More Micro-Fiction for #FreeFictionFriday

Hey, All!

Another end to the week and another Free Fiction Friday! Last time, I posted a short collection of micro-fiction (stories less than 500 words). This week, a few more short shorts, but also adding some speculative haiku called Horrorku (for horror) and SciFaiku (for sci-fi).

By the way, most of these were written about 15 years ago – as experiments or practice or just having a blast exploring, putting words together. They appeared in such online zines as MicroHorror, Bewildering Stories, Flashshot, Aphelion, Scifaikuest, Mindflights, Thaumatrope, Tales from the Moonlit Path, and Long Story Short.

Hope you have fun with them. Let me know which bit of doggerel you enjoyed the most. And make it a great weekend!

<>< 

Show, Don’t Tell

“Read to me what you’ve channeled so far,” she says.

I clear my throat. Death and destruction await the one…

“Cliché.” My muse frowns. “What else?”

I fumble at my manuscript and turn a page. Blindly, the Mummy exits the tomb…

“Derivative,” she says.

“But these are your ideas!” I protest.

“My ideas. Your anemic attempts.”

“This is my first stab at horror,” I rationalize.

“Ah, then,” she nods. “First rule of fiction—write what you know.”

“Could you tell me how?” I ask.

My muse produces a stiletto. “Here, let me show you instead.”

(The next poem is the same story structured as a horrorku.)

Writer's Block

death and destruction…

cliché my muse scoffs

      I falter once more

the mummy will rise…

banal she now cries

     I weep at her feet

respite I plead

she frowns at my prayer

     searing thoughts remain

the death of me

I’m now sweating blood

     she starts to smile

write what you know

my muse says with a knife

     and shows me how

<><

SciFaiku Collection

Au Naturale

denuded satellites

race across earth’s open fields

     streakers celebrate

Proposal

first stop Saturn’s rings

on to diamond-like stars

     alien engagement

Generation Gap

white hot, young sun boasts

super nova still on fire

     and replies, eat my dust

Our Christening

alien suitor

seed long forgotten

     orphan earth

star pollen falls

fullness of time

     human life

magi from space

showering gifts

     reunion

Courtship

suitors from space

scatter gifts to earth

     alien proposal

diamonds sparkle

against velvet heavens

     engagement announced

humans transcending

don Saturn’s rings

     cosmic wedding

<><

Twitter-Bytes (≤140 characters)

“I think our baby is a changeling!” I told my Stepford wife. So I wasn’t surprised when my doppelganger showed up and said I had to leave.

~*~

“Tell me how to write horror,” I beg my muse. “Write what you know,” she replies and pulls out a stiletto. “Here, let me show you now.”

~*~

I married a serial killer. Fortunately, he only murders strangers. But lately we’ve drifted apart; he said he didn’t know me anymore...

The Time Had Come

He sat in his chair and waited. She said she would come and he did not doubt it. She’d come for his roommate earlier and had taken him. Away. He knew it was only a matter of time.

He fidgeted. He wasn’t scared; he just didn’t want to go. But he couldn’t tell her that. She wouldn’t have listened anyway – he’d seen her take plenty of others. Friends and acquaintances passed every so often. Most of them with smiles on their faces. He could never understand that. Where they were heading just wasn’t someplace he wanted to go.

You’ll see him again, she had said, laughing, when his roommate left. I know, he’d tried to respond. I know!

He soon heard footsteps; they were coming nearer. She was coming back like she said she would. For him.

“Time for supper, Mr. Grossman,” the aide called out, bubbly as ever. “Shall I take you to the dining room now?”

He grunted. What choice did he have? He’d had a stroke the previous year and couldn’t walk or talk. So the aide wheeled him down the corridor. He would see his roommate again as promised, at dinner. After all, she said she would come.

The Resignation

Dear Al,

I quit!

I’m sick and tired of being bossed around. We agreed on three wishes. But your last wish was always for three more. You could never quit. It was like a drug with you. "Your wish is my command." Yeah, right. My wish is my command now, baby.

Plus, you asked for impossibilities. Like wanting a plan for world peace. Or trying to understand the mind of a woman. You even wished for tasty jello. Unbelievable!

Al, from now on you'll be rubbing your own stupid lamp. I'm going into business for myself.

No longer yours,

Genie

All stories and poems (c) 2007-2022 Lyndon Perry

Btw, if you want to subscribe to these weekly stories so you get them in your inbox, 

go to my Substack page and subscribe. Every Friday, a short story. Free! What a deal!

~*~

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A Sonnet - Love Lost and Found

They Still to Steal a Secret Kiss

Recent rains leave but shallow streams,

gone the wresting rapids of winter's end;

Through darkest glen where shadows teem

he follows fading paths from bend to bend.

A faint voice pulses, pleads to break pursuit

of love's past echoes now distant mem'ries;

So stumbles onward toward a hidden route,

wand'ring lost, surprised by sunlit valleys.

Far she seems, too far for certain joy,

yet in yon vale they meet, a timid wish;

Familiar strangers with hearts held high

they still to steal a secret kiss.

Found befriended as once before

accepting fin'ly this sweet amour.

