Haunted by Ego Death

OctPoWriMo

Today’s Poetics prompt at dVerse Poets Pub is to write a poem about Harvest or Haunting, or a Haunted Harvest. Let’s see if I can fit that in with the prompt from the first day of Writober post Letters: Symbols of Sound.

Four of the ten words in my word list started with “s,” so I focused my alliteration with “s” words. And can you guess which letter I left out for my lipogram? 🎃

There’s No U in Harvest

Tender, brittle leaves cling
as stranger-shaped shadows
lengthen, and the light hides
behind a choking cotton-ball cloak.
Crows caw in the cornstalks,
whispering warning with the wind
while I shiver.

I’ve collected the last of my harvest,
the green beans giant and crispy this year,
yet something skitters in the wilted vines.
It tsks my poor pickings, never ample,
and spits its hate into the soil
like an acid rain to make next year’s
sowing even more severe.

He shames the soil.
It has never been acceptable.

Maybe that’s why I try and try:
we have many things in common
my garden and I,
and I am always astonished
by what grows.

Writober Flash Fiction

He Always Had a Big Head

Stan licked his finger and smoothed a stray eyebrow hair. “Today’s the day,” he told himself in the mirror. “Stan. Stan. Superman.” He said this to himself all the time, and truly believed it. He rubbed his freshly shaven chin of his long, large head then smiled. All celebrities had large heads, and after this interview on Good Morning Cleveland, he would finally have the celebrity to fit what God gave him.

At the studio he was hurried into make-up. Of course they loved his style and said what he was wearing was fine, sending the wardrobe guy away in a huff. His torn jeans and Atari half-sleeve t-shirt made it clear to Stan that he couldn’t have dressed him anyway. When he asked the make-up girl for a coffee while she was trying to put lipstick on him, her sour lips said all she was thinking, but he didn’t care as long as the coffee was hot. She yelled, “coffee,” then looked him in the recently eye-lined eyes and snapped, “Don’t move.” By the time he was waiting at the back of the stage, Stan sensed hostility from everyone he had met. They are so jealous, he thought.

Suddenly, he felt a shove from behind. Someone yell-whispered, “Get out there.” His toe caught on the edge of something and he went tumbling out to the set. The host’s smile faded. He heard a gasp from the audience. It was as if a dimmer had turned down the whole show, but Stan caught himself and so did everyone else. The host stood, one giant smile, and the audience clapped and clapped. Stan took his seat in a plush, but uncomfortable chair that clashed with his suit. He watched the show every morning he could. They must have changed their guest chair just this morning. He looked around. The whole set seemed changed.

“So Stewart, I’m absolutely in love with . . .” the host began.

She got his name wrong. He couldn’t believe it. “It’s Stan,” he blurted out.

“Excuse me?”

“My name is Stan. I’m Stan. Stan. Superman. How could you get it wrong?”

The whole audience burst out laughing. Stan’s head was hot. It hurt: skin stretching tight, pulsing inside and out. The audience chanted “Stan. Stan. Superman.” and each time they said it, he felt like his head grew. It grew and grew until his chin was in his lap and he could barely hold its weight.

The room went silent. The host said, “Stan. I’m so sorry. What I was trying to say is I absolutely love your book, Big Heads Are Beautiful. It’s so obvious to me now that big heads are just better. And I’m excited about all your suggestions for how we can try to emulate those with larger heads. I’ve heard some people are already getting the surgeries you propose.”

Did she not see what was happening to him? Could none of them see? Stan felt something he had never felt before. Embarrassment? Shame? What had he been thinking, trying to convince people to change themselves to be more like him? Bigger head surgery? That’s insane.

The host was showing him off the set. He could barely walk using his thighs to help push the weight of his head in his hands forward one step at a time. In the green room one of the later guests, a celebrity, obviously from his large, oval face, handed him a bottled water. Stan looked for some recognition of his perilous situation in the other’s face, but the guest only said, “Great interview. You got one of your books you can sign for me?”

He did. He had a ton, but Stan couldn’t let go of his head, so he just moved his chin side to side.

The other guest smiled. “No worries. I get it. Being a success can be a humbling experience.”

Halloween Photography Challenge

For today’s photo, “Ego Death – A New Persona” I drew from an image I made in my fashion design notebook many many years ago ( a couple lifetimes ago, really) and then cut out a filter and took pictures of my floating studio. While I was working, one of my mirrors fell to the bottom of the lake, so I got to go swimming too. Brisk and refreshing. Thank you, dysfunctional children’s floating bath mirror, for making up my mind to go for a swim.

I really had fun today. I followed all of my prompts and ideas in the Writober prompt post and went for a walk (in my comfy pants) and an unexpected swim to get moving. I put my ten words in my spreadsheet, and four of them made it into my poem. I thought about my persona, and she influenced my photo. And I had fun writing a flash fiction to an image in the Pinterest file. I love it when a plan comes together! (Yes, I get nostalgic for a little A-team TV show now and then).

Experience Writing has had an amazing number of visits and views yesterday and today. I hope that means you are creating and having fun. Please link to all your poems, stories, and photos in the Writober prompt post chat. I can’t wait to see what inspired you and what you created.