Ms. Pain

She sits on the mountain

free 

at last

I've learned so many things from pain

I need to thank her

Ice Cold Eyes

From an email I received: Authors of fiction may submit sci-fi and fantasy, 1,000 to 8,000 words. They accept stories on most themes, but they are especially interested in, “compelling adventures, folk-retellings, stories of hope in the dark, emotional healing, love of all sorts, environmentalism, and the humanity (or lack of it) among the fantastical and speculative.”

He stared at me with ice cold eyes. Every part of the cave was melting. I hung back in the shadows, not knowing when the growling in my stomach would go away, or if I even wanted it to. I had come here, after all, for a spiritual awakening, but this cave in the middle of God knows where in Mexico was starting to feel like a prison.

Adam was always quiet, and today he was especially, except he was talking with his eyes. The burned into me. There was an anger I had never seen before, usually tempered by a softness, but not this time. I cleared my throat. He scowled.

I looked up at the stalagmites and watched the dripping. All of them dripping together sounded like a percussionist convention, haphazard but oddly comforting. Methodical and hypnotizing, it eclipsed my attention until he spoke.

"We are stuck here, you know," he said. 

Just moments ago, I tried to move a large rock and it created a small avalanche, which created a new obstacle of stones which now blocked our exit. The fall was the height of drama. Then the rocks settled and it was quiet. Minutes seemed like days. I hid, waiting for what was next. 

There was still sunlight coming in over the pile of rocks, which was encouraging. Light could get in. It gave us hope for now. I stepped out of the shadows and into the one sunbeam falling in. 

"I know," I said. 

Radical Acceptance

He wrote me a paper

Bled it into being

Sat upon the salt mine

Turned my envy green

She said he name was Ruby

she poured the champagne

Grey Ghost stomped me silly

I swung where I hanged

Gretchen was the one

who served the beer

that fateful night

when I fell into his stars

Memory of a Mermaid

I saws the photo on my brain, burned in like the tattoo on a sailor

his arm hairy and strong from pulling rope

his face sunburned and hard flesh

calloused palms and eyes as clear as vinegar

My life escaped like a mermaid under the water

pristine in its disappearance

like a memory 

or a dream.