Outside the clouds pile up like laundry, dirty, grey, tumbling on top of one another, decisively blotting out the sunshine so that the sun itself reminisces the moon, holding no danger to the naked eye.
Along with the accumulation, the sky's pitch changes into a minacious hue at once both an overripe green and a dusty road stopping in a deadend. As lighter clouds enter into the scene, like vinegar and soda, they brew up a storm.
Enceinte drops of water splash down into the graveled street only recently burried under drifts of snow; tiny bombs lobbed by devilish rainclouds. Carpenter and Black ants alike scurry deeper into their newly excavated nests, running along pretzeled tunnels before the rain swells their entrances shut.
The air, perfumed with an organic grime, grows dense with falling rain. Trees stand like wild women, arms outstretched, as they catch the first flying drops with their leafy hands. And the old mallard lets down its guard, coaxing downy balls of fluff into the pond to turn, bill under webbed toes, learning to fish for minnows.
Prompts for May 12, due by May 18:
- Use the words pitch, guard, and pretzel
- No humans are aloud to talk or have their thoughts voiced
- Allow the season of your piece to be prominent
- tag with gwwe
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Comments: 16
This is lovely writing! Rich with some delightfully original metaphors, evocative, redolent of the rain, and such an insightful, beautiful ending to boot. After all, if Nature's unexpected bounties do anything to us, it is to compel us to let down our guards, step back for a moment from the frenetic lives we lead , and look at Life with childlike eyes!
In that sense, the mallard is such a an intriguing, innovative and original metaphor for Nature's effect on all creation! It's for this reason I've come to love your writing so much - there's always something subliminal and something sublime about it ... the subliminal, ironically, flitting joyously about right there on the surface, the sublime forming its lotus-core!
And in this case, your piece was very educative too, for it brought into my consciousness two new words - enceinte and mallard. I'd never heard of them before - not even in my dreams! heheheh And minacious is one I haven't read in any writing in a long time - thanks for restoring it to my consciousness again, Susan!
This piece of yours is such a treasure - and with the way you've been rolling, Susan, I'm scared to death I'm swiftly going to turn that precious word into a horrible cliche! :)
Thanks for sharing this absolute gem with us. my friend. And wow, look at this - I just peeked out on hearing rainfall - and, after what's been the hottest summer in two decades, a sudden rainstorm, with driving rain that is making me dance in delight!
Susan, if this isn't synchronicity, nothing is! You just brought the rains to my suffering city, God! This is luvverly - excuse me while I kiss the sky!
(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((Susan)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Enceinte is a word that Atticus * used and I had to look it up, didn't forget it, either. Mallard is a very common duck around here. Sometimes in our yard, often in our ponds and lakes.
wicked bad is even better than wicked good. wicked is merely an intensifier. Only in Boston could we be known primarily for beans, banning and wicked.
I might try it this week. I like the prompts. A lot.
Vivid!