The Trees on Her Block

By Camille Sherman

Thick strands, split ends, hanging in zero gravity toward the sky

A morning stretch, limbs painting fine details on the clouds

Noble, astute, aged and ageless

Naked and resolute, spindly in its brittle winter coat

Immune from human error, impervious to neglect or over-watering

Pledging a sacred vow of new life in the spring

Thawing those that pass below

Breathing new poems into poets,

Fresh brush strokes into painters

Holding our attention and springing our steps

Until a season-long sunset

When autumn leaves start to fall

Camille Sherman is a professional opera singer from the Bay Area. She trained at The Boston Conservatory and the San Francisco Conservatory of music, and served as an Artist in Residence at Pensacola Opera and Portland Opera. She currently lives in Portland, where she continues to sing and develop artistic projects with local artists.

This Side of a Freeze

By Deb Fenwick

You have one last stop to make. The holidays are approaching, and you have one final card to mail. A quick stop at the post office, and you can tick the box and check that task right off the list just before dark hits at 4:30 on a December day.

Parking strategies are key here, and when you find a second-tier one across the street, you grab it. You’ve got layers. Layers of fleece and GORE-TEX, even a new hat, to insulate you from temperatures that are just this side of a freeze. 

You cross Lake Street when you first see him. He’s just a little older than your daughter. He’s standing outside the main entrance near the flagpole as you approach the mailbox box with your stamped envelope—with your contents safely sealed inside.

You see him approaching. He’s tall, and he looks like he could be one of your daughter’s friends. But, no, on second thought, no. They’re all off at college in dorm rooms, counting down for winter break. He’s shifting his gaze back and forth but walking directly toward you on the snowy sidewalk. Although young, you note that he doesn’t have the same posture you recognize in your daughter’s friends. All the times she brought them home for parties and fire pits. Even in their teens, her friends stood tall.They made eye contact and small talk.They perfected handshakes and polite niceties as they moved through rooms with all the confidence that a promise of a bright future bestows. 

The wind from the North makes the flag dance with a violent whip. When he’s close enough to speak, you notice that his hand shakes as he says, “Excuse me.” He says it twice. He asks if you have any food. Then he apologizes.

Caught off-guard at his youth and the request for food—not money, food. You look down at your envelope holding a card that is wishing a friend who lives two cities away glad tidings. You feel utterly unprepared for this moment. Food? you rhetorically ask him. Like it’s the first time you’ve ever heard the word. Now it’s your turn to apologize. Your cashless approach to life means your debit card is woefully underwhelming in this situation. You can’t even buy your way out of the discomfort you feel by offering him money for food. 

When you can’t look him in the eye any longer, you shift your attention back to his hands. No gloves of fleece or GORE-TEX. He has hands red from the cold with long fingers that shake. These hands were once as tiny as your child’s sweet baby hands. You imagine his childhood fingers learning to tie shoes, practicing the writing of letters and numbers. His hands must have been held by the hand of a parent, a grandparent, some adult that loved him.

Love. It echoes in your head and sounds hollow in the frosty air. You remember the spare set of gloves that you have in the car. You ask him to wait there while you dash across the street and rummage through the vehicle for the gloves and granola bars or any spare food you carelessly tossed aside in favor of better options.

When you return, you give him the gloves and a smashed Nutrigrain bar. You apologize again and forget to mail the card as the winter wind continues its assault on the flag overhead.

Deb Fenwick is a Chicago-born writer who currently lives in Oak Park, Illinois. After spending nearly thirty years working as an arts educator, school program specialist, youth advocate, and public school administrator, she now finds herself with ample time to read books by her heroes and write every story that was patiently waiting to be told. When she’s not traveling with her heartthrob of a husband or dreaming up wildly impractical adventures with her intrepid, college-age daughter, you’ll find her out in the garden getting muddy with two little pups.

Flood By Karen Ely

A riddle is a bridge.

A bridge to the truth,

arching over the angry, churning river

that is our nation’s canker.

 

The howling denials

humiliating trials

of fact versus fiction

0ur country’s affliction.

 

And the riddle is this:

What lies on the other side?

 

A people of unity,

Indivisible

or a new status quo

leaving gospel invisible

As we strive

To thrive

Keep hope alive

Compromise.

 

Calm the beast and keep the peace.

Cross over that muddy sludge

On a one lane bridge

Feet dry

Expectations high.

 

Looking for the promised land,

The pot of gold,

The rainbow’s end.

 

Yet the river remains.

Always raging

Turning the soil

Trumpers loyal

Ready to spill over the banks

and flood the fields

of honest, hard-won crops.

The hatred never really stops.

Perhaps we need a dam.

Karen Ely was born and raised in Petaluma, California. Upon graduating from UC Davis, she worked in San Francisco and New York City in corporate finance. After a 30-year career as a mom and “professional” volunteer in Scottsdale, AZ, Karen returned to her beloved hometown in Sonoma County.

She delights in difficult crossword puzzles, the Santa Rosa Symphony, and traveling with  her husband (of 35 years) James. Karen has been published in The Write Spot to Jumpstart Your Writing: Discoveries, The Write Spot: Reflections, The Write Spot: Possibilities, and The Write Spot: Writing as a Path to Healing (all available on Amazon).

Sounds Of The Unheard, A Connection To Self

By Joop Delahaye

Silence: The perennial challenge in my meditation practice.

Tara Brach says that that is the real draw for her now in her meditation practice.

I am not sure if that is true for me. I have been attracted to the sounds of the usually unheard things when “normal” sounds are absent. That has been something I have paid attention to most of my life.

No planes overhead, no 101 traffic, no Petaluma Creamery machinery, no dumb drivers going west on B Street. No leaf blowers or power washers! What is there when these are absent?

