love you…” — connections break. She stares down at the phone, at the clock at weekend coats, his slippers, the […]
We talk and stroll among the trees and brambles. I make space with a cautious question an offer to listen. You respond, then step aside onto safer ground. You say little, listening to my chatter, seldom of any consequence – I don’t know how to interpret your quiet. Unvoiced questions, like rain are falling in […]
Imagination baits me – mother to relentless thoughts, a fierce dance in my head to bruise my weary mind and snake through empty hours. They move through the night, trip me up in the darkness with quiet, persistent words loud as a headline. They howl, and silently bear my heart away, worry it like a […]