I found the small book when we had to pack Grandpa's things so he could move out of that old house, and into an old people's apartment building. Mom said it would be better for him there, people could watch him and take care of him. Better care than she could, she said.
I said I could do it, but she said I had to go to school, and I never even walked the dog before he went to live on that farm we see on the side of the highway between our house and Grandpa's.So how could I expect...
The wind whistled around me, caressing me like i was its lover. Its icy touch leaving trails of fire all over my skin. I felt like i was the only man alive, standing on the pinnacle of planet earth. The ocean loomed below me, looking so warm and inviting, the waves pounding on the rocks relentlessly. The waves foamed like a dog with rabies, frothing at the mouth. It beckoned me to reach its dark depths
My legs trembled. it would be oh so easy to just jump
The gust gathered behind me, as if it was pushing me over...
To the President of the United States,
Please do not pass this law. There are many people who depend on life support for long periods of time and then come back to resume normal lives. If you allow family members to 'pull the plug' if they cannot afford the medical treatment, many people of little means will die. I know this because I am a paraplegic. When I lost my legs, I spent some time on the very machines in question. My family couldn't afford the treatment, and paid bills for years to make it right. I am now a...
Skipper was panting from the last half hour of running, in fact he was frothing at the mouth. Compared to the rest of his pack however, Skipper was doing quite well. In their eerily black and white world, one of their best friends had begun to experiment on the poor dogs, and now, their world had exploded inexplicably into a cosmos of strange and disconcerting qualities. The farmer had, much to Skipper and the other dogs' dismay, altered the K-9's to the point that they had been forced to trust their previously useless eyes more than their noses. What had...
"I got a garbage brain," he sang as he swam.
"What?" she asked, spitting water.
"I got ninety six ears and ninety six eyes," he continued.
She knew she wasn't going to get a straight answer out of him and plunged down under the surface. She let the air escape her lungs as she sank deeper into the turquoise water.
A brightly coloured fish swam passed her. She wondered what kind of fish it was. She wondered why she hadn't ever been curious about fish before. Her lungs started to hurt.
She kicked and stroked and soon broke the surface....
Anyway, after the assembly, the fourth-graders signed up for whatever instrument interested us.
"I like the saxophone!" So my parents signed me up for the saxophone.
Later, when we went to the music rental shop, I was presented with the saxophone. I was confused as it did not resemble what I thought was a saxophone. Where was that brass tube that slid in and out?
What a dumb kid! I wanted to play the trombone, but thought it was called a saxophone. I never protested, shy and passive as I was. So I learned to play the saxophone.
I never...
The man wrote to the woman down by the river Yo. He had finished in the fields and his brother was calling from the high hill.
"Young!" he screamed "the soldiers are here!"
The man dropped his pen. The notepaper, pink and full of tiny perforations the man had made in the shape of a lotus flower, flew in the direction of a crane's nest. A young bird who was wading blinked at it. Soon, it began to rain.
The soldiers carried out the brother and left behind the others. A girl ran to the river for the pen as...
...and the walrus said to the jellyfish, "but see, I have tasks, so I can accomplish far more than you can, you spineless twit." And the jellyfish replied back, "that may be true, but I am far more viscous than you will ever be!"
And thus the walrus and the jellyfish commenced forth with their plan of under-sea domination by overthrowing king Neptune with their vast army of rabid seahorses. It was a long battle and many comrades were lost, but in the end, peace and order had been returned to the likes of the ocean.
Until one day when...
White sky. The sky was so white. Sky-white. Sky-writing white smoke in the white sky.
But the bayou was blue. I'm humming it now. Bayou-blue. The snapped crayon read "you-blue."
I wanted to say something. What do I want to say. I raced through my mind looking for a word. Where is it?
What is it?
Sky-white? Bayou-blue. Nah, neither of them. I want to say "succumb" or "parse". Maybe "grenadine"?
I peeled the surface of the bayou up like a t-shirt transfer. But too soon. The corner wrinkled.
The sky went blue
I don't even notice as he walks up behind me and presses something into my hand. "See you later," and he's gone. I open my palm and see the huge plastic easter egg that he gave me. It's a light purple and blank, no clues. Carefully, hopefully, I open it up. "Please, please let there be a note inside. Please." I pop it open and look inside. Nothing. But it's not empty. It's full of disappointment. Disappointment and a single tear.