whisp'rings

As a child what did you believe?
Did you hold conversations with the bathroom towels or nod to the teacups as you passed by so they wouldn't feel slighted by your attention to the drinking glasses?
Made sure to whisper to every piece of furniture in your bedroom that you loved it just the same as all the other pieces?
I never spoke to the monsters under the bed. I knew they were there, but I'd jump fast into bed so they couldn't catch my ankles as I brought them up under the covers.
The jealous teacups don't speak anymore, but sometimes I still give them a nod as I pass.

Just to let them know I think of them.

(Photos by the talented Annelie Solis and from here)

wake up now

Come on summer, I know you now, you know I know

Silly lazy, come along now, it's time to get going and lie down now

It's time to put the leaves back on the trees and that perfume on the breeze
And at the end of the day you can stretch out so nice and long that everything turns orange
Wouldn't you like to have a picnic on the shore with me?
Warm up the rocks, lets go- we're so long overdue

 (I don't know all the wonderful photographers whose pictures these are, but can't you just taste summer on your skin?)

mademoiselle la pluie

Hello there rain, I suppose you had to come back sometime didn't you?

Here you are an old man who likes to keep the sun abed, but in lilting tilting french you are a young girl eager to make the world grow.
I don't know which of you I like better-
The you who cautions me warm and safe back to my bed and lets me curl up with silky black coffee
Or the you who takes my chin and tilts it up with loving fingers so that my face is awash with the new
Maybe I just love you

P.s. The mists are back. Please guide the ships home to harbour and don't let the one crash into the jetty like last time.

oh peter

Life: it loves the young
The spring is short and summer brings hotter days for sleeping through.
Open your windows wide, the breeze carries the sea- it lives for you, now
Break off a piece of chocolate and hold it in your mouth. Laugh when the wind catches at your dress- it only wants to play.
Life lives for the young.
So live.

...So live

the ballerina and the baseball player

She packed up her things for the weekend. A weekend away from here is what I need, she thought. Can't let too much of life go by standing still.

The travel was long and tiring, but she finally found a welcoming place with a hard, warm floor she could rest on for the night or two. Friends awaited there. Friends who had been met before, and friends who hadn't. They took her out of the rain and the driving wind and fed her and warmed her and treated her as one of their own.

Across the rough, round table there was a man with eyes the color of chocolate which seemed to melt at the edges. They smiled at the ballerina and frequently flicked back to her face to check the tip of her nose or the curve of her collarbones. Her eyes, hazel and dancing, took in his hands, long as a pianist's (though he didn't play) and the way his cheek seemed to tug at his mouth when he laughed.

This night she slept not on the hard, friendly floor, but in a soft high bed where her long legs couldn't reach the ground. He smelled of earth and the clean sharpness of snow melt in rivers. He reminded her of summer and everything she wanted in life outside of the studio and the stage. Strong hands traced those collarbones and fit the slim waist. They laughed when they found he could enclose her tiny fist in one of those hands- it was perfectly baseball sized.

Together they hid from sleep and fought the night, but morning came anyway. It was time for the ballerina to move on, but he kissed her forehead and stole back a few more minutes. She walked back into the driving rain with a smile and the cold didn't bother her. She took the bed with her and stayed wrapped up in the soft, the smell of earth still in her hair.

perfect

Once upon a time there was a beautiful little girl

Everything she said or did was perfect

But the little girl had a secret

She was in love with the elk who came to visit her by night

By day her father lined up suitors all the way to the shore to promise riches for her hand

She was not a princess

She was a deer, locked up in the body of a girl

And she was miserable

One night the elk came to her and asked her to come with him

So she stepped out of her body

And she went.

wednesday was bittersweet

It seemed to me more bitter than sweet, the only thing that keeps me going through the winter is finally ended. It was my last, and now I'll never have that back. There were tears of course. And there was laughter, sweet as rain that melts away the snow. Smiles like sideways slashes, dragged down at one side from the sad and gone, but unable to be kept at bay and so the other side stretched up regardless. Hugs picked me up and squeezed me tight, even after they let go. Sure it was hard to speak, but a father-kiss on the forehead made me slash-smile again.

It was nice to be the oldest, the privileges, the responsibilities. That was the sweet. But the bitter was always in the corner trying to catch your eye and tell you its time to go.

-A Thought Like Light-
I can always come back.
Not to stay, but to visit.

I'll miss my winter family, but it will grow without me. I suppose it was mine for a while. They took me in out of the cold and chose to teach me instead. But four years went round and now it's time. They'll make a perfect family for the next winter misfit. Look, I've already patted down a soft place for you to fit. Here, take my spot.

lovely

(photos)