They grow in the dirt
They’re pretty incredible
And they are also
entirely Edible!
Violas
Rose pedals
Tulips
Daylily
Empress of India (variety of nasturtium)
(Just to name a few)
Yumsters
1
Category Archives: Daily post
Unhinged
Sofie was naked, of course, having stripped off her clothing as soon as she returned from the fabric store. She didn’t bother transferring the eggs to a plate. She stood over them, eating from the skillet. Besides there was no one to talk to but herself and, right now, the way she was feeling, it was good enough.
Perhaps it was the opium coursing through her that made them so beautiful. Little fried eggs showing up like new suns, waiting to be devoured. Her fork pierced the middle, the yellow sunrays spreading throughout the pan like a new day. The sight was so fascinating; she hesitated before taking a bite. But yes, eat the new day, Savor and enjoy. The egg slid down her eager throat. Taking the remaining butter from beside the stove, she smeared it on her arms, then her breasts. She was a new egg on a new day.
CD-W
Daily post word of the day: Savor
Forgivenss: NOW OPEN!!
clipart by CD-W
Grandma parked her Ferrari
and rushed through the door
of the Moxie Courageous Everything Store.
“I need one sturdy jump rope,
two twenty-pound weights,
elbow and knee pads
and blue roller skates.”
“Will that be all?” the salesman said.
Grandma looked at the ceiling
and then shook her head.
“I need a large sack of forgiveness,
‘No cost,’ I was told,
‘If you give it out freely,
it will lighten your load.'”
He pulled down the sack
from the highest of shelves
and smiled when he said,
“I might give some myself.”
She lifted her items
and knew who she’d call
for the bag wasn’t heavy,
not heavy at all.
Daily word prompt: Moxie
The Roaring Twenties
A party Tailored to celebrate my 1917 Parlor Grand Steinway around ten years ago. (Me in the middle)
If it crawls up your drawers
“So’s what she found a scarf? Who wouldn’t pick it up if it weren’t attached to a person?” Reba’s hands might have been in the kitchen when Meta came home, but her ears were everywhere in the house. She knew what had happened.
“It belongs to that missing Temperance girl, Rebie.”
“And ‘member that red hat I’s left at Market Square? Belongs to somebody else now. That Sadie might have a stubborn streak miles long, but she wouldn’t hurt a Bumble bee ‘less it crawled up her drawers.”
Had it? Had the Temperance women hovered over her, gotten too close? Invaded her safety? Sadie had become a barbed-wire fence that kept others out or, perhaps herself in.
What was Sadie keeping from me?
Excerpt from The Last Bordello
daily word prompt: Bumble
Missing Moms
Maybe Frank doesn’t like the quiet since I’ve stopped talking because he says, “Emma June, I’m sorry about your mom being gone.”
My eyes water. I grab a stick, snap it in two.
“I’m sorry you don’t get on with your real mom,” I mutter.
“Maybe I’d like her if she’d raised me. She didn’t. She gave that job to her sister. I only live with her now because Aunt Sissy died. I don’t have any other kinfolk.”
Like me. I only have Daddy now. “What does your mom do in Holly Gap?”
“Nothing really. Takes in ironing. Doesn’t leave the house unless she makes enough to buy groceries. Sulks mostly.”
Like Daddy. But when I’m around, he tries to Bury his sadness.
“She never drives anywhere, takes you places?” I ask.
Frank shakes his head and gives me a devilish eye. “Sometimes I get to drive her old jalopy, though. When Aunt Sissy died, Ma got the junk heap and me.”
Now I feel bad about giving him that dog food sandwich.
Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket, 1928
daily post prompt: Bury
Shootin’ Sunshine
Cono Dennis, my father
Here I go again, on the way back to Sweetwater. Not to get a donkey but to shoot Sunshine, My Only Sunshine.
Driving down the highway, Aunt Nolie doesn’t talk much, at least not with her mouth. She clutches that steering wheel like she’s about to squeeze all the Texas sand and Grit out of it and that’s a whole conversation in itself.
