Winter Solace

Dear Mike, the trees are lost in the gray
that surrounds them today.
Barren branches strain upward with a cry
to a frozen and lifeless sky
praying for a brighter day.

Cypress roots are stuck in a muddy bog below,
don't know which way to go.
Their knees rise up in search of solace
uncertain of their purpose
in this lonely winter cold.

This season of solitude no lover can defeat,
you've left me incomplete.
I wander through the trees aimlessly
getting bored shamelessly
with every man I meet.

Spanish moss desperately clings to it's due,
like I cling to you.
But your ashes have grown cold
with nothing left to hold,
I need someone to talk to.

Beneath the reflections lie decaying leaves
whose color the bog bereaves.
I'm stuck in a world of wintery dead
a shivering stillness within my head;
cries you once consoled, aren't percieved.

finding

What If

What if I never left you that day
when you sent me away?
What if I simply shrugged and said,
“Well, OK, Patti, I hope you have a nice time
on your date with your new boyfriend.
But I’m going to sit and stay
right here in this chair in your dorm lobby.
It’s a free country isn’t it?”
I suspect you would have become flustered
and upset, asking me again to leave,
perhaps even pleading for me to leave
to not embarrass you in front of your friends.
But no, I would be a real man this time
and I wouldn’t go. Instead, I’d stay right there
minding my own business in this dorm lobby chair
and watch as Bobbie introduced you
to your blind date, watch as he shook
your sweet, soft hand and maybe leaned in
for a quick hug and kiss on the cheek.
I’d watch as you tried to ignore me, tried not
to look across the room and see
the devastated look on my face.
And then I’d watch too as you followed
your new date through the door, followed along
behind him outside, out, free, to your freedom
from me, to enjoy your blind date all day,
some lunch in the campus cafeteria,
asking clumsy questions trying to get
to know one another as fast as possible
so you could enjoy your precious time together
at the game and then in the back seat
of Bobbie’s boyfriend’s big old car.
What if . . .

~~

words: Michael Estabrook, Massachusetts (more)

Forgotten

Forgotten smiles, remembered memories
Simmering in my half empty coffee cup
Making their way across the freeways of the mind
Grasping on the reeds of time, they seek to find
Loving glances. Timely touches. Promises on paper

Forgotten ways, remembered paths
Those days spent in Jayanagar bazaar bylanes
Wind along misty crevasses of life
Brushing past the damp cobwebs of dreams
Lured by melancholy and sweetness, so they seem

Forgotten music, remembered echoes
Tunes from my favorite singers
Dance their notes off the walls of the past
Percolating through the blurred eyepiece of tomorrow
Blissful tones shaded with happiness drenched in sorrow

Suitcases full of hours and minutes
Lie in our hands
At times heavy with enchantment and magic and illusion
At times light with hurt and grime and lemons
It's the handle of the suitcase that matters
Lift it gently or it can lie in tatters
Unlock Fate, lose the key to Destiny
Before Life closes its shutters

~~
words: Swati Nair, India (more)
photo: Dorothee Lang, Germany

lost, found & stolen

the new issue of blueprintreview is online:

issue #16 - "Lost, Found & Stolen"

while working on this issue, the idea grew that it could be interesting to pick up this theme in the blog, too, and to include one page of the issue as blog post. the page is included already: a page that is belonging, and named Forgotten. and hopefully attracts an open series of lost, found and stolen posts.

lost and found and other posts
if you want to make a post (connected to the lost-found-stolen theme, or just a moment in words or pixels) but aren't registered with this blog yet, then drop me a line: doro21 AT gmail DOT com. you can also simply send a mail with an image or a text, and put "Lost+Found" in the header, then i do the posting.

blueprintreview #17

there is no theme for the next issue of blueprintreview yet, i am curious in which direction the submissions will point this time. once the theme is taking shape, i will post it in this blog.

note: short stories over 1000 words are especially invited for the next issue

~~