Drabble #25 – Sunlight in your
hair.
Smoke stacks line the roof and tea sits fermenting in the back
yard under the mid-summer sun. Mindless thoughts spin around my
head and settle like a crown of black berries and sumac leaves.
The air, hot and stagnant, draws into the deep energy reserves
of my body in a lazy osmosis that sucks motivation from my
fingertips. Honey-like lethargy saturates the space around me
so heavily I can almost taste the guaranteed regret on my
tongue, and when fireflies start to dot the edges of my vision,
feel it in the gold sunset glinting off of my
skin.
Drabble #27 – The Work of Wasted
Daylight
If these dots were stars, and not freckles, I’d spend my
life mapping and studying them until they are all I see on the
backs of my eyelids when I close my eyes. You swear that you
love me more than space, and when I see you reflected back at
me in gas and dust, hooked around the moon and eyes made of
sunlight, I can’t help but think that the universe loves
you more than I ever could. But, you are nothing more than a
husk of skin and memories and simpler lines with a heart that
never loved simply.
Drabble #16 – Wombat Day
There’s a frazzled redhead to my left holding a
distressed turtle that’s releasing awful raspy keens and
an auspicious cluster of feathers to my right, both seated on
cracked brown leather. A small tawny-brown wombat rests on my
thighs, turning in circles and wiggling its nose. I question
how it got on the subway, or in America. As far as I know
wombats live primarily in the country of Not America. I look
down at my digital watch, it’s October 22nd.
There’s a startling noise of every window being smashed
at once. Hordes of wombats start pouring into the subway.
Happy Wombat day eveyone!
Drabble #22 – I'm closing my eyes
now.
The radio plays softly. It’s on a station full of chatter
and small talk, too many things to say for there to be room for
music. Under the fluorescent light my skin looks yellow and
thin, like the paper in old books. A bent fracture of light
bores into my eye. It’s snowing, just because it’s
that kind of day. A song request breaks the flowing
conversation. There’s a repetitive dripping sound behind
me, pattering in harmony with the piano. It’s a sad song,
one that I used to really like. The person who requested it
must be alone too.
Drabble #23 – Don’t let the green
grass fool you.
I can run my fingers through your hair and feel the deepest
cracks of the streets in Bombay. I can shove my hands down your
pockets and find foreign money tucked to the bottom of your
favorite jeans, forgotten and washed so many times. I can
skitter my knuckles across your skin and feel the moon shining
in Ireland. “The moon doesn’t shine,”
You’d say “It just reflects the sun’s
light.” Like us. I no longer wait for you to leave again,
or for life to get better. I’ve learned to live in this
moment, something that you taught me.
Drabble #17 - She Bangs, She
Bangs
I’m standing at the opening. I glance down the alleyway
and into the sunrise at the other end. There’s gold light
glinting off of the wet cobblestone and echoes of horseless
carriages rumbling down the road several paces away. Even in
the early morning everyone is already bustling. “Life
starts early.” My mother would say. I lean against the
wooden stake behind me and wait. I’m early, but I know
she’ll be here soon. I don’t mind waiting, but
she… she does. I hear a soft laugh and, when I turn
towards it, see a flash of long brown hair, a wink of a
smile.