… All you have to do is run toward it.
Out of this World – Weekly Photo Prompt
It’s Out There …
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Author Archives: Carolyn Dennis-Willingham, Author
A Quilted Journey
In every fabric of my soul
where fibers weave and thread
where stitching seems quite flawless
there are stains from when I bled
Ah, but isn’t it quite marvelous
to know this quilt has tracked
all my strains and struggles
yet I still remain intact.
Yes, I still remain intact.
— by C. Dennis-Willingham
photo image – quilt of Maya Angelou made by Faith Ringgold
via Fabric
Thank You, Yes, I’m Fine
Is my hair in little tangles
Do I laugh when I recline
Do I make my paintings messy?
Then, thank you, yes, I’m fine.
Do I lose my rhythm dancing
on a silvery cloud nine
and laugh since it don’t matter
if you laugh at my benign?
When I forget to wear the “good”shoes
where in fancy restaurant, dine
Can’t I let my toes be happy
while indulging my waistline?
Will you think of me uncouth if,
preferring the bus line,
I talk to random strangers
than the snobby, asinine?
Somewhere in the midst of fake
I have to draw the line
and teeter not upon it
but erect in my design.
And, thank you, yes, I’m fine.
Image credit, painting by Angela Morgan
via Messy
A Restart to Nothing New
Delma mashes her little nose up against the window of the car. I stay quiet, thinking about what lays ahead, something I don’t yet know about. I try to picture it, a town with gypsum snow under the ground, a town where Dad is happy, a town where….
“Where we goin’, Cono?” Delma whispers.
“I ain’t so sure Sis, but it’ll be someplace good ‘cause looky here, we’re ridin’ in a four-door automobile!”
She turns away from me then and keeps pressing her little nose up against the window until she finally gives in to sleeping on Mother’s lap. At least we are together, Delma and me. It’s just another place that I plan to watch over her. I want to keep her close by, so nobody can snatch her away again. As long as I can do that, it doesn’t make no difference where we are.
The car keeps humming slowly down the highway. I try to sleep but I can’t. Instead, I think about Mr. Ed Rotan and decide right then and there that “Cono, Texas” has a real good ring to it. Cono, Texas won’t just have snow gypsum under the ground and a railroad on top of it. It’ll have oil underground and derricks on the top, pumping night and day. I call them jacks “grasshoppers” because that’s just what they look like when they’re pumping up and down. They’re grasshoppers trying to hop away, but they’re stuck and have to settle for hopping up and down in the same place.
My town will have at least two good cafés that serve T-bone steaks and tea iced in clean tin jars, free to me since it’s my town.
My mind leaves Cono, Texas and I think again on Ranger, the town where I learned how to brush my teeth, where Ma and Pa have a farm and a house that you’ll always want to go back to, where Polo takes me anywhere I want to go. Ranger is about haircuts that teach you about boxing and about boxing that teaches you to keep standing up. It’s a town where a Tiger can stir the ground and make you a little sister.
Oh yeah. The town of Ranger teaches you that goats freeze, but hands burn.
I go back to the comfort of Cono, Texas, off the poor list and high on the hog. I don’t quite know what to expect, but I sure do like this red brick highway leading to someplace new. I’m thinking that everything’s going to be “copacetic,” like bright colorful times might be ahead, like we’re following a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.
But I don’t know nothin’ from nothin’.
Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper by C. Dennis-Willingham
photo credit
via Restart
More than a Bloody Moon
Dad is slumped over on me now; half of his weight is on my right side, my right arm under his. I walk him to his side of the bed hoping Mother won’t wake up and see how drunk he is, see the blood I didn’t get the chance to wipe off his face. He lies down and is out cold. He’s good for the night.
I go into my room and see Delma asleep on her bed. I lie down on mine and stare up at the ceiling. A dim light comes through my window. The half-moon pays me a visit, casts shadows of a kid named Cono who never could beat Hicks Boy.
Well, I guess Dad has met his own Hicks Boy.
I can’t believe I’m not jumping up and down, celebrating. I feel kinda sorry for him, my dad beaten by a cue stick. The same man who, to my knowledge, never lost a fight except for in the boxing ring with Shorty Houghton when I was three years old.
I also feel pretty good that I was there for him, did something for him that maybe he’ll remember. But it doesn’t really matter if he remembers. I will. For the first time, I felt useful to him.
I hear Mother scream. I snap back into the present, out of my daydream. Maybe she’s woken up, has seen blood on her sheets reflected in moonlight, seen the blood on Dad’s face.
I start to get up but the quiet has taken over. I think I might just go back to sleep but the silence only lasts for a moment.
Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper by C. Dennis-Willingham
Image credit
via Dim
Ah, Those Mentors Who Have Not Been Touched by the Absolute
I decided to look up one of my favorite words along with my favorite poet. Here’s what I got:
What? Emily Dickinson hasn’t posted anything within 14 days??
And then I thought of how we rekindle our own imaginations – through the eyes of children, of course.
Then, I thought of Shel Silverstein.
But this is my all-time favorite:
And, by the way – Just because Emily hasn’t posted in a while doesn’t mean she’s not alive.
see more here
via Imagination
Shepherding a Herd of Bullheads
Let us congregate together
to reach a common goal
of liberty and justice
to make the people whole.
Secure the budding children
the elderly and homeless
the rejected and the lonely
will no longer be an onus.
How hard is it to link our arms
to agree and thus succeed –
to reach solutions with accord?
It’s very hard, indeed.
images credit
via Congregate
Curiosity DID NOT Kill the Cat
You know what DID kill the cat? Fear. Fear encrusted the cat like a toxic blanket. Because of this, the cat, stuck high up in a tree, could not come down. He was paralyzed and not curious enough to see what would happen if he tried.
Curiosity encourages us to learn, to explore, to question. Curiosity leads to knowledge.
No one has ever said so, but I wonder sometimes if my questions make people think I’m nosy when I’m actually inquiring and attempting to gather information.
Answers gives us knowledge and truth sets us free.
So, be curious and climb down from that tree.
And, if you need to hang on for dear life, do it while standing firmly on the ground.
via Encrusted
photo credit
When Numbers Play Hopscotch
Although my body has never been flexible (can’t blame age for that one) I like to think I’m flexible in my thinking. But not always.
My opinions on important matters have remained constant – my position on gun safety, on child advocacy, on human rights.
And many things I used to love I have put on a shelf – Bikram Yoga, pilates (well, not too much love for that one), Italian lessons, playing piano, playing a djembe, oil and acrylic painting.
Not writing. I will always write. Now, however, I am focusing on children’s stories instead of novels.
I am learning more about photoshop, embroidery, Netflix.
One thing I know for sure: Change is constant.
And damn, I love that about this world.
Photoshopped for my children’s book, What Happened to Ten, a work in progress.
via Constant
Carolyn Dennis-Willingham 