write a small stone today (& hurrays & thankyous)

in honour of this year's River of Stones, rather than reading a small stone today I'd like you to write one and post it here. here's our Hurrays & Thankyous post with links to all our marvellous guest bloggers.

while I'm at it, a huge thank you to all the contributors and readers of a handful of stones over the years. you rock. (hee hee)

_/\_ (deep bow)

tea
        from a broken bag
            floating on top

*

Robert Quiggle III

snow storm— the pregnant bear remains calm * P K Padhy

mahjong
cloudburst on a tin roof
then
fitful
drips

*

James Newton

Mudlark

The shore crumbles.
Beer caps spring up
like geysers. A thousand
metal detectors chirp.

*

Christian Ward

a mesh sack
          of garlic, one bulb broken
                where it's open

*

Robert Quiggle III

Birds
sing in circles
as the light dances

*

Kylie Dinning
Pausing to pick up small stones

break out

She glares at the bathroom tiles,
all identical, like her days.
She runs out,
pees in the backyard.

*

Debbi Antebi

“Crazy Daisies” – in hues of tangerine, saffron, carnelian and palest jade; a grocery-store bouquet of flowers aptly named she has to agree, given her state of mind from time to time, graces their kitchen table this week.

*

S. E. Ingraham

vacuum bar rail
all words-sucked smoke rings into the light above

*

Steve Myers
Broken Bats

reading to my children

my voice catches and tears escape
"mom stop!" they plead
and i remember
the terror of my mother's tears

*

lara simmon

making a desperate bid
for freedom via a leaky faucet

tap water.

*

Molly Guy

Nightmares hiccup explanations

of what you're doing here,
and why don't you leave?

*

Lee Sittler

Signs

Chest pains.

Nosebleeds
in the shower.

I’m not yet
thirty.

*

Jody Porter

rose garden
a child searching for
Thumbelina

*

Christine L. Villa
Blossom Rain

Five Geese

Out of the mist
in a row of beans
a gardener hears
five geese wing-bellow
low over his bent back.

*

David Fraser

THE SECOND GETTYSBURG ADDRESS

Tomorrow morning I am going to spend
an entire day studying a penny. I want to
figure out what it does. At night, I am
almost sure, it does nothing.

*

Ricky Garni

In the schoolyard, three thousand children are rendered anonymous by
numbers and blue track-suit uniforms. On the stage their classmates
dance in iridescent costumes. Teachers in black watch from the wings.

*

Bob Hale
The Hitting The Road Again Blues

I am full of want
and want for nothing but you
in Barcelona.

*

Guy Duperreault
egajd

guessing game -
from dusk to dawn
the sea darkens

*

Stella Pierides

A beige vase of clay
stands on rust brown kitchen cloths,
scissors at its side

*

Claudia Messelodi

Bikes in the window bragged of their journeys ~ past ~ future ~ and beamed back the sunlight's praise.

*

Kate

roots dangling
        where the wall
            fell down

*

Robert Quiggle III

The tick-tock sound of yeast expanding as I take the bowl of dough from the airing cupboard.

*

Freya Pickard
Dragonscale Clippings

Yesterday I found myself inexplicably nostalgic for the swallows of Rionero. These swift elegant birds are found in great flocks there and suddenly I was thinking about them swooping and diving and soaring the way they do, looking like they’re just narrowly avoiding each other . I was right back there, in southeast Italy, sitting on the steps of the dig-house, in the warm morning sun, sipping my frothy cappuccino and munching a fresh out-of-the-oven chocolate-filled cornetto, mesmerized by the swallows before I started my day, and I was over-whelmed with this longing to go back.

*

S. E. Ingraham

As sickly yellow wilts into crumbling brown,
two new shoots stretch from the soil.

*

mr oCean
The Electric oCean

millions of stars
in the summer sky--
I walk by myself

*

P K Padhy

millions of stars
in the summer sky--
I walk by myself

*

P K Padhy

The Fix

Miserable morning.

Warm white tea, cradled
between both palms,
sipped slowly.

Hope opens up.

*

Gareth Trew

Traces of Her

He returns home and picks up the empty packets from the syringes the paramedics had left, sits on the bed, and sinks.

*

James Alden

Luminous Moon

Full, luminous, silver moon casts a glow through the dark. Bright Venus hangs below. The Milky Way and the constellations counterpane the sky. A lamp shines in a window across the street where an old man keeps vigil at his wife’s bedside. And at the corner house, light shows through the curtains of the baby’s bedroom. The midlife insomniac, the elderly carer and the sleep-deprived new mother are all watched over. This too will pass.

*

Anne Stormont
Write Enough

Winter's Advent

Cherry blossoms press
themselves to windows
steamed by bathwater.

Shivering, I pull the lace
and long for the cherry tree
whose limbs I know
and petals I trust.

*

Belle DiMonté
Belle of Mountains

turning compost
          a bright green leaf
                of brussels sprout

*

Robert Quiggle III