Chalk Kisses And The Zen Of Sticks




Rain nestles on the window pane.
Grandchild 2 sits on the other office chair, eating peanut butter from a small jar.
She laughs at the waggle in birds’ tails as starlings hop on the ash branches. They are silhouette puppets to her.
Steampunk cloud sails in on a quickening squall. Starlings are sprung to flight.
We watch.
On the storm scale from eye-opening to life-threatening, this measures at come-to-the-beach.

Weary faces in the town, a hard night spent midwifing the New Year.
Without their ritualising, perhaps it would breech, fail to arrive.
We had watched Lilo and Stitch, drunk up some vodka with coconut milk, called to our year all our love for it. An easy beginning.

A mother, her daughter, her daughter’s daughter, they blink in the sanded wind, shut the car doors. Dog gets underfoot, too impatient.

On the sand Dog squats, too excited. Everyone is happy now for the gale to blow, salt scented.
Granma carries the bag up to the bin. Mess is not a surprise: but right there, interrupting the flow of people where they stream up and down the beach steps: Dog is comedic.

Waves splurge bold lines of foam. Three generations and one Dog stomp; some of the bubbles have rainbows trapped. Fluffed blobs take flight: alien, adorable, ocean snow.

Granma throws a stick, it arcs into a moving mass. Dog zigzags wave breaks, to retrieve, to start again. It’s the same game, but the waves vary. Dog practices stick Zen. Dog is happy.

Granma hears her title; the word finds a thermal and slides over the cold air; she turns.
Grandchild 2 has been given the knowledge of how one stone can make marks on another.
She chalks kisses and they must be shared.





Comments

Dixie@dcrelief said…
So lovely - your way with words entices the imagination to come play!
Geo. said…
Read this one aloud to Norma. Beautiful. You amaze me.
Cherdo said…
Lovely, sweet post. Happy New Year!
Lisa Southard said…
The invitation to play is the artist's greatest achievement :-) x
Lisa Southard said…
Feeling that lovely humble-proud stuff right now- thank you Geo :-)
Lisa Southard said…
Happy New Year to you also, thank you Cherdo!

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