What is there now? Swaying tree branches, birds in my neighbor’s old tree, the wind. The “thermal compressions” I have heard for years. I have learned to listen for it, to it. This sound became a barometer of my connection to self, to the quiet space inside. How many seconds until I hear it? There it is.

Some might label it “ringing in the ears,” the aftermath of a loud concert at the Fillmore, or Carousel Ballroom on Van Ness, or, later, the Sleeping Lady in Fairfax. Maybe . . . but I like it now. It is an ally, not unpleasant, not hostile.

It is a grounding wire connecting to a more silent world, a world of greater harmony with self and surroundings. This inner sound seems to spread down the body, straightening the spine, energizing the cells. It focuses the attention. I appreciate the silence, the work it takes, the things it brings.

Joop Delahaye is a recently retired healthcare worker, now with time in his life to do some writing. He is grateful to Marlene Cullen and also Lakin Kahn for providing the Zoom setting to explore/free his creative muse.

Silence

By Kathy Guthormsen

A blanket of pristine snow glistens on the grass, while windows glow from warm fires inside

Ice frosts peaked rooves, softening their lines

The village waits in silence

 

A brightly lit Christmas tree sits in the square

Streetlights glow under a darkening sky

The village waits alone

 

There are no people singing carols

No children laughing and building snowmen before going inside for cookies and milk

The village waits alone in silence

 

Fretful silence

Fearful silence

Frantic silence

 

Pregnant silence

Palpable silence

Potent silence

 

Reflective silence

Ruminating silence

Resilient silence

 

Tacit silence

Tactful silence

Total silence

 

Silence between heartbeats

Silence between breaths

Silence between impulse and response

 

The villagers shelter cautiously behind closed doors, alone

Some have been taken by an insidious virus

And grieved for in silence

 

The villagers are gone

But the village awaits their return

In hopeful silence

 

Kathy Guthormsen’s work has been published in The Write Spot: Memories, The Write Spot: Possibilities, and The Write Spot: Writing as a Path to Healing, all available on Amazon.

Her Halloween story, Run, was published in the Petaluma Argus Courier in October2020.

Kathy lives in northern California with her husband, one psychotic cat, a small flock of demanding chickens, and a pond full of peaceful koi. She maintains a blog, Kathy G. Space, where she occasionally posts essays, short stories, and fairy tales.

Winter Solstice 2020

By M.A. Dooley

To re-build beauty we split the wood

Don’t split the hairs, it does no good

 

To build more beauty, we light the flame

The kindling catches, we say the names

 

Of those we love who went beyond

They shaped our lives, they’re never gone

 

Reflection first, then put it away

Forgive, don’t forget, make up one day

 

Let go the work, the world of greed

The rules of day, the ego needs

 

Gathered in darkness wait for the light

Beauty glows on faces this fire lit night

 

The circle round holds hearts and dreams,

Tears fall for loves no longer seen

 

The year was wrought with judging and pain

Hindsight 2020 the last refrain

 

Awake on the longest night, the fire

Releases suffering and unmet desires

 

This invocation is for you,

You represent your sisters too

 

For mothers, daughters we hold you dear

For fathers, sons not shaped by fear

 

We stand for sacredness of life, for living

The year’s behind us without misgiving

 
We stand together and hold our place
Embrace salvation of the human race
 
We are so close to being one
Let’s end this year with love and fun.

M.A. Dooley is a fourth generation Californian who spent her childhood in the Santa Cruz Mountains. M.A. Dooley is an architect in partnership with her husband. They have three sons. Among a multitude of athletic interests, she loves to ski and dance. Her work has been published in Sunset, Trends, San Francisco Magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, The Press Democrat, and in Poems of a Modern Day Architect published by ARCHHIVE BOOKS, 2020.

English as a First Language

By Ken Delpit

If I could learn a foreign language that I currently do not know all that well, I might choose English. That’s silly, you might say. You’re writing in English now. What’s to learn? This is a legitimate question. Allow me to explain.

My comprehension of English is OK much of the time. I can get by. Once in a while, it may approach pretty good. In disturbingly frequent other times, though, even moderate fluency is sadly lacking on my part.

For example, I would like to learn the English spoken by people whom I do not understand. Crazy as their thoughts might be when heard by my ears, I would like to hear those thoughts through theirs. Or, among everyday geniuses, when people reveal astute perspectives or brilliant insights, I would love to grasp the language that gave rise to those sparks. And for those cherished rescuers among us who are able to find the funny or the bright in the darkest of hours, I would be delirious to have that kind of language facility.

But my deficiency goes beyond not comprehending the English used by others. Sometimes, I don’t understand it for myself. I can find myself searching hopefully, perhaps naively, for words that describe situations appropriately and accurately. And, too often for my liking, those words are nowhere to be found. I can be left slack-jawed, sometimes literally, when trying to express my own thoughts and feelings, whether subtle or extreme. Although the word “dumbstruck” is typically used to describe audience or reader, I confirm that the word can apply equally to speaker or writer.

English is a wonderful and versatile language, a copious toolbox of practical and artful utensils, just waiting to be deployed in infinite varieties of forms, and for unlimited types of purposes. Would that I could know the adept English of all those who speak and write it well now. Even better, would that I could find a fluency of my own, a constant companion who helps me to express myself ably and naturally, no matter the circumstances. English As A First Language. Sign me up.

Ken Delpit has been writing for quite a while, that is if you count computer programming and technical documentation as “writing.” Since leaving those professions behind, Ken has discovered an exciting new world of creative writing. He is now giddily exploring new devices, such as adjectives, subtlety, mystery, and humans with emotions and feelings.