Have been exploring flash fiction on, and off, and on again. Here’s a selection.
Pointlessness
I’ve never come to grips
With why the BBC
Called a TV game
Pointless
It is simply depressing
Let’s get real
If someone elects
To turn their TV on
Before the evening news
It is most likely
That they feel
That life is already
Pointless
And, maybe
That watching the news
Will flip them back into reality
But sadly
Brexit gives neither consolation
Or reality
It too
Is Pointless
Scoring is futile
History Herstory
history
herstory
photostory
backstory
lifestory
paststory
newstory
futurestory
lovestory
18th April 2018
Delicate Conversation Needed
She’d cherished the little pot for 40 years, remembers slipping it into her pocket when she found it, the rusty nails inside made a tinkling sound and the soot-blackened lid left a smudge on her coat. Cleaning revealed the silver cap and delicate, multi-faceted glass sides.
In her possession it had contained, variously, earrings, paperclips, moisturizers and face creams. Her daughter dipped her fingers into the coconut oil and asked her about the pot’s history. She’d always admired it and it fits in her hand perfectly. Soon, when she dies, her daughter will inherit it. Somehow she must tell her.
Published in thedrabble 17th April 2018
Writing Workshop with Sally O’Reilly at Spike Island
April 2018
Hush Hush Hush
The video shows someone being treated brutally. She’s in floods of tears. The persistent whacking of the man behind his knees with a truncheon makes her feel violently sick.
The man cries out stop, stop, please stop.
The repetition of the act echoes. The reiteration of power makes her recoil. Such incidents enter her body, churn her gut. Her sight goes fuzzy.
Hisbody
Herbody
Screaming. Again and again and again.
Her heart goes thump, thump, thump; sounds thicken inside her head. Vision blurs. Then breath returns, slow, steady. Quelling the thump thump thump, silencing the sensory cacophony.
Hush hush hush
Written 2016, edited April 2018
Russian Doll
I sit on the shelf, a little bit smug because, unlike the human that made
me, I hold all five of my children inside my rotund body – I get to carry
them all my life. My painter was a very good artist, he did us proud.
I enjoyed his gentle brushstrokes on my body when he worked on me. I
love the duck egg blue scarf he gave me. He painted flowers on our
tummies. We all have beautiful almond shaped eyes, I overheard
him say to his wife that our eyes were the same shape as hers.
Written 2016, edited February 2018
Carolyn Black 