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You are worthy of your own love . . .
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Making Amends . . .
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Carrot Ranch Flash Fiction Challenge – The Chair on the Porch
When the autumn winds blew, the old rocking chair came to life and creaked a ghostly sound, familiar and comforting.
Through the window she watched the weathered wooden armrest gently come into view and disappear again, like the ebb and flow of her memories.
When she closed her eyes, she’d imagine him sitting there with the Sunday paper on his lap, rocking to the rhythm of her beating heart.
She tolerated the still, summer days knowing the season would soon enough change and the winds would come, bringing with them, her fading memory of him.
Flash Fiction Challenge – Carrot Ranch Literary Community – 99 words, no more, no less.
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What would YOU do?
You’re standing in line at the 7-11, there are three people in front of you. The woman at the register is making a purchase, behind her, a little girl and her mother.
The little girl has a hot cocoa in one hand and a package of gummy worms in the other – she sneezes. The projectile 
lands directly on the booty of the woman in front of her.
Mom’s face turns a bright shade of red. She is clearly conflicted . . .
What does she do? What should she do?
Casually reach out a remove the boogie? Say, “Pardon me, Ma’am, but there is a booger on your butt? Accidentally bump into her backside and hope the snotty nose waste falls off?
Clearly momma was mortified and hadn’t a clue what to do. What she did, was take her daughters hand and say, “I think I’ll get a cocoa too.” And retreated to the other side of the store, leaving me to deal with the tail end of her dilemma.
What did I do? I told the woman she had a booger on her butt. Her face turned a bright shade of red and she looked at me like I was crazy.
I made it clear the already drying nose missle wasn’t mine and threw the kid and her creator under the snot train.
I’m curious, what would you have done?
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#OctPoWriMo (day 12) Beneath the Poet Tree
DAY 12
Prompt ~ Imagination Stands in the Road
My current WIP has moved into the drivers seat, and as I am just a passenger on this journey paved in ink, I must follow where it leads. So, again, I’m resurrecting old words that once stopped to play with me.
Not long ago, I typed poetry to a page, I’m not certain where my mistake was made, but it was auto corrected to poet tree. My original intent was lost, and something new began to bloom, the tale of The Poet Tree was born.
I’ll tell you
a tale
once shared
with me,
of a magical place
and the
Poet Tree,
where muses
dance in the
gentle breeze,
and butterflies fly
with gossamer wings.
It’s been told
a word
was planted,
and a tree began
to grow,
the trunk rose
high above,
the roots reached
far below.
Her branches lifted
toward the sky,
upon each leaf
a poem
was writ,
she shaded
wandering scribes,
who chose
that place
to sit.
Some say
the tree
called out,
to those it felt
would hear,
they sensed a
gentle pull
when they
dared to
venture near.
They say
the leaves
would whisper,
in softly spoken
rhyme,
with pure and
perfect recitation,
line by
lovely line.
They felt a
temperate presence,
like a ghost
from days
of old,
weaving words
around them,
so the story has
been told.
With unseen
inspiration,
their words
began to spill,
filling full
their parchment,
emptying
their quills.
Oh, how I long
to hear,
her softly
whispered plea,
to take
my place
and rest
and write
beneath the
Poet Tree.
With pen
in hand
and heart
agleam,
I’d script
the hopes
and thoughts
inside me.
Words would waltz
and words
would breathe,
her words
would sing,
they’d sing
to me.
And I
would
slumber
neath her branches,
and dream
a paper dream
© 2017 Crystal R. Cook
Previous Challenge Posts ~
Day 10 – Choose Them With Care
Day 11 – Playing With Words
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#OctPoWriMo (day 11) Playing With Words
DAY 11
Prompt ~ Playing With Words
* * *
For day 11, I chose the alternative prompt, playing with words. It offered me the opportunity to play with one of my favorite writing apps, WordPalette. I suppose it’s much like magnetic poetry, you have words to choose from, to do with them as you please, and sometimes it turns out pretty cool, other times, not so much.
This one is a little in-between, but it says something.
Shadows and light,
superimposed humanity.
Ghosts of the past,
no longer living,
not completely dead,
their voices scattered,
fractured, waiting to be heard.
Memories and madness
trapped beyond the veil,
interrupted existence,
desperate with regret,
seeking to save souls,
looking down upon the living,
they see walking dead.
If they would hear,
if they would listen,
it might not be too late,
they are drowning
in their own noise
in the cacophony
they create,
trapped inside a bubble
they’re not willing to break.
The dead now know,
know too well,
too late,
they see the living
scream without being heard,
shouting to the deaf,
meaningless sounds,
the protests, the discord,
the right and the wrong,
nothing more than a soundtrack
to fill voids the noise can never fill.
If only they would
welcome silence,
they would hear
the echoes of the past
pleading from the nothingness
of what awaits
the beating hearts below,
listen to us,
hear our plea,
find a way to peace,
find a different way to be.
The day is coming,
the winds of change
are raging,
and soon the rains will fall,
hang on tightly to each other,
your differences won’t matter
when the waves come crashing down,
and they’ll come crashing down on all.
Previous Challenge Posts ~
#OctPoWriMo 2017
Day 1 – How Did You Get here?
Day 2 – We Write Because We Must
Day 3 – Cherita Poem – Metal
Day 4 – Where Does Poetry Hide?
