Word Count: 154
Some summer nights now I lay down under the moon in the cucumber patch. Feel the tiny prickles of their stems on bare skin. Feel the soft leaves like hands on my body, caressing my breasts.
In the moonlight the tall cornstalks shadow my bed, like a lover waiting to enter. It’s a soft blue-gray phantom that springs from my memories of youth.
This isn’t just a dream I’ve been having. Since the tumor was felt in my belly. Since it’s spread its long fingers into my womb.
One of these nights I will bring with me the knife, the one that I use to gather bouquets of zinnias that border the garden. Their bright colors tinged dusky with the moon’s paler light. I will close my eyes, fall asleep in the warm night air. In the arms of my lover I will bleed out my life, like soft summer rain into soil.
There’s something scary and sharp about this one.
Thank you! Maybe it’s the prickley cucumbers. Funny how everything came together in a soft sexual way and yet held sharp edges of prick(le)s and knives.