“Halo…salut…sunt eu…un haiduc,” he whispered tenderly into his pillow.  Bryan imagined Regina leaning down to take a kiss from his lips, her blue/black hair hanging down in the dark, and she wouldn’t mind at all that his belly was between them.  He heard her singing those words by her locker, watched her twirl away on tiny sneakered feet, laughing down the hall with her friends because she couldn’t carry a tune to save her life. He wanted to be the one to save her life, to pick her tiny body…

Greetings, Fellow Sixers.

Jamie Hogan left me a very nice comment and it inspired me to issue a challenge.  Not that you need one.  I refuse to believe you've run out of ideas, you all are brimming.  But in case you need one, have some fun with this?   

(paraphrased)   "Hey Kristine, write about that grey rock in the middle of that brown field"

Six sentences around a rock and field, or something remotely, loosely, (barely)…

The idea caught on faster than norovirus on a cruise ship, and soon it became SOP.  Gauntlets and jousting came back into style, and there was no downside to a man fighting for the right to a woman after he’d had a chance to inspect her on Futurebride. 

It was a good time to be a man in every way, and society benefited from the results: single digit-divorce rates (which, even then, were cause for ostracism), boys thrived and grew into strong, healthy men who in turn grew to love their…

I took it with me, even though they say you can’t.   Well, I didn’t take it all, though, because it’s everything that still makes you.  

I took your patience and kindness, your reliability, humor, logic, and fun. Tucked it right in here, and how it upholds me!

I have your clear blue eyes and hard, lean hands still holding mine.

Keep that pine box shut and put up a picture of me instead, the one with the black t-shirt slopping beer all over, dancing to *that* song, today…

Cuthred did not know what transgression made Thunor angry, to pelt them so with watery rocks unceasing, nor did he care: all he wanted was for his fish stew to finish cooking so he could partake with his brothers.   Wiglaf bragged he would slay Thunor if he met him on that very night, which of course caused the rain to fall even harder.

As the brothers hunched over their little cauldron feebly simmering, nearly nose to nose, Cuthred took a pinch of something from a little bag he…

Johnnie Roadkill pondered that a while, moving the answer around in his mouth like a bitter apple in a heavenly slice of pie.

“If Jenna Roberts drunk dialed 911 to tell you she saw a soaking wet hyena run across the road like the devil itself was behind, if I were you, I would believe her,” he pronounced solemnly.…

Listen, there is not a reason in the world this has to be taught in school, not even at home, for Pete’s sake!

I mean, the body does what it does, and I know you know exactly what I mean, and deep down you agree with me.

It’s all about nature, I mean kids aren’t stupid, and they figure out what things are and how it all works. 

Unless they’re (you know) and then there’s nothing left for anyone to do but close your eyes and pray.

So people, I humbly ask you all…

Jodiee and Alan had been a couple for so long that friends and family wondered when they were going to take the big plunge. (The only exception was Alan’s ex-best friend Lou, who used to call Jodiee “Jody-Toady” and  he certainly wasn’t looking for a “save the date” note in the mail.) Everybody loved her (was it her gentle pink lips?) but none if it really mattered to Alan.  Maybe it was the way she explained things, like why she could only drink from glasses with round stems instead of…

The flood began and though impure I rose upon the tide.  I’m washed long and across slabs of concrete things, scraping wrist and knee.

I flow and follow, trying to keep my face to the sun.  

It’s not long before I reach the end, by feet, then  knees and everything follows over the falls of your voice, reaching, knowing I will never know you.

I seek your eyes, your arms, some kind of beacon in the chaos of my life and what I receive is song,…

life was simple.

i wake up later than everyone because i know the early  doesn't really catch, so i lie around and think about things.

i think about what i see when i study that and that, that and that, and those things i find in them sometimes.

now everything has changed.

mister big over there, the one with the stimulated parietal lobule, decided he has a name for everything, and not only does he know the name, he demands we all use the same sound for whatever it…

Like a wallet lifted from a unsupecting pocket, their kid could disappear on family outings--vanish right from under their eyes.   After it happened a few times, they began to wonder if he was born with some kind of superpower, making himself invisible with the snap of his fingers, confounding them and driving them up a wall instead of using his new found powers only for Good. 

