fairytale | To Create...

I am offering this piece as an experiment. Our writing group met this afternoon. The words we were charged with using were taken from our environment: parsley, introduction, source, design, famous, envy. My randomly chosen opening line was: The chocolate sauce…

This is very different from what I usually post, a fairytale of sorts. Enjoy. Or not. But do come back.

Winter

The chocolate sauce dribbled ever so slightly from the corner of his mouth.

The bear sat on a parsley green chair next to Corrine’s bed.

He wasn’t always there. Only sometimes when she was alone, so alone, and when she needed company.

Tonight he was there. A bit of chocolate escaped his ravenous mouth leaving behind a tiny recollection of its pleasure.

“I’m glad you came.” Corrine waited.

She always waited for an answer. Sometimes the bear replied with a big guffaw making them both laugh until tears escaped from the corners of their eyes and they had to blow their noses. Corrine always used a tissue from the evergreen box on the wooden nightstand made famous by her chocolate drops. The bear simply rubbed his snout against the back of the parsley green chair.

The bear looked into her hazel eyes not offering a clue.

Was he listening? Was he angry to be called upon when sleep had been deep and warm?

“I’m sad.”

Corrine waited for a tilt of his wide head or a small release of air from his lungs.

“I don’t think I want to finish.” She waited.

He stared at her. She hated that. Sometimes he would shift in the parsley green chair and that way she would know he was listening.

Today the bear with coarse tawny fur that protected his soft heart gave no indication.

Corrine reached over to the nightstand and lifted another chocolate drop from the crystal plate rimmed with white painted snowflakes. The only thing she ever changed for their liaison was the plate. It always matched the season. She lived by season. So did the bear.

She didn’t care for chocolate drops, but the bear found them perfect to his taste. She had to be careful lifting the chocolate drop to his muzzle. She could never tell if he was in a nasty mood, so she needed to be ready for a quick pull back as she released the morsel, else there would be blood.

That was their introduction. He appeared one dusk rimmed afternoon as she awoke from a nap. She thought he smelled the chocolate drops. He was unable to tell her it was the jasmine scent of her dream that drew him to her.

She offered the bear his first chocolate drop and, not thinking, left her hand a bit too long. It frightened her more than hurt. But there was blood. She dropped her hand into her lap and let blood soak through her nightgown. She wore the stain that wouldn’t wash out as a reminder to be careful when around the bear.

Tonight Corrine wondered if envy was the source of his countenance. Did he know she had shared the chocolate drops with another? It wasn’t her fault. The wolf with silver blue fur showed up at dawn after her evening sleep under a dark moon. She just did.

After the chocolate drop, the wolf and Corrine walked. For hours the two walked without words breathing in rhythm, not together really, more side by side as two on a journey, yet one in union.

That didn’t matter now. The bear was sitting on the parsley green chair with chocolate sauce dribbling from the corner of his mouth.

Corrine reached out to his powerful jaw, the crystal plate with white painted snowflakes now empty.

They were there.

In the silent sky early on my daily
drives, wings flapped. Although they
were too far away to see motion’s grace
or hear wind rush over and under
hollow-boned arms, I saw them.
A patterned V placed their purpose.

There were geese this fall with each
journey outside. It must be true
of this time of year, a thing
I never noticed.

Seldom did they make their voices known,
but they were always there. Gliding in front
of a full moon, a photo unable to impress
upon an iPhone screen.

They were there in afternoon walks, in
sun and grey filled skies. At night when
words flowed from my fingers in depths
of darkness. Then I could hear the cry,
in midnight still, their cry to me.

On this morning of Winter’s Solstice, four
times an Advent celebration, a new moon
soon to birth her smile, they were there.

Fireballs falling from a sky kissed by a
rising sun. A fairytale vision. Golden-winged
snitches raced across the blue, soared
over rooftops. The end of a fireworks
display, that last brave spark to shower earth
when all color has spent itself and drops only
burning embers to please the eye.

They were there. Not alien ships as misunderstood
by more fantastic eyes, but geese reflecting an
ascending light, pointing to a new beginning,
a path to take, a voice now heard, a song in
tandem harmony.

I stepped once again into this morning one last
time, three flew as one. In a moment’s breath
one departed on a path laid down only for a sole
navigator. Alone, and yet, eternally Three In One.

Author’s Note:

I had quite an interesting experience this morning and wanted to capture it. However, I think the explanation below will help with understanding my words above.

I was sitting in the family room this morning looking out the top windows when I saw this big ball of light falling from the sky. I said to Leroy, “I just saw a falling star?” He said, “Meteor.” It’s a joke from the past. (Apparently, some amateur astronomers (not my husband) have little fancy about them. I was sternly corrected when I mentioned falling stars in the presence of one of these amateurs while visiting a local star night at Gates Planetarium a few years back.)

I looked up again and saw another. It looked like it was on fire. I know I will sound crazy when I say this, but it looked like a Quidditch snitch. It was a ball of fire with wings.

He stood up and as soon as he looked out the window there was another. Spooked, we went outside and looked up to the skies. One more and then nothing. After about a half a minute of searching the skies, a flock of geese in a V pattern flew past lit by the sun.

Even though these beautiful creatures were also ablaze, they were white light, so bright they didn’t look real. The other single ones were golden fire. We watched and realized that the falling balls of fire we both saw were individual geese lit up by this Solstice sun.

What a blessing to see these balls of fire flying through the air.