Daily (w)rite

I have written before about writing prompts and writing inspirations from an image. I am trying the experiment on this blog today with the help of an image from Rick Mobbs, who was also the “prompter” behind this post.

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I thought you were falling in love with me, death.

Your kisses on my nape, your breath in my hair, are quivering still.

I sought the hollow of your breast, a cave of ice, where I could nestle, undisturbed, under warm quilted snow, for a slumber that knows no awakening.

I have looked to you, death, and you have looked at me for all the years that we stayed, surrounded by this blue haze, this illusion of certainty.
Swollen and sore, longing for you, my death, my body laid, warm and in wait.

It sought your touch.

But my body was never on your mind, and it stayed, steady, breathing, white, like a song frozen on your lips.
You looked at me and I looked to you, laden with the weight of a gaze held too long.

You were once so near, I could have reached out and touched your skin, tender and shriveled as an autumn leaf.

I waited, looking over my shoulder, waiting for you to come nearer, but softly, death, you left, just as you had come, crept out of my veins in stealth.
I am tired, death,waiting, and still awake.

Oh, there she is! Must go up to her! Is that milk I smell? She does look like she has something in her hand…yes, yes, slurp, it is milk! Come closer, come closer! Oh I am so hungry and this thing at my neck pulls so! I know I stink, girl, but just come closer so I can have a go at that bowl. Come nearer, nearer! Ok, now!

It is silly how useless these legs are, I can drag along so fine with these on the front, but how about having a pair to shove me up at the back too, like my brothers and sisters? Never mind, never mind, I will get to it in time, can I have some of that milk, please, now??

Ok…sigh..that was good! Now why does she look so down? Say something! I like it when you say things, I don’t understand them one bit, but I like the sound. Reminds me of my mum. I like how you touch my head too, I know you avoid the back because I have been sitting around in my own shit, but you see I can’t pull up my behind at all! I try, I try, see how I try! Oh look! I managed a bit! Oh no! I fell down again! Don’t look so low, I will manage, I will!

So you are going to do that washing thing? Why so early today? Usually you do it when I get my food next. I like that food: all that yellow and white fluffy stuff, very smelly, but nice! Ok, now, I hate this cold, why do you have to put me in water? There is not even enough sun yet! I like the way you pick me up tho, by the scruff of my neck, like mum used to.

Not like that monster boy who picked me up, making that awful sound looking really happy, just before he dropped me. I used to be able to move all my four legs before then. But when I fell, I was hurt, oh so hurt. I cried, I yelped, because it hurt. I was scared already because he had taken me away from my mum and my siblings, but now it hurt!

There, you got me all clean, I like the smell of that stuff you put on me. Your hand smells nice too, I like telling you how nice you are by licking your hand, because I don’t know how else to say it. It is like when you pat my head, and say Feenix, Feenix! That’s me right? I know when you say Feenix, you are calling me! You are saying something about me right now!

I have to call you something too, but I know you don’t understand anything when I talk to you, you just stroke me softer. So I lick your hand. You make a funny, happy sound then! But why aren’t you making that sound today? And why is your face all wet? Pick me up, pick me up, so I can lick you clean! I don’t stink right now, so you can pick me up!

Now that I am full, lets play! I cant move much I know, but you can bring your hand near and I can try biting at it, like I always do! Such fun! And such a nice day it is too! I’d like to go a bit further, but this thing at my neck you tie me with! Ah, can’t you just loosen it a little bit? Let’s go, come on, please!

Hey you are picking me up, what fun! There, there, I know you don’t look too good today. That’s alright. I will lick you better. Hey your face doesn’t taste alright, all salty, what is this wet thing all over it? It looks like water, but ugh, it tastes bad! Never mind, I will dry it up for you, there girl! How about some more milk then, eh? I can do with some more! I like it when there is nothing on my neck, so wonderful, so free!

So you are putting me into the basket? We are going to meet that man eh? I don’t like it when he pokes me though, he tries to make me stand, and I hate it when you look so low when I fall. I want to stand, I do! I will too, you’ll see!

