A great sunflower grows in the desert. It stands 6000ft tall and blocks out the sun. The most common question asked regarding it is how?, followed by who did this?, but there are no answers to either. It has been said that the great sunflower looks sad. The desert below is cold and full of …
Norman and Claire had argued on the way to the hospital and she’d ostracised him to an uncomfortable chair outside the delivery room. ‘Don’t you know the pain I’m in?!’ Claire had screeched as he tried to negotiate the A26 around Tunbridge Wells. ‘And you pick now to make that bloody stupid suggestion? No, Norman, …
The cardigan doesn’t yet realize the effect it will have on the woman with the tortoise shell glasses. It hangs, quiet and listless on the rack between a hoodie and a vest, ignorant of the power it holds. How could a simple garment woven together with cotton threads and synthetic fibres be expected to foresee …
Okay. I was on my way to Grandma’s after work and thought I’d take the bus on account of the rain, but nothing showed so I flipped up my hood and started walking. From Paddy’s, the little boxing gym off Cooper Street? With the neon clover outside. I work the front desk. But it starts …
He said I was the only person who’d asked about his eye. Tonight anyway. ‘One minute I had two eyes. And the next, one,’ he said, adjusting his black leatherette eye-patch. ‘Too near her young ‘uns. You know how protective the females are.’ ‘Eagle Owl in Finland?’ I asked. ‘Great Grey in Norway.’ ‘Still, you’ve …
“Oh, you make my heart clap!” I blurt but it’s true, with her soft hat on I’ve not seen in months. She beams, and she’s inside my coat, hugging my ribs hello, and I’m all around her, and the sharp cold and dark of the evening offset the bright lights pouring off of the shops, …
Dan speaks to me in Zen koans. A line, two at most, flung at me like a wannabe philosopher’s frisbee. He has been taking classes at the Buddhist Centre. At the end of week one, he came home with a pink lotus-shaped meditation cushion. Week two, he walked around the yard barefoot. He switched from …
Anya let the balloons take her upward. She’d waited so long for this she wanted to enjoy it, despite the flying feeling being so alien. She told herself to relax, like she had as a child lying back in the swimming pool, allowing the water to cradle her. Some of the strings cut into her …
I wear other people. Their clothes, their shoes, their hair and skin and bones. An organ might not fit, or a limb might creak, or a muscle groan. Adjusting to auditory and visual signals takes its toll. And practice. A new residence is wearing on the soul. I fill the hollows first. This morning a …
Her over the road’s got a fancy man. He’s got a face like a bulldog lickin’ pish off a thistle, but he’s got a BMW, so she’s happy enough. He’s there now, washing the car. She’s in a deckchair, filing her nails, fake-tanned legs crossed, one bouncing up and down so her sparkly gold sandal …
Truth be told, though it was Eric’s doing, it was hardly his fault. It was she, after all, who was late for her ‘August 22 @ 11:00am’ interview, retreating with a watery glare when the receptionist ignored her wheedling. Stomping dejectedly into the street, she slammed into Eric in a silky-smooth blur. When he straightened …
The morning after my husband announced he didn’t think he loved me, I woke to the squawking of gulls and terns, which was strange since we didn’t live at the shore. When I slid out of bed, the floor tilted at an odd angle and I braced myself against the bed to keep from sliding …