Day 5 – Bête Noire – Now I Understand
Day 6 – Don’t Forget to Breathe
Day 7 – The Lines We Cannot See
Day 8 – What do you know, and how do you know it?
Day 9 – Twisted Wonderland
Day 10 – Choose Them With Care
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#OctPoWriMo (day 10) Choose Them With Care
DAY 10
Prompt ~ Power
The Power of Words
Day 10 has been a blur . . . I’d much to do, and much I did. I cleaned, I wrote, I shopped, I wrote a little more, but not a poem, so I traveled back in time, to not too long ago, and picked a poem about power from the archives.
Words wield an awesome power – choose them with care.
“Sticks and stones may break my bones,
but words can never hurt me.”
Oh, my precious soul,
but they can
and they do.
Words cut.
Words sting.
They echo
in hearts and minds.
Those sticks and stones
may bruise you, yes,
but bruises fade.
Scars of the flesh can heal.
Broken bones renew.
Words though,
sharp enough to etch
a mark upon the heart
fester and grow,
inflicting pain
long after
they are spoken.
Words become weapons
when wielded
without care.
But hope, too,
resides within them.
Words can heal,
mend what others
have broken.
Used as a shield, deflecting
spoken daggers aimed
at the heart.
Words, the right words,
can fell foes
and lift the fallen.
Choose them, precious soul,
choose them with
thoughtful intention.
Command them
with honor,
respect the power
they hold
and you will
find strength
within them.
Choose them wisely,
precious soul,
and use them
for your good . . .
CrC
Previous Challenge Posts ~
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#OctPoWriMo (day 9 of 31) Twisted Wonderland
DAY 9
~ Alternative Prompt ~
Pull a book off your shelf and randomly open it up to any page. The first word or sentence you land on, write from there.
I chose Alice by Christina Henry.
~ Page 57 ~
“We have to go, Alice.”
Cheshire Cat is angry,
the caterpillar’s dead,
the flowers lost their voices,
and it seems you’ve lost your head.
The mushroom’s all been eaten,
the drink has been all drunk,
the rabbit hole is closing,
and time . . . time is almost up.
Tick, tock, tock, tick,
don’t jump over the candlestick,
poor rabbit already burned,
oh, it’s a nasty little trick.
Now, my dear, it’s time for tea,
beside the Hatter’s grave,
Dormouse is expecting us,
you know he hates to wait.
He might just dig him up (again)
he can’t stand to drink alone,
surely you don’t want to sit (again)
beside poor Hatter’s bones.
Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum,
have made some walrus stew,
we must hurry along, or we’ll be late,
and I’ll be blaming you.
I’ve been meaning to ask,
but keep remembering to forget,
where was it you were going,
when you and I first met?
No matter now, of course,
you’ll never find your way.
Ah, but it’s been fun,
too bad you couldn’t stay.
Just think of all you’ve done,
since curiosity killed your cat,
Did you get a taste for blood?
Is that why you came back?
Was it to pet the Jabberwocky?
Did you mean to set him free?
Now he’s loose, you silly goose,
he’s been feeding on the queen.
Were you expecting someone?
There’s a knocking all about.
Never mind, it’s only me,
come again to get you out.
Hello? It’s me, It’s Alice,
I’ve come to fetch myself again.
I know I must be in there,
though I’m not certain where I’ve been.
Time is of the essence,
the hourglass, it’s almost out of sand,
and me and Alice, as you know,
belong in Wonderland.
Again, my dear, the answer’s no,
she can’t come out to play,
not today and not the morrow,
. . . she’s still locked away.
Previous Challenge Posts ~
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#OctPoWriMo (day 8 of 31)
DAY 8
– Prompt –
What Do You Know, and How Do You Know It?
* * *
I went with an Etheree for this one. I usually like them to look a little cleaner, but . . . the tired has me.
An Etheree is a wedge-shaped form consisting of 10 lines with a syllable count per line of, 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10. It doesn’t require rhyme or meter, but should contain a message. Etherees with more than one verse are fun and look great on the page, just reverse the syllable count for each additional verse.
* * *
How
do we
know the truth
of what we’re told,
lest we examine
the knowledge for ourselves,
uncover and discover,
dig deeper, find correlation,
question, search, scrutinize, understand,
that’s how we find the truth of what we’re told.
* * *
I learn by doing, by seeing, by thinking, and feeling. I listen, but that isn’t how I learn. I take cues from what I’m told, from what others try to teach, then I dig deeper, exploring, discovering, uncovering, immersing, and digesting morsels of knowledge as I find them. Facts and histories, not simply versions and diversions from truths with possible twists to fit the atmosphere of the day. I want to learn from masters and intellectual gods, not regurgitated rhetoric from someone who read a book or heard a lecture and proclaimed themselves an expert. I don’t want to know how it’s been interpreted, I want to know what is and was and will always be. Actuality, factuality, undeniable, and reliable. I don’t want to be told and expected to accept with blind faith in a system of fault and misinformation, I want to learn, to see, to touch, to examine, to read. I want to know . . .
* * *
Previous Challenge Posts ~
#OctPoWriMo 2017
Day 1 – How Did You Get here?
Day 2 – We Write Because We Must
Day 3 – Cherita Poem – Metal
The Qwiet Muse 