flash fiction

On a Wing and a Prayer ~ flash fiction

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 6 Comments

On a Wing and a Prayer

Touching down at the end of the runway in a maneuver too late to provide a safe landing, the wheels of the airplane chirp and skid before continuing on a line that tears a path through a carpet of tall grass and wild flowers, leaving a scar on the land. One after another, the members of a missionary contingent slide down the emergency exit and gather in a small circle where they drop to the ground, kneeling.  They produce votives, each from a breast pocket, and pray by candlelight, thankful that they are among the living.

 

This foolish bit of flash fiction is my response to The Sunday Whirl – Wordle #518.

land – carpets – line – down – kneeling – tears – flowers
late – wheels – living – touching – candlelight

Click images for larger view in new tab.

Sky Watching ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 34 Comments

Sky Watching

Lying in the bed of my pickup, on my back with a jacket balled up beneath my head, I took in the splendor of the stars and marveled at the beautiful arc of the Milky Way.

But what seemed like a simple enough proposition has become an unending nightmare. Drive several miles out of town, into the desert, for a night of sky watching. What could go wrong? Falling asleep with my parking lights on, for one thing.

Sun blazing and my water long gone, I lie in the bare shadow of a large rock after two days and nights of walking. I realize I am seeing clouds in what was clear sky just moments ago, but these clouds are clearly foreign, such an exotic clutter against the blue cloth of the sky.

I close my eyes and wait for rain that never comes.

 

This is my response to Prosery: Clouds, the prompt from Merril at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. For this prompt, the line to be included is from “Clouds,” by Constance Urdang

“But these clouds are clearly foreign, such an exotic clutter
Against the blue cloth of the sky”
                                                                           – Constance Urdang

I’ve met the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.

Image source: wallpaperseden.com

What Is Nine Hundred Miles? ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 28 Comments

What Is Nine Hundred Miles?

What is nine hundred miles to a man when family is a short flight away, or a drive in a day? Is there separation when connection is as simple as a message, a call, or FaceTime? What is the separation when the difference is measured in split seconds?

The heart will guide where the mind cannot see. And so the man made the move. Both baggage and cartage. A relocation of nine hundred miles to be with the woman he loved, loves still, and to know happiness. He learned that nine hundred miles is actually eighteen hundred miles, for the heart must always return. He has traveled that distance many times over the years, so that he could know the two sides of happiness. So it is, and will always be, for crucial to finding the way is this: there is no beginning or end.

This is my response to Prosery: Finding Your Way, the prompt from Merril at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. For this prompt, the line to be included is from “Map to the Next World,” by Jo Harjo.

“Crucial to finding the way is this: there is no beginning or end”
                                                                                                    – Jo Harjo

I’ve met the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.

July will be nine years since I moved from New York to be with Bonnie. We were married three years ago, but there have been many trips back to Buffalo to visit family.

Terra Nova ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 36 Comments

TerraNova

Terra Nova

With little more than the clothes on my back, I approach a building found by following the directions in a note meant only for true believers. An otherwise empty wall holds one nondescript door. As I enter, it closes behind me. I feel a rush of air and realize I am in an airlock. Glancing back, I see that the entrance is gone. There is only one door before me. Above it is a sign that reads, “If you are a dreamer, come in.” Without hesitation, I open it to see a wondrous vista before me and realize that gone are the technologies that would deny Terra the expression of her true self. I step through with no regrets, for who could deny this unspoiled beauty is worth more than all I leave behind. Forward lies the future mankind once thought out of reach.

 

This is my response to Meet me where the sidewalk ends…,
the prosery prompt form Lillian at dVerse ~ Poets Pub.

With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. For this prompt, the line to be included is from “Invitation,” a poem from Shel Silverstein’s Where the Sidewalk Ends.

“If you are a dreamer, come in.”
                                  – Shel Silverstein

This prosery started out as a poem for Day 12 at napowrimo.net, which challenges us to use words from Lempriere’s Classical Dictionary and the Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction.” I used “airlock” and “Terra.” When I saw Lillian’s prompt at dVerse I realized I could revise it to be a prosery. I’ve met the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.

Image source: Wikipedia (edited here)span>

Heavy Heart ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 57 Comments

Heavy Heart

It was not by choice, but he left much earlier than anyone expected, his body finally succumbing to the ravages of illness that had plagued his life. His last six months were the hardest for him. The hardest for us.

But we go on. And so she did, for another fifteen years. Missing his love. Missing the many things he’d done for all of their life together. She was overwhelmed at first, but we assured her that we would do anything for her.

And we did, but the time came when her own health issues became too much for her. As I sit beside her bed, holding her hand while she sleeps, I know that soon she will take her last breath. Both of my parents will be gone.

Sometimes the great bones of my life seem so heavy, no night heavier than this.

This is my response to Prosery: Bone Weary, the prompt from Linda Lee Lyberg at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. I suppose this could be seen as fiction. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. For this prompt, the line to be included is from “Spring Azures,” by Mary Oliver.

“Sometimes the great bones of my life seem so heavy,”
                                                                                     – Mary Oliver

I’ve met the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.

Nothing Behind the Wall ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 21 Comments

Nothing Behind the Wall

As the wall grows higher, some think they understand, for they feel threatened. Something must be done to hold back the masses who threaten their insular worlds, to exclude those with foreign designs and deviant thoughts.

