start time: 2:12 pm
As another assignment for my creative writing class, I was asked to describe the physical transformation of a protagonist, as Franz Kafka does in The Metamorphosis.
---
I am becoming my grandfather's pocketwatch. The one I misplaced a week ago.
We were in Salt Lake, and I was to load in the herds at precisely 3:08 pm, when I realized it was missing. But I still heard the ticking.
"All Aboard!" I yelled, and the steady beat persisted. It was different than the meter of my watch--this I could feel inside my bowels.
The next morning, my blue trousers seemed a bit more snug. By the end of the day, I had lost my button. It had shot off in the smoking cabin, flying through the air like an engine at full speed. My waist was widening, growing sideways so that my once narrowest part had become the broadest.
I waddled into the changing room and exchanged my uniform for a larger set. My skin felt cold as I undressed, cool and hard like metal. My face looked a dull, yellowish-bronze in the dirty mirror, like finger smudged gold. I spun myself around and noticed the faintest etch on my back: TDH.
My arms and legs shrunk. The hair on top of my head became rigged, a hinge appeared on my right side, and I felt queasy, as if something was moving around in my gut. I still had no watch and no real sense of time. But I prayed that we were on schedule, and used my internal ticking to count the minutes at each station.
But it is my job to know the time, to inform passengers of our progress, to give the appearance of quality, expertise, and efficiency. When asked, I'd rely on my knowledge of schedule and the racing scenery and guess. "We're scheduled to arrive in Sacramento at 4:09, Sir. I'd say we're about an hour away."
But today as I wobbled down the aisle, punching holes into passengers’ tickets, a woman insisted for the precise time, as I had it.
I shrugged, and pushed the bump that has been swelling atop of my head. Instantly, my jacket swung open, my belly gaping like a clam and revealing a tea-stained face with black roman numerals and hands. "11:42 on the dot."
I snapped myself closed and rolled into the next car.
end time: 3:33 pm
Showing posts with label fiction. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fiction. Show all posts
Sunday, March 11, 2012
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
the exquisite corpse
start time: 7:32 pm
"The exquisite corpse shall drink the new wine."
A few weeks ago (yet again in my creative writing class), I was introduced to the "exquisite corpse" method. Invented by the Surrealists in an attempt to break one's imagination free from the constraints of the subconscious, it is a phrase or sentence collectively assembled in a group that follows a basic rule.
Our rule was a favored standard: (1) article and adjective; (2) noun; (3) verb; (4) article and adjective; (5) noun.
"The butterfly moon eats a screaming comb."
The following short piece was inspired by this sentence.
---
In my town, no one believes that cheese comes from milk. Milk is Magic. It appears in the empty glass bottles we leave at our side door each morning, and vanishes into our coffees and cakes, with our cereals and cookies. In no way does it have anything to do with cheese. Cheese is not Magic; we know exactly where it comes from.
The man in the moon makes our cheese, and each night he shuttles down blue cheese crumbles and blocks of brie to us on the backs of tiny space-cows and tiny space-goats, who ride shooting stars while listening to Bach, or so it was written very long ago.
But in my family, we know the secret behind it all, that this simply isn’t true. Cheese does come from milk--milk from cows and goats, sure, but ones who live on farms and chew on grass all day long.
The man in the moon, in fact, is a fake. He’s a cover up for something even more fantastic and remarkable, something completely beyond the imaginations of rational beings (which, is why, I’m forced to have faith in her existence): the Moon Bunny.
She has ears that stick up and soft fur, but other than that the Moon Bunny is unlike any bunny around here. She doesn't wiggle her nose nor chomp on carrots. No, this bunny is far more wonderful. She is a keeper of sacred butterflies. (But, just like this fantastic bunny, these butterflies are unlike any butterflies you or I have ever seen.)
Each day, before the moon has risen and after it has set, the Moon Bunny hops around her lunar Eden, tending to brightly colored flowers and a nursery of caterpillars. Once they’ve swaddled themselves in their silk cocoons, she coaxes them out with a lullaby and gives them a good scratch with a screaming comb. They hover amongst the sweet flowers for just a while and then, when they are all ready, she releases them into space for us to see, and as they flutter they reflect the shine of the sun.
“Meteor showers,” our scientists call them. And how quick everyone is to believe!
end time: 8:50 pm
"The exquisite corpse shall drink the new wine."
A few weeks ago (yet again in my creative writing class), I was introduced to the "exquisite corpse" method. Invented by the Surrealists in an attempt to break one's imagination free from the constraints of the subconscious, it is a phrase or sentence collectively assembled in a group that follows a basic rule.
Our rule was a favored standard: (1) article and adjective; (2) noun; (3) verb; (4) article and adjective; (5) noun.
