A Beautiful Mess

A beautiful mess
A glorious disaster
A fine pickle
A very nice muddle

Sequins all over the table
Glitter all over the floor
Seed beads all over the sofa
Glass beads all over the chairs

No one knew where to start cleaning.
No one knew how to start.

The mop had been snapped in half.
The broom had been lost in the yard.
The dust pan had been thrown away yesterday.

But the mess couldn’t be ignored.
Nor could it be delayed for later or some other day.

They would have to buy new cleaning supplies.
They would have to tackle the mess — one mess at a time.

It was a glorious mess.
A beautiful disaster.
An extravagant pickle.
And a wonderful muddle.

August 2021 Writing Prompts – Putting My Feet in the Dirt

Hoping For A Miracle

Jim and Dana were no longer newlyweds. They’d been married for a full year, hoping for a miracle. Hoping for a missed period. Hoping for all of those wonderful symptoms that most freshly married people hope for.

It took them another full year for that miracle to come true.

*************

Betty and Albert had been married for many years. They had no children. She was getting up in age. She believed that menopause would happen.  She didn’t hope for a miracle. Neither did he.

But they welcomed it when it came.

*****

Pete sat alone with his newborn baby in his arms. She was so small. So small. So frightfully small wrapped up in so many blankets. Her life was fragile, like a spiderweb line waiting to be snapped. Maybe even more frail than that.

Yet, she was still alive. Her heart was beating. She was still breathing.

She wasn’t the miracle he’d hoped for.

But she was a miracle all the same.

August 2021 Writing Prompts – Putting My Feet in the Dirt

Waking At Sunrise

Every day I wake to the sunrise, to the sun’s sleepy glow in the hazy sky.

The sky is pink and the hills are blue. Fog banks roll over the hills’ edges like ocean foam. The trees are only dark silhouettes. Their green shades will lighten as the sunlight brightens.

It’s a beautiful sight.

It’s a beautiful sunrise. Every morning that I wake to it, I am grateful. I marvel at its beauty every morning.

And the first bird of the morning begins to sing.

Sunrise at Nurali Ridge South Ural | The Daily Spur (wordpress.com)

A Bottle Of Hope

A bottle of hope sat on the old wooden shelf. It was made out of black glass. Yet, every now and then small hints of silver and gold shimmered and glinted inside the darkness.

It wasn’t something that could be bought or sold. Nor could it be stolen away.

It could be held.

It could be borrowed.

It could be freely given away.

The little orphan girl took it off the shelf and hugged it close to her chest. She held it until she could feel hope’s warm, shimmering glow inside of her. She returned it to the shelf for whoever needed it more than she did.

There was always someone who needed it. Some needed it more. Some needed it less.

Some found it hard to let go. They were the ones who held it the longest with a fierce desperation until it had to be pried out of their fingers.

Because there was always someone who needed that hope. Always someone else.

The orphan girl stepped outside with a smile on her face and hope in her heart.

July 2021 Writing Prompts – Putting My Feet in the Dirt

The Perfect Bride

The bride was beautiful, to no one’s surprise. After all, she had been carefully created and designed to be the epitome of womanly beauty. Her features were arranged in the ideal alignment. Her eyes were large and the perfect shade of blue. Her eyelashes were long and black and thick. Her skin, her hair, her lips, everything about her was beyond insult or reproach.

But there was one small flaw that nothing could eradicate. Her eyes had an emptiness inside of them. Even when she smiled her perfect smile, the emptiness was still there. It was a manufacturing defect.

The bride’s creator told the groom that he could exchange her for a better model.

The groom looked into his bride’s perfect yet imperfect eyes and smiled. “No. I will keep her.”

So, he did.

The groom kept her for all of the days of his life. And, even though her eyes never lost that emptiness, he loved her. To him, she was perfect.

Personal portraits Ms.Putri Rahmania | The Daily Spur (wordpress.com)

Tales And Time

Do you have time to sit a while?
Do you have time to hear a tale or two?
Would you mind if we spoke of crocodiles
And maybe a fairy queen too?

Do you have time to imagine?
Do you have time to dream?
Would you want to hear of magic
In a world where all is not as it may seem?

Do you want to dine on stardust?
Do you want to fly on wings of gold to the moon?
Would you want to do it today or tomorrow
Or sometime very soon?

When you choose to do so
And when you make up your mind,
Come and find me.
I have tales to tell and a great deal of time.

June 2021 Writing Prompts – Putting My Feet in the Dirt