Mi papá:
Escribo este porque
Siempre quiso que escribiera
Para mi profesión,
Por mi vida.
Breakup in Alaska
They call it “breakup” when —
The earth begins to warm
And the trees shed their winter coats
Spreading their prickled fingers
And stretching like a cat to meet the sun
That has spent so many months in hibernation —
Spring is breaking up with winter.
Reddit writing prompt: You receive a mysterious package in the mail. It contains a smartphone with a single app: “Planet Earth Settings”
I stare at the phone from its place on the other side of the couch. It sat there ever since I had retrieved the mail a few hours ago. All I wanted to do was find the owner, but when I had opened the screen to find a contact list, it was already loaded on something that I could only describe as a weather screen and I barely touched it when the snow starting fluttering from the sky. In July. In Arizona. I promptly waltzed into the house, threw the phone onto the couch, and sat on the other side to watch it, drinking my way through a six-pack.
Reddit writing prompt: Cuddles is a good boy
The good boy found her, a blonde angel in her blue robes, resting upon a bed of freshly-fallen snow.
Canonical Literature of Choice: The Baby-sitters Club through a Feminist Application
Analyzing feminism through the tween book series, The Baby-Sitters Club.
Grief:
comes unannounced, unwanted.
It is the uninvited houseguest that arrives laden with its baggage
and leaves its messes on the floor,
in the kitchen,
in the hallway,
and smears ugly, wet stains on the pillows.
It is the unwashed clothes,
the dirty dishes,
the neglected chores,
and the suitcase with his t-shirts and cologne under the bed.
Reddit writing prompt: Miss Matilda Honey nee Wordwood, we are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted to Hogwart’s…
It had been a long time since she used her powers. After her birth family left hurriedly for Spain and Jennifer Honey formally adopted the young girl, Matilda’s frustrations and anger dissolved overnight, replaced with a warmth and love in her heart that hadn’t been there before. She either didn’t have the compulsions to act out in her special way or she simply couldn’t if she didn’t have the anger to fuel her. Whatever the reason was, Matilda didn’t mind, nor did she try to exercise her gifts again. That is, until the owl came.
Matilda heard a strange tapping that roused her from a deep sleep. Squinting at her bedside clock, it was nearly midnight. She figured she was imagining things and pulled her Punky Brewster duvet over her head.
Reddit writing prompt: After 2 decades of extreme isolation, North Korea decides to contact the outside world but finds it abandoned
The last relief delivery had arrived nearly twenty years ago, almost like an afterthought.
Heavy rains caused a land slide that wiped out a significant portion of Samjiyon-kun. Nearly a week later, the humanitarian trucks lazily crossed their way over from China and brought not even a quarter of what was expected.
The incident occurred at the time the Dear Leader arrived in the beloved city to assess the damage and, enraged at the weak and delayed response, ordered all of the truck drivers shot and forced the remaining distributors to march back and try their luck swimming across the Tumen River. As a consolation prize, Dear Leader kept the fleet of a dozen vehicles and choice selections from each, leaving the infested rice and fortified bread for the grateful citizens who remained in Samjiyon.
Ice cream (without Dad)
I waited to pick up my order at the Dairy Queen
down the street from where my grandparents once lived.
Reddit writing prompt: Native Americans are able to push back the European colonization
“Father.” The young man nervously ran his fingers over his scalp, then tugged at the edge of his black braid. It was a nervous habit he developed as a child and it came out whenever he was telling a lie or nervous to tell the truth. This was the latter situation.