"The butterfly moon eats a screaming comb."
The following short piece was inspired by this sentence.
---
In my town, no one believes that cheese comes from milk. Milk is Magic. It appears in the empty glass bottles we leave at our side door each morning, and vanishes into our coffees and cakes, with our cereals and cookies. In no way does it have anything to do with cheese. Cheese is not Magic; we know exactly where it comes from.
The man in the moon makes our cheese, and each night he shuttles down blue cheese crumbles and blocks of brie to us on the backs of tiny space-cows and tiny space-goats, who ride shooting stars while listening to Bach, or so it was written very long ago.
But in my family, we know the secret behind it all, that this simply isn’t true. Cheese does come from milk--milk from cows and goats, sure, but ones who live on farms and chew on grass all day long.
The man in the moon, in fact, is a fake. He’s a cover up for something even more fantastic and remarkable, something completely beyond the imaginations of rational beings (which, is why, I’m forced to have faith in her existence): the Moon Bunny.
She has ears that stick up and soft fur, but other than that the Moon Bunny is unlike any bunny around here. She doesn't wiggle her nose nor chomp on carrots. No, this bunny is far more wonderful. She is a keeper of sacred butterflies. (But, just like this fantastic bunny, these butterflies are unlike any butterflies you or I have ever seen.)
Each day, before the moon has risen and after it has set, the Moon Bunny hops around her lunar Eden, tending to brightly colored flowers and a nursery of caterpillars. Once they’ve swaddled themselves in their silk cocoons, she coaxes them out with a lullaby and gives them a good scratch with a screaming comb. They hover amongst the sweet flowers for just a while and then, when they are all ready, she releases them into space for us to see, and as they flutter they reflect the shine of the sun.
“Meteor showers,” our scientists call them. And how quick everyone is to believe!
end time: 8:50 pm
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
laughing and crying
start time: 1:40 pm
NPR's All Things Considered has this contest, "Three Minute Fiction," for listeners to submit original pieces of fiction that can be read in three minutes (or are 600 words) or less.
I've never submitted anything, but I like to think of the prompts as practice.
Here is an about-130-word-too-long piece I've been working on. The prompt, "laughing and crying," asks for one character to laugh and another to cry.
---
He just won't stop. He won't. Not even for a second.
"I'm feeding him at least every two hours--shit, Ma, my nipples are killin' me. And I swear to God I'm changin' him like every second."
I try the whole bouncing and rocking and singing and cuddling and cooing and humming and swaddling, but nothing works. He still makes that noise that makes me want to cry like I did on my wedding day.
"It's normal, honey. Every new mommy goes through this," Ma assures me, her voice breaking through the plastic receiver. "It'll get easier, you'll see."
Well it's been three weeks and I haven't slept more than an hour a night for any of it. Besides, I can't bear to talk to her much anymore. Not as the big disappointment I am, the one who coulda "gotten out" with that scholarship but got knocked-up halfway through junior year. And now I can't even calm a newborn.
And it's not like Jim's been any help, either. He needs his rest so he can "put food on the table." Yeah, right. He's never even once put food on our table. No starch, no vegetable, and certainly no meat. Except maybe me, that one night about a year ago, after we'd shared beers at that self-loathing pool hall and drunkenly stumbled back to this dump, clothes only half off as he hoisted me onto the round formica. Oh, but since I'm the only one able to feed our little bundle of joy, he says, there's no use in both of us getting out of bed three times a night. So there I sit, alone, raw tit out in zombie-gaze.
"I can't..." I try to talk to him about it before he leaves in the morning, but he's always rolling out of bed with seconds to spare.
"I've got my own job to think about," he snaps over his shoulder and buttons up his shirt on his way out the door.
I've called him while he's at work a few times, but his supervisor refuses to stop the line and let me talk to him. He always gives me shit about it later, so I've given up there.
"What about those nice old ladies on your street?" Ma asks.
Those blue-haired maids stop by every other afternoon to "see how the little guy's doing." The funny thing is that whenever they walk in with their matching shoes and pocketbooks, he transforms from the monster he is with me to the wide-eyed, bald-headed gerber baby, bouncing pleasantly on a lumpy lap, mouth forming that annoying little o.
"What a little darling!"
And there I am, on the farthest edge of the couch, bags under my eyes, hair pulled up in a messy knot, grinding my teeth behind a forced grin.
"No matter what, he's just givin' me that look," I whine to Ma.
I wish I could send him back to wherever he came from, back to that night with the lonely beers and the unstable table, before the secondhand white dress and city hall. But I don't tell her that, of course. Gotta keep pretending that this was what I wanted, that I didn't really wanna be a nurse. Too much schooling, in all, ya know?
