Chapter One “A Break”

The grass unfurls like a carpet all the way to the dusty road. We are playing, my laughter emerging in firecracker bursts. Clark has his baseball cars splayed out on the ground where we've trampled down the lawn with bare feet. He points to Joe DiMaggio and waves a freckled hand over his face. Joe is gone.

I hoot again, disbelief swirled up with my joy like on a painter’s palette. “How’re you doin’ that?”

He grins, and dimples sprout on both cheeks. “I ain’t gonna tell.”

I shake my head at him. “I’ll just look it up in a book.”

For Nanny with love, for many precious years
Of joining in laughter and drying up tears,
For prayer and encouragement, tender and true,
For the times of welcoming with "I love you."
A beautiful heart given beautiful hands
To pour out her love and fill up all demands.
Short in stature; a fearless warrior and bold;
Every life touch'd will miss her wisdom of gold.

This life is like a road we walk,
And as we walk along we talk
Of unseen things and things above,
Of things below like hate and love.
But hate and love are heav'nly, too;
My God hates sin; I do, do you?
Do you show love along the way,
Make sacrifices every day?
For that is love; you'll see, 'tis true,
God loved the world, and me, and you
Enough to give His only Son,
He ransomed every chosen one.
He died on the cross:
Suffered pain, not loss,
To hold us and keep us,
To save us, redeem us.

Staring blankly into the starlight
Yearningly, longingly, tearfully.
Watching the moon meander ‘cross the sky,
I’m thinking and dreaming of you.

Insomnia’s got a hold on me
ADD’s been hounding me
My brain is playing tricks on me
Sweating, striving, pushing.

You’re there—I know you’re there
But who are you, which one?
Darkness shrouds my forward vision
I squint—and stare in vain.

I’m waiting for you
to show your hand
Will you hold
or will you fold?
Don’t you know
you can’t play the game
with fire red,
and coal black,
both in your hands?
I’m bleeding,
red,
diamond-shaped tears.
I can’t win
For you always hold
the upper hand:
a flushing red
of my beating heart.
It isn’t fair
to leave me holding
onto only blackness.
Don’t you know?
I could beat you
with such a hand as this,
but I found
that I don’t want to

Sometimes I ponder and I wonder why
A woman who's blessed tears up to cry
And then I remember her eyes so gentle
Feeling so deeply she loves not a little

Her life is a beautiful poem
Her heart is intricately woven
Her God-given life a sacrifice of love;
Her soul made of beauty given from above

Remember her tear; needed; 'tis true
It's a privilege if shared with you
Her sorrows are all yours now, as are her joys
Her heart is in your hands, your love it employs

My name is Mary. Though many of you may not know me now, I was once one of the most active, involved, and prolific contributors to ApricotPie, and many of you who have been here for a long while no doubt remember me.
I joined ApricotPie in 2008. Shortly after joining, I began posting a chapters of a serial historical fiction called The Shadowfields. It was written offhandedly, perhaps even flippantly, purely for the fun of writing it, while my focus and concentration were dedicated to my more serious current project at the time.

1. Primal Again

eyes scan
wide space and
I am back

on the savanna
where I hunted
as a cub

my knuckles
in the wet ground
roots poke my

weak peachy flesh
but soon, that human skin
is again calloused paw-pads

I am back,
I am a hunter
again

all fours,
primal, and throw
my head skyward

and I roar
like my father taught me
they know I am coming

they scatter, all of them
as I run, I charge
they are no match

I smiled at my little girl and imagined what frame would fit best around this pose of hers. And then I stopped smiling. There were tears in her eyelashes. I looked closer and noticed the little pucker just below the left side of her lips that she always wore when she was sad or hurt. I wondered what was wrong. I forgot about the perfect frame and worried about my little daughter. I wondered if I should wake her up and ask what was wrong. Her mother would have known. But her mother wasn't here. I shook my head as I turned to go out the door and then I stopped.