Mom and Dad had grown used to it, though, and his disappearing act eventually became the subject for uneasy…

It happens like this sometimes, that a young man in New York spends a decade looking for a car like the one he learned to drive in, and another car that spent its entire life in Pennsylvania has been waiting for the young man to rescue it from a lonely garage. We should all look so good in cream-n-green at 41 years of age, a little sag here and only a tiny bit of discoloration there, the kind of stain that catches up to us in lonely garages. Behold a car with no cup holders and too many…

Someone brought the ladies of customer service a cute little box of chocolates--how thoughtful! What a pretty gold wrapper.  Soon I begin to salivate in anticipation, thinking of my first bite into that soft chocolate with crunchy little bits of hazelnut.  Then I think about the article I read yesterday and wonder just how much castoreum women of the world are ingesting today, and across the years.

Naturally my mind wandered to the logical question: who milks the beavers’…

He appeared abruptly and without need of introduction.  He polished an apple on his pink YSL sleeve pretending not to scan the words on my screen, then leaned his head back on my doorframe.

He drew a long deep breath and exhaled at length, and I could feel him looking at my hands.

“Think that’s a good idea, do you, writing about your demons, speaking of them so casually like some kind of little word you say before you eat? Remember what happened the last time you thought it was…

I guess the Iron Maiden really did want me for dead!

Bruce, the scars of my heart bear your name.

Steve, Bruce, Adrian, Janick, Dave, and Nicko, you saved my life so many times, and I haven’t the words or the time left to thank you.

Since I’m gone and it doesn’t matter much anymore (not that it mattered while I was here), you think you might try changing the set list around for Pete’s sake?

My last request as an Iron Maiden fan should be that you play Alexander…

When Lindsey came into the room and saw the two caskets, cadet grey, side by side, she squeezed her eyes shut and buried her head in her father’s chest. He put his arm around her neck, felt her racking sobs and remembered back when it was okay for him to hug her in public. He felt surprised but then adjusted as he watched the kids take pictures of the brothers in their better days, as babies being smothered by puppies or long-haired, smokey-eyed hotties covered in BMX mud. Looking around the…

Welcome to the birth of the riot grrl.  She’s not waiting for you to throw a party or acknowledge that you made her, but she does expect you treat her with X-n-Y respect.

She recognizes the rocks, untangles from the thorns where she was spawned, checks to make sure the sun has gone full down before emerging in the fullness of the moon.

She’s not sorry she wasn’t born a boy because they don’t have all the fun, and they’re not the only ones who can write

kick-ass poetry.…

“Here” is where I wound up after being kidnapped and dumped in a cow field, post solstice December, dragged away from friends, family, payphones, the library up the block, half a dozen playgrounds that were havens for bike riders and skateboarders like me, but if you ask my Dad what “here” is, he will tell you unapologetically and with very few R’s that it was his way of getting me off “the street” before the crime wave of the 70s could kill me--or worse.

Today, “here” is a place…

"SSShh... here she comes, don't look at her, don't say anything, girls," Flossie flapped and the rest of her hens did as she bid, nestling down and trying to keep their eyes on the floor.  Rosie ducked into the coop, took a look around at their pointy little noses, pretending like they didn't know her Larry was caught with the peacock porn again, and knew she had to stay strong.

"So Rosie, how's things down in peacockville?" she winked and nudged her with a blunt…

are activities that would like to be thought of as writing related, but are really disguised, incognito, wishful, hopeful that it all adds up to something that looks like moving forward.

cleaned my office (and I do mean cleaned, right down to the spider, trapped in the corner, bug-eyed and begging me not to take down her home so I left it there and got rid of 30 books i haven't opened in years, and reunited with 60 more that i will never, ever part with.)

not much blogging…