Shimmer

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Writers Online One Word Challenge

My entry to the Writers Online One Word Challenge Prose - June 2012

Word - Shimmer

Painting by Stewart Platt  

  


First Born

A hot June day. Sleek fronds of sea weed lie sweltering in the sun’s rays at the water’s edge. Pebbles smoothed by endless tides piled in mounds where they’ve been deposited and tiny pieces of shell and glass glint in the strong light. I stare out to sea.

   The boat was your pride and joy. When other’s named theirs Lady Mary or Sea Breeze, yours was “First Born” and you cherished it as such. My feelings could hardly compete with the empathy you shared with this wood and canvas. Sailing with only seabirds for company was the best time spent and I understood because you were my child, now grown.

  If life had not impeded on your chosen simple one, maybe things would have turned out differently. Solitude is not for us all, but for you it was everything and though I knew this, somehow I failed you. I knew you’d not return. As you set sail the heat shimmered above the water forming a mirage of reflections, quivering and dancing in the stillness of the air.

Today I wait, watching the horizon for some sign that you are still near. Knowing that a mirage is all I will see.


   

Comments

Anonymous said…
I like this idea of choosing a word and then using it for a writing piece.
29 June 2012 at 16:35
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