(c) Lyndon Perry

I wrote the above sonnet about ten years ago, slightly modified for today's #FreeFictionFriday. It doesn't follow all the rules, but heh, it's free. Would love to hear what you think. I'm not an avid poetry fan or reader, but do enjoy the various forms on occasion - as the muse leads. 

~*~

"Tip a buck, get a book."

(via PayPal.Me - an e-book from Tule Fog Press.) 

This blog is reader supported. Thank you for your support!

Free Fiction Friday - She Raced the Waves

Here's a prose poem for your enjoyment. I don't write a lot of poetry, but when I do... ;)

Hope you have a great weekend! Let me know what you're reading. Email me any time.

She Raced the Waves by Lyndon Perry

She raced the waves as they crashed behind her

with thunderous applause

as if she’d won a gold medal at the Olympics.

When the packed, sea-heavy sand changed abruptly

to thick, ankle-deep grains of brown and gold

she flopped to the ground and basked in the sun’s warmth.

Her eyes shut tight against the sun’s glory,

she could still hear the roar of the waves

and every third or fourth pounding

felt the spray of the ocean beckoning her

to return and run and frolic along its expansive coast.

Making sand angels instead, she felt

the tiny rocks polish the backs of her arms and legs;

she could taste the salt and smell the drying kelp as well.

But it wasn’t the allure of any of these magnificent and sensual pleasures

that finally compelled her to return and baptize herself

one final time

in the crisp, rejuvenating waters a block from her home.

It was the call of her mother

for lunch

and

“don’t bring any of that sand in the house with you this time.”

She Raced the Waves © 2017 by Lyndon Perry

For more to read, visit Tule Fog Press

www.TuleFogPress.com

William Blake's The Tyger

Starting a new semester and am taking a British Writers class. We're beginning our discussion with the Romantics and were assigned some poems by William Blake (1757-1827).

Blake was a poet and illustrator and is probably best known for his singular publications which combined his (increasingly esoteric) poetry and art. Songs of Innocence and of Experience is perhaps his most well-known and accessible collection of works.

In Songs (and other volumes), Blake experimented with a technique called "relief etching" (along with illuminated printing) where he created individual copper plates of art and poetry etched into the surface. He would then print a limited number of copies, hand illustrating each page using mostly water colors. These pages would eventually be hand-bound into small chapbooks which he would sell or distribute to a close circle of friends. Thus, without mass distribution, Blake was relatively unknown during his life time.

In fact, I had never really heard of him (I know, for shame!)...and yet when I started reading his poems, I found familiar quotes. For example, from the final verse of "The Tyger" comes this memorable line: "What immortal hand or eye / Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?" (Yes, it's also an instrumental piece by Inked in Blood on their "Lay Waste the Poets" album, lol.)

So, I have a new Romantic to delve into. And he's worth the delve. Look at the sample illustrations of "The Tyger" - and each one is different which shades the message slightly as the poem and art work together in various ways. Notice that the tiger in one appears to be smiling. Huh! For an indepth look at his artwork, you must visit the William Blake Archive.

For more information, visit:
+ Poets.org
+ WebMuseum

Scottsboro, Too, Is Worth Its Song

Taking an American Multicultural Literature class this Summer. In the first class we discussed Countee Cullen's poem, Scottsboro, Too, Is Worth Its Song. (pdf)

The poem is a reaction to the lack of outcry against the infamous multiple trials and convictions of the "Scottsboro Boys" in Alabama in the early 1930s.

The heart of the story is retold in an appropriately slowly paced film, Heavens Fall (2006), starring Timothy Hutton and David Strathairn. The title of the film is from the quote, "Let justice be done, though the heavens fall." While not heavy-handed, the movie is definitely a morality play that casts a spotlight on our racist and prejudicial past. The acting is strong, the story well-told, and the outcome tragic. Despite the suspect witnesses (one recants) and lack of clear evidence, the men are convicted and sentenced to death for raping two white women in 1931.

Countee Cullen's poem (below) questions why the poets of the day (usually advocates for the downtrodden) were not raising this issue to the level of indignation that surrounded the Sacco and Vanzetti trial.

Scottsboro, Too, Is Worth Its Song
A poem to American poets
by Countee Cullen, 1934

I said:
Now will the poets sing, -
Their cries go thundering
Like blood and tears
Into the nation's ears,
Like lightening dart
Into the nation's heart.
Against disease and death and all things fell,
And war,
Their strophes rise and swell
To jar
The foe smug in his citadel.

Remembering their sharp and pretty
Tunes for Sacco and Vanzetti,
I said:
Here too's a cause divinely spun
For those whose eyes are on the sun,
Here in epitome
Is all disgrace
And epic wrong.
Let wine to brace
The minstrel heart, and blare it into song.

Surely, I said,
Now will the poets sing.

But they have raised no cry.
I wonder why.

---

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My Stabs at Scifaiku

Aphelion has been gracious enough to publish my amateur haiku mutterings and encourage me to continue to explore this form. Here are three recent attempts for your enjoyment or critique...

Generation Gap (May 2008)

white hot, young sun boasts
super nova still on fire
and replies, eat my dust

~*~

Au Naturale (April 2008)

denuded satellites
race across earth's open fields
streakers celebrate

~*~

Proposal (March 2008)

first stop Saturn's rings
on to diamond-like stars
alien engagement