Day's End

The threshold - an invisible barrier between the never-ending hum of the larger spaces under the pitched roof; beyond, a diffused calmness longed for as the shadows claim the places once dappled with sunlight and sound.

Feet sink into thick carpet, pleasingly cushioning weighted steps across the room. Antique lace curtains ripple as summer puffs tiny breaths of coolness scented by Moonflowers in through a trio of oak framed windows - the cascade of night voices rise and fall as if in unison with the gentle winds. A well-worn overstuffed chair sits beside the lacquered old sewing box that was her mother's, its contents neatly arranged by size and color. Filtered moonlight echoes back from the mirror over the decades old wooden bureau and illuminates the gilded frames which hold the smiling faces of her most beloved. Beyond, the simple bed adorned in hand quilted finery beckons repose.

London

There's a London phone booth sitting in the doorway. This is where she keeps her DVDs. And her reading lamp. Her reading lamp is from Peter Pan, but she never turns the light on because there are lights built into the ceiling. There are suitcases from the early 20th century filled with nothing. And candle shrines, sparkling bottles filled with lights. Magic wands and remote controls. 5 guitars that shine abalone. Percussion and piano. Her finest purchase is a cheeseboard that she uses for everything but cheese. These are the things my sister collects in her bedroom. These are the things that make her bedroom my favorite home away from home.

Beach Scene

A peach bedspread loomed in quilted ridges across a four-poster bedframe made of scrolled metal painted white. The headboard rolled in curlicues like a pale gothic mansegate, and the posts were twisted like barber poles. On the wall facing the bed there was a window, and over this was a luminous stained glass picture of a beach scene with a massive gilded frame. Rolling turquoise waves glowed obscenely, and in the upper left corner, a brilliant red sun squatted, top-wide and fat. Black seagulls crawled flylike across a pork-pale, iridescent sky. Through the whole thing you could see faintly the stubbled brown backyard, a rusted swingset, and the clouding top of a brackish arborvitae studded with crows.

Portrait of a Bedroom

Hi from the Herkimer!

Hard, grey cat turds festooned every corner. There was nothing on the scuffed white walls but a large poster of Boy George.

This week, describe a person by describing that person's bedroom.

Write with guts!

Filthy carpets, galley windows, and multiple cats,

HERKIMER

Ahhh, Shit!

"Oops," he said. And it was the last thing he said, although it was not the last thing that ran through his mind - that was "Fuck, this hurts.", as the blue bus slammed into him. His body burst like a blood balloon, a bloodblot on the windshield. His face scraped along the pavement, his left eye popped out of his skull and the last thing that eye saw was the face of a young child by the side of the road. She was holding an ice cream cone and had a cream mustache that had dripped into a white Fu Manchu. He assumed it was vanilla, but it could have been rocky road.

Nancy

Nancy was constantly terrified of death, but this didn’t stop her from dying when she did. As always, on an errand to which someone else was driving, she kept the muscles in her shoulders tense and imagined what prevention she would utter if each mishap she imagined should come near to actual occurrence: watch that drifter; hasn’t rained in a while; that man’s in a hurry; that biker’s got the jitters. She noticed every wobbly hubcap and sometimes checked the lights for synchronicity—she had heard that in New Orleans not even the stoplights were back to normal, and God knows, times were getting tough in every old hill and borough, and it was bound to happen sooner or later. She had looked out the window up at the clear blue day and relaxed her guard for an instant to think of the pineapple she had eaten earlier that week—it was a good pineapple, sweet and juicy without too much of that stuff which stuck like brittle cloth threads in your teeth—when a truck swung out of the left turn lane on the opposite side and, without quite as much sound as you would expect from such a thing, took the whole passenger side clean off, Nancy with it.

Flash Fiction: Obituary

She turned from locking the top deadbolt on the door and straightened her shoulders as she stepped into the hall, remembering her posture, and as she did so she walked smack-dab into an intruder who reached out and grabbed her neck and snapped it like an old wood bow.

Hi from the Herkimer!

This week, write a short piece about someone's death. Make it either a poem or under 300 words.
No suicides! (Unless they're accidental.)

Write with guts!

Ladder falls, fishing accidents, and unfortunate occurrences at dinner parties,

HERKIMER