We finally get to Sweetwater and park in front of the Lucky Star Bar.
“Cono, ye wait right here.”
“OK,” I say, since I’ve already met the woman, who’s about to be shot anyway.
I sit in the car, again. I watch the people come and go, again, except this time, the ones that had been going were coming and the ones that had been coming were now going. I wait for the sound of a gunshot, the sound I’ve become familiar with when I hunt with my dad. I wait alright ‘cause there’s nothing else for me to do.
Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper
daily word prompt: Grit
A frolic food?
“This is good. What the hell is it? Huh? An aphrodisiac, you say?”
That’s what I said the first time I ate one off a cheese plate.
The Caper berry is a Mediterranean fruit that grows on a thorny plant. They are actually the buds that are picked before they flower into white blossoms. In Biblical times, the caper berry was supposed to have aphrodisiac properties. Hmm… Perhaps, when ingested, they help us frolic about and have a mischievous caper of our own.
Suggestion: eat sparingly 🙂 🙂
daily word prompt: Caper
The Brute at the Butcher Shop
Savage. An appropriate name for a butcher.
The door ajar, the stench of raw meat penetrated my nose, but the familiar voice inside stopped me from running past. “Hold on, Sadie.”
“What?” Sadie bent down, retying her bootlaces.
I peeked inside the butcher shop. Miss Reba stared up at the burly man towering over her. “No sir, you must’a misunderstood I’s just—”
“Don’t tell me I misunderstood.” He drew his arm across his chest then slapped Miss Reba across the face with the back of his hand. She tumbled sideways, her head smacking the edge of a table before she hit the floor.
“Colored’s always have to wait,” he added.
My blood curdled as I rushed to her side. “Miss Reba!”
“What have you done?” Sadie yelled behind me.
I knelt beside Miss Reba. “Ach Gott. Are you all right?”
She moaned and lifted a limp hand to the side of her head where blood dripped onto the floor.
“She needs to wait her turn, ain’t that right butcher?” the brute said.
Mr. Savage stood there, his mouth open. The patrons gasped and whispered. No one came forth. What was wrong with these people?
Sadie glared at the man and reached inside her small black purse. She unfolded a man’s shaving knife, stood and approached him. “If I pricked you with this, you’d squeal like a stuck pig.”
My mind blurred. What does it take to kill someone? To sacrifice one’s self for a cause?
The bearded man pointed a finger at Sadie. “Whoa, now girlie …”
“And then, our butcher will take you for a hog,” she said. “After hanging you on a meat hook, he’ll slit you from neck to belly until you bleed out. Isn’t that right, Mr. Savage?”
Mr. Savage blinked a few times and cleared his throat. “Sadie, you best look after Miss Reba there.”
The abuser’s nostrils flared. He pointed a finger inches from Sadie’s face. “You need to shut that vulgar trap ‘a yours, Missy. Surely you got a sheriff in town who can lock you up for pulling a weapon on me.”
“ Unmensch! Her weapon?” My words hurled forth, surprising me. “Your hand was a weapon! You hurt Miss Reba.”
Sadie glanced side to side. “We have the best county sheriff in the state. Looks like he’s not here right now. So, the next time any of us return to purchase pork, including this fine lady on the floor bleeding the same color red as everyone else, you might be the pig we get to eat.”
The man clenched both hands into fists. “Why you …”
Excerpt from The Last Bordello
Missing the country-side
Electric streetcar rails made circular patterns on the paved intersections of busy streets while the trolley’s bells deafened my rural ears. Businesses of every kind lined up one after another, many sharing common walls. Women wore feathers and stuffed birds attached to their hats and paraded them down the street like migrating nests. Barouche carriages transported men and women in their finery. At least the clamor and Jangle of wagons pulled by tried horses reminded me of home.
I set my luggage down and rubbed my tired arms.
Excerpt from The Last Bordello, 1901
Carolyn Dennis-Willingham 