Ok we are there. I don’t like that table. I feel scared, don’t put me down, don’t!

Ok, nasty man go away. Give me back to her!

Wait, girl, why are you going away? Don’t leave me and go, please, please, please! I am calling to you, are you deaf? You always come when I cry, don’t leave me with the nasty man!

Oh, he hurt me, he put that sharp thing in me! The nasty man hurt me! Come back!

I feel sleepy now, I feel so sleepy…come back, come back!

When it comes to poetry, I admit I am a little cynical. I write poems, but they are not really things I’d rather put up on a blog.

Rick Mobbs, who is an artist by profession, but a painter and poet at heart has asked me more than once to share with him the fiction I have been writing. Uh, I thought, why not poetry? Maybe go the whole hog and make a complete fool of myself?

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Writing about making chicken soup was not on the top of my list of things to do today, but then I thought, well, why the heck not?

It was like this: I heard some really, really, really bad news. My uncle lost his battle with cancer.

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This was a post I had done ages ago. A cherished few of you, who used to visit my old blog, might recognize it. I am posting it today (with an update) because I cannot forget dear, dear Sam for more reasons than I care to count.

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It is a tough call: to accept or to fight? When life hands you a raw deal, what do you do? Fight, of course. Fight and let consequences take care of themselves. But what if no matter how you fight, what you do, and how much you strive, the situation will not change: when everything is well and truly beyond your control?

I vote for fighting. I am a fighter, and the religion of a fighter is to fight, fight till the last breath, till the last drop of blood. 

Acceptance is not for me. 

In the middle of one of the important scenes of one of my stories, the protagonist decides to thumb his nose at the death of his friend, and does not accept the passing. He slowly descends into depression, and finally madness. I am very tempted to give the story a different ending, to give the hero a sense of acceptance, of wisdom beyond death, but I finally think I will not.

Facts:

Phoenix is a month-old puppy.

Phoenix cannot walk.

Phoenix was not born that way.

Dad went and picked him up one cold night, after a neighbor left him near our home. Phoenix’s mum was apparently a stray, and the neighbor’s son had picked up the puppy.

The son broke Phoenix’s back, and so the father left the puppy near our home hoping “its mother would come and pick it up”.

My dad could not stand the puppy’s crying at night and picked it up….only to discover the broken back in the morning. The vet said the puppy had permanent spinal nerve injury, would never walk and it would be best to put it out of its misery. My dad, trying hard to be a realist, agreed.

The puppy was euthanised, and the vet gave it a dose that would kill a Rottweiler, because it kept waking up.

My dad left the bag hanging outside, and went to find a spade to give the poor mite a decent burial.

But when he came back, the bag was moving……and a groggy pup was peeping out! So the name Phoenix was born.(The vet nearly fainted when he saw Phoenix at his clinic the next day.)

Phoenix is full of beans and tries to drag himself everywhere on his forelegs. My dad has found a new occupation in his retired life: how to keep a handicapped puppy clean—because Phoenix pees and poos and rolls about in the mess with gay abandon, and does not act handicapped at all.

He has to be restrained with a soft cloth, because the vet says dragging himself around would give him a dangerously sore butt. Not that Phoenix cares.

My dad who had never done much to keep his own progeny clean, is found hovering over Phoenix all the time. He puts the pup in warm water to try and make it swim, massages its lifeless hind legs four times a day with medicines, takes it for a nerve injection everyday(the vet treats Phoenix for free and refuses to take money after being asked a dozen times) and so on.

Dad is extremely proud of Phoenix because he licks up the medicine without complaint, and has a wolf’s appetite for milk-soaked biscuits. (When I think of sheer will to live, I can’t think of anyone stronger than our tiny Phoenix:).

Phoenix has now started wagging his tail in greeting, and moving his hind legs very, very little, which has Dad in absolute throes of happiness.

Love has created many miracles.

Though the vet is not hopeful, I have a feeling Phoenix would walk—he has already come too far not to.