Tag Archives: loss

RITA RIEBEL MITCHELL: Cartwheeling Mama

Artistic, Submissions, Top Stories, , , ,

Drippy red wax stained the white carpet where the lava lamp leaked after it tumbled off the table and cracked open when Sandy kicked it while demonstrating for her ten-year-old daughter the one-handed cartwheels she performed at high school football games before she got pregnant and had to quit cheerleading.

Rita Riebel Mitchell writes in the Pinelands of South Jersey where she lives amongst the trees with her husband. Her work appears in HAD, Flash Fiction Magazine, Versification, and more. Find her at ritariebelmitchell.com/friday-micro.

BRYSON MOOSO: Twins

Artistic, Submissions, , , , ,

It was a kind funeral. Black cloth and sweet rolls.
They sang your song and recycled old stories anew.
They spoke well-wishes, treated me as if I was still whole.
They saw your empty body laid to rest then scattered like crows.
We buried two that day, you and I.

Bryson Mooso is still searching for that perfect sentence. He’s resigned to writing millions of them to find it.

SUSAN R BARCLAY: Museum

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

Both fond and traumatic memories coexist in my static eight-year self. I spend decades collecting markers of your existence. All things September, the month of your birth. Mid-century décor, each piece a thrift store find. Coins – relics from your year of expiration. I am the curator of an abbreviated life.

Originally from Atlanta, Georgia, Susan R. Barclay makes persistent attempts at witticism and stories; sometimes she is successful. Her works have appeared/are forthcoming, in the The Blue Nib, Vine Street Press, Defuncted Journal, Write Time, Paragraph Planet, Workers Write, and the 42 Stories Anthology.

LYNN WHITE: Loss

Artistic, Poetry, Submissions, , , ,

The door was unexpectedly locked.
He found an open window
and climbed in.
She was lying there
on the bathroom floor
dead
beyond revival.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” they said
but the greatest loss was hers,
the one who was
dead.
He knew then that irony
was still alive.

Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She has been nominated for Pushcarts, Best of the Net and a Rhysling Award. See more at lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com and www.facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry-1603675983213077/.

SETH ROSENMAN: Grandparents

Artistic, Submissions, , , , , ,

“When your grandfather and I were kids, we walked barefoot to school, uphill in the snow both ways. The school had one room for everyone, from kindergarteners to Talmudic scholars. But what a delight the snow became when we discovered the downhill routes! This was before the war, of course.”

Seth Rosenman writes, but he doesn’t wrong. His writing has appeared in numerous places, and so has he. He can be found sleeping in your hat when Tom Waits isn’t. His dreams are manifested forever at infiniteseth.blogspot.com.

MICHELLE DINNICK: Back and Forth

Artistic, Submissions, Top Stories, , , , , ,

“Only what I can put in my backpack.”

They ask for their Lego.

I hang a bag from each handle bar… Throws my balance off a little, but I can manage.
I can only make a few more trips before I have to make dinner.
Thank goodness it’s not far.

Michelle Dinnick really enjoys writing micro-fiction, often inspired by personal experience. Sometimes she writes longer pieces as well. She has been published in the Globe and Mail, and Chicken Soup for the Soul; and won several writing and poetry awards. You can find her online at: fiftywordstories.com, commuterlit.com, and femininecollective.com.

SAM VAN DER LUGT: Stone

Artistic, Submissions, , , , ,

We visited you today. I think she’s too young to understand. She asked me if you turned into a stone.

“Kind of,” I said.

“Why a gray stone?” she asked. “Why not blue or orange or purplegreen?”

I shrugged.

She thought you should have at least dressed up a little.

Sam van der Lugt is a writer and anthropologist based in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. He’s working on some short stories and a PhD thesis. Sometimes, he wonders what to do with all of this existence.

COLLETTE NIGHT: After the fire left

Artistic, Submissions, , , , , ,

Bitter smoke clings to the rafters.
The corrugated shed is but a skeleton, creaking in the breeze.
Embers crackle hungrily in the paddocks, sending ashes dancing like butterflies in spring.
Beneath cracked soil, seeds awake.
Soon new life will sprout and the fire will linger only as a painful memory.

Collette Night is an Australian writer who crafts lyrical prose with bite, often circling themes of healing, memory, and the uncarved future. Her work seeks to take you elsewhere as you read—even if only for a moment. She has appeared in Starry Eyed Press and The Riot Collective, with forthcoming work in Trembling with Fear and Black Hare Press.

RITA RIEBEL MITCHELL: Fire Sale

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

Memories, stacked in moving vans, evaporated like morning dew, leaving the house empty and sad. Rooms shed tears of loneliness, missing love and laughter as loss echoed off bare walls.

With a brisk click, flames swallowed doors, licked ceilings, and seared floors as the unwanted house cried out in agony.

Rita Riebel Mitchell writes in the Pinelands of South Jersey where she lives amongst the trees with her husband. Her work appears in HAD, Flash Fiction Magazine, Versification, and more. Find her at ritariebelmitchell.com/friday-micro.

JULIE K DANIELS: Bottle Baby

Artistic, Submissions, , , ,

Asking about my littlest brother? He dropped out of school, joined a carny crew he’d seen fleece folks at the fair. “Three for a dollah!” they’d hawk, fingering soft balls near chalky bottles. He’d learned, flinging ammo just so. Did I tell you? Was me fed him his first milk.

Julie K. Daniels lives, writes, and teaches in St. Paul, Minnesota, enjoying all four (not quite equal) seasons.