Enga mellom fjella

4th period composition

4th period composition

Daryl flicked long raven locks and chose a pen with sable ink. She sat in English at her desk, poised to scratch, compose whatever crap the teacher wanted.

Daryl wrote her name in looping cursive across the sheet, scribbled across the top:

         Certain dreams I wish I could remember;
         certain nightmares I wish I had forgot.

At the teacher's prompt she began to jot:

The soil was gravel; the grass was sparse. In the lee of the sun, the shadows collected in the dirty drifts of snow. Spring was on the calendar but had not come.

The shades-of-shadows sighed. Trapped here in a cold Hell north of nowhere they dreamed of dappled maple shade and moist moss cover. The smell of clover lingered in their thoughts. But each day they woke to harsh reality: ice ruled here and snow gave little shelter. By the time the dawn stretched out its fingers the dreams were gone, forgot.

They wandered off each day among the stones and gravel beneath the grey of clouds that barely wet the soil. What would piss them off enough to wash the salt from dust? The lodgepole pines glowered at the rashness of their should'ves could'ves, oughts. Patience is a virtue here, best practiced by those, who blessed with cones and needles, fear only fire, not shadow, shade nor gusts.

They wheedled out existence in communion with the mundane ghosts that harbored them. Live folks ran rushed, too busy to provide them random hugs or spare a momentary thought. Their nightmares lurked behind each smile. They'd seen those grins and smirks before, hidden behind stale social graces over empty hearts, loathing camouflaged by dark designs they tattooed into titles and degrees wrought in ink from blackened blood.

They skirted around the nightmare of that cesspooled mud each day, afraid to touch the gleaming poison. Today it glimmered off the river, yesterday in a mirror of ice, tomorrow it would choose another spot. It never went away. The shades-of-shadows had studied the art of artifice with sword and pen but never Zen and the lessons learned from letting go and going to where their being could just be.

Each evening when the sun withdrew her fingers, scraping painted nails across regrets of indigo-bled sky, the shades-of-shadows cried:

         Certain dreams we wish we could remember;
         certain nightmares we wish we had forgot.

© 2009 Kåre Enga [165.450] 2009-02-23

I had left the comment "Certain dreams we wish we could remember; certain nightmares we wish we could forget." in a blog entry of darylm. He mentioned it would make a good story. So, I thought of growing up with Daryl Cole, who was a couple years older than me. I remember her long dark hair. I remember how I hated writing essays in English class, but most of all I just sat at the key board and began typing: The soil was gravel; the grass was sparse The poetic prose unraveled from there. [In English, Daryl is usually a male name... it comes from D'Arielle (note the feminine form in French) from the angel Ariel, the 'lion of God'. The first Daryl I ever knew was female.]

Blah Blah:

Walked to Greenough Park up the Rattlesnake yesterday. Nice mild sunny day that was cold in the shadows (hmmm ... see prose above ). Took a couple photos. Other than ice and dogs and dog shit, there wasn't much to note. A few people, a few kids. I may have seen a bird. The creek was rumbling by. Not much snow in the mountains, so if we don't have a rainy/snowy March-May, it'll run low come fire season.

I didn't do much! Did call family this past weekend. My mother and aunt as always and my cousin Carol. My cousin David's son is getting married in Miami next month ... Carol's daughter found a decent job which is excellent news as the economy is not good in a small old industrial town. And I also got to chat with my "heart's" sister Cyndy, who is in a convalescent home in Illinois dealing with psoriasis and diabetes and prescribed drugs that have wrecked havoc with her immune system. Cyndy was cheery as always.

MILLSTONES and MILESTONES and BLOGVILLE BOULDERS:

I managed to check out 23 blogs last night and leave 25 comments. My week's totals: 15th 21/23; 16th 13/13; 17th 26/28; 18th 17/17; 20th 15/16 and 21st 8/9. A grand total of 131 comments in who knows how many 'unique' blogs. And I missed a few. So ... having blogs checked as "My Favorites" works out okay, but I need to check only every other or third day. More than that is not reasonably feasible, especially if I ever shake my boredom, find some energy and get a life.

Montana: 44º at 13:00

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