You can’t start climbing the mountain until the first rays of sunlight touch the top and you don’t want to be touching stone when the last evening beams fall, so from the moment your foot touches the base there is no time to spare. The mountain is so tall you can’t see the top for the boulders in between and there’s not time enough in the day but if you want it badly enough this is the only way.
Tag: story
Old Stars, New Stars
Rayna sat in front of the mirror removing her makeup and wondering who she would discover underneath.* Her cheeks had felt hot all afternoon, a warm flush that suggested her stars were shifting. But she had to focus on the dictation she was taking, the click of keys as her fingers flew across them. A long afternoon! Oh, there were some of these brazen young girls in the office who went practically bare- you could see the pin-prick glow of stars right through their makeup. Rayna grew up with a proper standard of modesty, and she was not about to abandon it for any new fashion fad. Showing off your Truth-Face to the world! She rinsed the rag, pale now with foundation, under the faucet and applied it to her face again.
the end of the world came as a relief
The end of the world came as a relief. Like summer breaking, the first crisp wind. For long months now, Mary had despaired of ever having another day off; day after day, week after week, never enough people or time at work and they always needed her. Despite spending her days in the walking nightmare that was retail, so consuming that her own laundry piled up, emails languished, and spider-plant wilted, there was still never enough money to pay bills. Everything was always rolling faster these days, and the only way to hang on at all was to close her eyes and plunge blindly on and on into every morning.
cocoon: a brief survey
Caterpillars do not simply grow into butterflies in the cocoon: first they dissolve into a gooey mass, then reform out of the sludge. Destruction and rebirth. (This is not the whole truth. Depending on the caterpillar, certain body parts will remain; and the “imaginal discs” for regrowth remain. Close enough!)
Fascinated by this process, I wrote a surreal, story-esque short questionnaire that you can take right here. Enjoy!
autumn winds
When the first leaves change color, call the herds in from the fields. Stable your horses, corral your cattle, bring dogs and cats and goats and stray children inside. When the valley is striped with fire and golden drifts spread across the fields, the dragons come.
Red Riding Hood, lost
I’ve been here before. You’ll make it safe through the woods if you stay on the path, that’s the rule, but there was never a path here in the first place. Dark branches tangle overhead and the trees are different this time around but the shadows are the same, thick and cloying and very very quiet. Continue reading “Red Riding Hood, lost”
Sleeping With Beauty
Once upon a time our princess was placed under a terrible curse at her christening.
(You know this story.) Continue reading “Sleeping With Beauty”
green-gold sea
memory of a place you’ve never been: green-gold sea
You have been climbing – reach and catch and pull and swing – for long enough that the day’s work lost its grip on your shoulders and slid off and has been left somewhere far below. Long enough that your mind rests comfortably in the rough bark beneath fingers and the rhythm of rough breath, and restless worries are left below.
Beware the Nuthatches
“Beware of the nuthatches,” my roommate says seriously.
“Oh no.”
“But there’s only three,” she adds, reassuringly. “This is a nuthatch behind me.” Apparently one of the museum-quality oil paintings hanging over her bed, all painted herself, has been one of this deceitful and alarming race of nuthatches the entire time.