Browsing Category: Short Story

AFTER-ECHO

               Together, they broke in night to trembling of a storm: slow-rolling tremors that lasted then lingered as after-echo through sky and spirit as rain struck in waves upon window face to bursts in flood and change of stirring winds as light danced through energy’s release.                 When day arrived, gone was the storm.  Sky […]

BOUNDS

               “Do you believe there are limits to what stories should be told?” he asked.                She smiled, thinking, and brushing away fallen hair from face so that answering eyes shone and spoke more true.                 “I am not the author of your stories,” she answered.  “You are; and each author writes their own answer […]

INTO LIFE

               They shared their morning reading and writing in light of golden dawn that shone through parted window blinds, slats of light manifest in shaped and spreading bands into openness of room.                 As the last of coffee percolated with hush and singe of finishing drip, he rose, pouring each a mug that warmed in […]

CANDLE FLAME

               In match of lips, they lit as candle flame; flutter and dance of heart and eyes’ light wavering to sudden change in air and energy around; the following-flicker and chase of kiss—wax and wane of fire and burn before softening in settled flame—seeking, again, one with kindle’s source; then, finding, the hold and still […]

CRADLE OF THE WORLD

               They were young and poor and much in love, and what they lacked in material things, they accounted for in dreams and lived affections so that—in their poverty of things—they lived perhaps more richly than those that seem to have it all.                To escape into dreams—to travel as they called it—they walked together […]

SHAME

               “For thy soul be not ashamed to say the truth.  For there is a shame that bringeth sin, and there is a shame that bringeth glory.”—Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) 6: 24-25                I was young and foolish; vain in the chase and ways of the world who, when things went wrong, perceived great tragedy; and of […]

IMPERFECTLY

               “The more I think it over, the more I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.”—Vincent van Gogh                “Are you good at that?” she asked.                “Not every day,” he answered, “but, still, I try—even when I fail.”                She smiled with compassion in countenance, an empathy for […]

SERPENT’S TONGUE

               “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the earth which the Lord God had made.  And he said to the woman: Why hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?  And the woman answered him, saying: Of the fruit of the trees that […]

DESIRE

               “Don’t you want more in life?” she asked, an irritation in her tone.  She paused, looking at him stern, “What do you even want?”                “I don’t know,” he answered.  “I’m back to a beginning.”                “Isn’t it a little late for that?”                He was thirty-three.                “No clue, but why waste effort […]

SHADOWS

               I was a little boy, scared of the dark, that failed in being brave.  No more than four or five, I remember the monsters and images over walls in room—shadows cast by silver light of rising moon.                 I went to my father, asking to be saved and comforted in my fears.  He returned […]