If they truly understood, they would recognize that he is only playing to their fears, as with anything he says or does. Anything to benefit his cronies, and especially himself, while elevating his stature in their eyes.

Walls are his favorite. Whether visible, such as the border wall, or the exaggerated principles meant to exclude outsiders, the imagined threat of those he so easily dupes, or the wall he builds around himself.

Not all are blind to this. There are those who understand completely, those who could tell his followers, “There is nothing behind the wall except a space where the wind whistles, but you cannot see that.”

This bit of flash fiction is my response to Of Houses, Walls, and Whistling WindsDreams, presented by Merril at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. My flash fiction also meets the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.
For this prompt, the line to be included is from “Drawings By Children,” by Lisel Mueller. (the complete poem can be found here)

“there is nothing behind the wall
except a space where the wind whistles.”

                              – Lisel Mueller

I have included the following line, as well. (“but you cannot see that”)
Image source: Detroit Free Press

Larger-Than-Life, Smaller in Truth ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 41 Comments

Larger-Than-Life, Smaller in Truth

Pen poised above his notepad, the correspondent had stopped taking notes shortly after the president started speaking. He sat at the White House press briefing, confident that little more than inflated accomplishments and no real news would be heard as he thought back on the president’s briefings for the past four years. As he had always done, the president spoke as if campaigning for re-election, loudly proclaiming that nothing that comes from the media is anything more than “fake news,” while little truth could be found in anything that left his own lips.

As the president left the podium and his fellow reporters rose from their chairs, he thought, “From across the room, we look at him through the wrong end of the long telescope of Time. With that telescope reversed, the future will recognize him for the small man that he truly is.”

This bit of flash fiction is my response to Prosery: Telescope of Time, presented by Kim at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. My flash fiction also meets the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.
For this prompt, the line to be included is from “Humming Bird,” by D.H. Lawrence. (the complete poem can be found here)

“From across the room, we look at him through the wrong end of the long telescope of Time”      – D.H. Lawrence

Image source: Politico / Getty
(edited here)

Moonlit Dreams ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 36 Comments

Moonlit Dreams

My parents experienced difficult times in their final days, and it was easy to see they were most at peace when they were asleep. At the time, I truly believed: In their dreams, they sleep with the moon.

The loss of both came far too early. My father’s early retirement due to health concerns meant that, rather than winding down to retirement, he was left with troubled years that ended well before he could reach true retirement age. I know my mother pined for him for the next fifteen years. As her own health failed, and with it her memory, I imagined that, in her dreams, he would return to her on a moonlit night.

These days, in my own dreams, they never sleep. I trust they would want their time together to be waking moments. Even in dreams, each moment is truly precious.

This bit of flash fiction is my response to Prosery Monday: Moonbeams and Moon Dreams, presented by Merril at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. My flash fiction also meets the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.
For this prompt, the line to be included is from “Death at Wind River,” by Mary Oliver. (the complete poem can be found here)

“In their dreams
they sleep with the moon.”

                              – Mary Oliver

Long Time Coming ~ prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 50 Comments

Long Time Coming

When it is over, said, and done, it was a time and there was never enough of it. It’s a wonder that it lasted as long as it had when we were never able to truly communicate. Even when we started out, our needs were never the same, but neither of us understood there was never any way either of us would change the other.

We would never get any more from it than we had. Opposites may attract, but the simple truth is that time catches up, and we had to accept that the prospect of reward was long gone from our relationship. The one long-lasting reward, of course is our children. That can never be taken from us. But comfort and satisfaction from each other will never be ours, and it was time to recognize that.

It was time to move on.

This bit of flash fiction is my response to Prosery Monday: A Time, presented by Merril at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. My flash fiction also meets the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly.
.For this prompt, the line to be included is from “A Time,” by Allison Adelle Hedge Coke. (the complete poem can be found here)

“when it is over said and done
it was a time
               and there was never enough of it.”

                              – Allison Adell Hedge Coke

Image source: Anne & Saturnino Miranda from Pixabay (edited here)

Armageddon’s Arrival – prosery

/ Ken / rivrvlogr / 29 Comments

 

Armageddon’s Arrival

I drift down the middle of the river, my paddle in the water only when necessary to navigate past hazards. And oh, are there hazards. Surrounded by the past, ablaze on the shores beside me and floating on the current that carries me, with little prospect for the future, my life is little more than the clothes on my back and as bleak as the landscape of death surrounding me.

Of what matter are the details that led to this tragic moment? One nation acted out of a desire to secure precious resources, another responded, and an Armageddon foretold through the ages has finally come to pass.

In the glow of the fires that surround me, everything is cloaked in the haze of smoke, and navigation becomes more difficult as dusk approaches. A red moon rides on the humps of the low river hills.

This bit of flash fiction is my response to Jazzing It up on Prosery Monday, presented by Lillian at dVerse ~ Poets Pub. With Prosery, the challenge is to write a piece of flash fiction with a 144-word limit. Included in the bit of prose is to be a complete line from a poem. For this prompt, the line to be included is “a red moon rides on the humps of the low river hills” from Carl Sandburg’s “Jazz Fantasia”. My flash fiction also meets the additional challenge of hitting the 144-word mark, exactly. Other entries can be read here.