Outside the earth and stone cobbled cottage, winds howled and screamed through winter bone trees, aged sentries silent in their solemnity stood witness to the bareness laid waste by the season.
Inside, the venerable Alchemist, struggling to find focus long since abandoned in disillusionment, stood patiently in staid determination. As the hour, poised at midnight’s doorstep, exhaled 1 minute past 12, she walked to the carved wooden table with its time worn glyphs and began situating various jars and bottles, potions, liquids… and metal.
Hours drifted dreamlike; while the Alchemist’s work intensified, shadows joined each other to dance by the light of the hearth’s fire, passion reigniting as Devil’s Hour drew near. Punctilious, dawn was announced by the rambunctious warbles, chirping and cheeping of woodland birds, unusual only in volume and intensity; opening the front door to the cottage, the Alchemist stepped out and into a new day.
Snow Moon, celestial ornament hanging low in the western sky, Sun ascending the horizon, golden light reflected off trees new with greenery, leaves dripping light dew as reddened rose buds opened shyly, daffodils and daisies dancing effusively in yellow along the garden path… “yes” whispers the Alchemist, “magic reigns once more”.
Welcome to GirlieOnTheEdge and another edition of Six Sentence Stories!
“Ya ever have one of those days?” A simple phrase, yet when spoken as a rhetorical question, conveys so much, lol. Written or verbal, those 7 words accords us a glimpse into the kind of day the speaker had without giving us any specific details. A colloquial expression, the inference is crystal clear…not a good day! Words alone are not magic. Words grouped in sentences, now that’s a different story. And speaking of…. why not group sufficient words to construct precisely 6 sentences and tell us a story, share a poem, or invite us to read the newest installment from your latest book or serial.
Share some magic 🙂
Rules of the hop: Write 6 Sentences. No more. No less.
Use the current week’s prompt word.
Link the URL to your post via the blue “Click here to enter” button below.
Link is live Wednesday through Saturday night late!
Spread the word and put in a good one to your fellow writers 😀
Clarissa carefully put her notebook in it’s special hiding place, the only one of her books she kept secret and locked away from the prying eyes of her older brothers.
No way would she chance any of them finding it, reading it and then making fun of her until she cried.
It was Christmas 4 years ago, when Clarissa was 7, that she’d awakened a little after midnight, went to her bedroom window, stood on tip toes to look out and up into the twinkling star night, and saw Santa Clause being pulled across the sky in his sleigh by his reindeer.
Sadly, no one in her family had believed the young girl, not one of them and so she kept her thoughts of that magical night to herself and as she grew older she developed a certain flexibility that allowed her to consider that anything is possible, we have only to be open to the idea of it; no requirements other than to believe.
It may not be the proper holiday for proving the impossible is possible but that was no deterrent to Clarissa, besides, she knew her family well enough that they would think it was either trick or treat, and she had no doubt they were going to be surprised….
I have a coupla posts about the Cat. So what? Of mice and men, cats and magic….there but for the grace of the Cat go I. Timelines? Did someone mention timelines? What? That was “timeframe”? I see.
I’m thinkin’ I have one more post about the Cat here. I mean, who doesn’t have a “Trilogy”? Back to the Future, The Matrix…The Godfather. Besides, you know what they say about trilogies. OK, the number 3 at least…. “it happens in 3’s, they go in 3’s, 3rd times a charm”, etc.
All of us can easily conjure up on the giant screen inside our brains, famous movie trilogies. Or recollect fondly? from our formative years the various religious references involving trilogies -Father, Son, Holy Ghost, Taoist Trilogy, the theory of clarks, scotts, rogers.… Aren’t there 3 major food groups? And what about the I, IV, V? Huh? Huh?! Triads, whether they be religious, criminal, physical or musical in nature, are significant.
Life is a triad. Can we call it a Trilogy? There are 3 “events”: we’re born, have a “life” and we die. 3 components that are linked and intertwined, in my humble opinion, in an Escher kind of way. There is no starting point A that immediately and linearly produces the B that ends with the flatline C. As a clarklike female, I prefer to think of life more like a Mobius strip and my existence as simple “configuration space”. I know what you’re thinkin’ about now….”any minute Girlie’s gonna go off on a Pythagorean rant with a side dish of discourse regarding the importance of adhering to proper Euclidian etiquette when in the company of well to do, hypontenustic people. LOL
……don’t worry. I’m better now. Sometimes when we freefloat, ponder the past, search the present or plan for the future we find ourselves veering off into all sorts of uncharted territory – landscapes morphed by memory, the litter of lingering feelings strewn along the roadsides… it’s easy to miss the paw prints. But if we are lucky, like little Jamaal, we’ll have a shoulder upon which to perch for however brief the moment, and the world will open up again to life lessons and the Cat….
There may or may not be a select few who, upon arriving at today’s post, will question the wisdom? the audacity? of writing a second post headlining…..the Cat. Known in certain circles as Arthur, he is, (like King Arthur of the Knights of the Round Table), a legend. The origins of this legend? A small, southern Rhode Island community circa early 1980’s. All I can say, dear readers, is that the feline in question (for those who have witnessed) is a Diety among Dieties. And someone you do not want to mess with!
If you have any doubts about what I have written thus far you have to go no further than here . I dare you to ask the Ragman how it was he found himself in the parking lot of The Wakefield Mall this past Saturday night, a little before 8:00 pm EST, standing, waiting beside his car. He will tell you he was there ostensibly to physically participate in the Wakefield Doctrine Saturday Night Drive Call In Show. “No, he did not step into a black Lincoln Town Car with tinted windows but he might as well have….”
If we are lucky enough, there will be a person (or the Cat) who crosses our path and demonstrates for us that life, reality itself isn’t always, shall we say, linear. They will lead by example, show us the ropes and in the case of the Cat, demonstrate that Magic is as real as the keyboard I am using to form these sentences.
You see in the picture, the Cat (Arthur) and his young acolyte (Jamaal). (“Why yes, fortune did look favorably upon Jamaal the day Arthur took him under His paw.”) You know what is amazing? Never, during his brief tutelage, did Jamaal ever question or complain about his training. Not when he found himself snatched up by the scruff of his fluffy little neck, dangling precariously from Arthur’s mouth (for purposes of relocation more pleasing to the Cat); not when he found himself flung (in a single swipe from the larger than life paw) to the far side of the couch because he was blocking the Cat’s view of the T.V. (“hey, it was the playoffs for goodness sake. what’s a Diety to do?”) In Jamaal’s young and formative mind, hanging from the jaw of the Cat now and again or being “helped” to the other side of the couch was simple payment for life lessons learned.
Lessons such as “the act of looking is not the same as the act of seeing”. Or that “not seeing a thing doesn’t necesssarily mean it does not exist”. It is true that very early on Jamaal learned to never lose sight of the Cat, even while engaging in something as simple and congenial as taking nourishment together. You can’t see it in the picture but our little acolyte, without lifting his tiny head is, in fact, periodically looking at his Mentor. You know, just in case….
[did someone over at that other blog make mention of good bass playing? I got your bass playing right here buddy. right here. oh, btw, there is more to come. and heads up – it’s gonna take a big ole lint brush to clean up all the cat hair]
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