070/100 aka 210/365

CLOUDS
Word Count: 285

Puffs of clouds animate the blue blue sky. There is a bear chasing a ball, or maybe it’s a witch’s head. They spread as they drift towards me overhead. A mass becomes the four furies and they disappear. Then a lion’s head that wears a hair bow in its mane. What does that mean?

I’m looking for you. It’s religiously ingrained, I suppose, to look above.

Hollow feeling. Nearly disemboweled. You’ve left a tapeworm that eats away my insides bite by bite. I have no appetite to feed it. My skin shrivels to my bones because your touch alone brought it to life. My hands hang useless, strength unwrapped and lost somewhere. My eyes are all that’s left to see with any clarity. A curse.

There is no suddenness that can measure more than that of someone leaving. Someone dying. Gone is more than just away. There is no hotel room I can imagine where you are sleeping, reaching out for me because in sleep there is no consciousness of time and space. No restaurant I can picture where you take your meals, leaving crusts of bread that I would pick and finish. There is no rain I’ll listen to when you say that it is raining there. There is no sound, no rain.

You used to laugh and say that when a cloud passed overhead, I should know it passed above you too. You used to say you’d call each night you were away.

I can’t help listening for the phone to ring before I clutch your pillow to my breast and fade into a night where maybe you’ll come back in dreams. I can’t help watching bears and lions march across the sky.

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2 Responses to 070/100 aka 210/365

  1. Marcus Speh says:

    my kind of thing…very strong imagery here and great flow: “I’m looking for you. It’s religiously ingrained, I suppose, to look above.” and “I can’t help watching bears and lions march across the sky.” yes…

  2. susan says:

    Thanks, Marcus. Some good ones have been coming through for me after being unable to write for a few days.

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