"It just takes some time," she reassures me before I hang up and free myself from the twisted cord.
I set him in his crib next to a stuffed bunny and a duck, and he makes that unbearable noise. "I guess this is it, bud." I make a run for it, the screen door slamming behind me in protest.
I don't get to the sidewalk before I'm caught under the searchlights of our block, sirens wailing.
But it's only Jim, and he catches me with a gentleness that's so, well, not Jim. He rocks me in his arms, humming in my ear, but it's no use. The sobbing won't stop, the tears keep flowing.
"Come on, let's go inside," he cooes. "Together."
We enter the sky-blue nursery and the noise pounds against my eardrums once again. "See what I'm sayin'? I can't take it!"
Brow furrowed in frustration, he picks up the baby and returns to the Jim I know, "Penny, what the hell is wrong with you? He's laughing for Christ's sake!" Then he tickles his little chin with a finger, coaxing out that aural beast from the tiny body.
end time: 3:04 pm
NPR's All Things Considered has this contest, "Three Minute Fiction," for listeners to submit original pieces of fiction that can be read in three minutes (or are 600 words) or less.
I've never submitted anything, but I like to think of the prompts as practice.
Here is an about-130-word-too-long piece I've been working on. The prompt, "laughing and crying," asks for one character to laugh and another to cry.
---
He just won't stop. He won't. Not even for a second.
"I'm feeding him at least every two hours--shit, Ma, my nipples are killin' me. And I swear to God I'm changin' him like every second."
I try the whole bouncing and rocking and singing and cuddling and cooing and humming and swaddling, but nothing works. He still makes that noise that makes me want to cry like I did on my wedding day.
"It's normal, honey. Every new mommy goes through this," Ma assures me, her voice breaking through the plastic receiver. "It'll get easier, you'll see."
Well it's been three weeks and I haven't slept more than an hour a night for any of it. Besides, I can't bear to talk to her much anymore. Not as the big disappointment I am, the one who coulda "gotten out" with that scholarship but got knocked-up halfway through junior year. And now I can't even calm a newborn.
And it's not like Jim's been any help, either. He needs his rest so he can "put food on the table." Yeah, right. He's never even once put food on our table. No starch, no vegetable, and certainly no meat. Except maybe me, that one night about a year ago, after we'd shared beers at that self-loathing pool hall and drunkenly stumbled back to this dump, clothes only half off as he hoisted me onto the round formica. Oh, but since I'm the only one able to feed our little bundle of joy, he says, there's no use in both of us getting out of bed three times a night. So there I sit, alone, raw tit out in zombie-gaze.
"I can't..." I try to talk to him about it before he leaves in the morning, but he's always rolling out of bed with seconds to spare.
"I've got my own job to think about," he snaps over his shoulder and buttons up his shirt on his way out the door.
I've called him while he's at work a few times, but his supervisor refuses to stop the line and let me talk to him. He always gives me shit about it later, so I've given up there.
"What about those nice old ladies on your street?" Ma asks.
Those blue-haired maids stop by every other afternoon to "see how the little guy's doing." The funny thing is that whenever they walk in with their matching shoes and pocketbooks, he transforms from the monster he is with me to the wide-eyed, bald-headed gerber baby, bouncing pleasantly on a lumpy lap, mouth forming that annoying little o.
"What a little darling!"
And there I am, on the farthest edge of the couch, bags under my eyes, hair pulled up in a messy knot, grinding my teeth behind a forced grin.
"No matter what, he's just givin' me that look," I whine to Ma.
I wish I could send him back to wherever he came from, back to that night with the lonely beers and the unstable table, before the secondhand white dress and city hall. But I don't tell her that, of course. Gotta keep pretending that this was what I wanted, that I didn't really wanna be a nurse. Too much schooling, in all, ya know?
"It just takes some time," she reassures me before I hang up and free myself from the twisted cord.
I set him in his crib next to a stuffed bunny and a duck, and he makes that unbearable noise. "I guess this is it, bud." I make a run for it, the screen door slamming behind me in protest.
I don't get to the sidewalk before I'm caught under the searchlights of our block, sirens wailing.
But it's only Jim, and he catches me with a gentleness that's so, well, not Jim. He rocks me in his arms, humming in my ear, but it's no use. The sobbing won't stop, the tears keep flowing.
"Come on, let's go inside," he cooes. "Together."
We enter the sky-blue nursery and the noise pounds against my eardrums once again. "See what I'm sayin'? I can't take it!"
Brow furrowed in frustration, he picks up the baby and returns to the Jim I know, "Penny, what the hell is wrong with you? He's laughing for Christ's sake!" Then he tickles his little chin with a finger, coaxing out that aural beast from the tiny body.
end time: 3:04 pm
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