Saturday, May 5, 2018

Pandora’s box is a circle

look, if you remember
anything about this town, 
remember stale yellow afternoons
before thunder rumbled in with night

remember crowded cafes
filled with the silence 
of fingers tapping phone screens

remember birds
singing through the night
terrified of what morning will bring

remember how summer 
steamed from wet sidewalks
and how you went home every night, 
shutting yourself into a rented room
to feel alive


for the Camera Flash prompt over at Toads today.  We were given a photo to respond to. The image reminded me of those afternoons when there is nothing to do but wait for night and see what unfolds.  

23 comments:

  1. Gosh I absolutely the atmospheric quality of this one, Izy!💜

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    1. Awe, thanks, Sanaa! Glad it resonated with you!

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  2. The birds struck me. Recently I was out in the dark back yard with my dog, just before bed, and a bird cried loudly, startling me. Maybe he was terrified, too.

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    1. I know right? We had a bad sotrm a few years back that felled several trees, and all night long you could here the robins and day birds singing back to each other. It was so unnatural and so unnerving. I keep thinking of it as something we grow accustom to, but really should be alarmed at!

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  3. shutting yourself into a rented room
    to feel alive

    Those were the days - the singles who somehow had lots of free and frustrating time to kill!

    Hank

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    1. I like that you picked up on the very subtle intimacy of those lines!

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  4. I really enjoyed this. I can feel that steam rising.

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  5. The title makes me wonder if Pandora is squaring the circle or the box is a circle, Izy - a face powder compact, maybe. The way it starts as if it's in the middle of a conversation is very effective - and we get only one side of it. I especially love the lines:
    'remember stale yellow afternoons
    before thunder rumbled in with night'
    and
    'remember how summer
    steamed from wet sidewalks'.
    The ending made me sad.

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    1. I love that you see two meanings in the title!
      Thanks for reading, Kim!

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  6. You Afterword is like a short summation of my life, friend!

    Your title already had my thoughts spinning, and you present your list with such visual precision, I felt the whole scenario unfold around me.. A person had better prepare themselves for living alone, or being alone, because that is generally how the story ends.

    Thanks for participating, Izy.

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    1. Should have known you'd understand the quiet boredom/terror that sets in after noon! Thanks for reading!

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  7. The sound of those phone screens and the image of steam rising... something so special with summers when nothing really happens. If this would be a novel the tension would build into murder.

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    1. Oh....sort of Tom Waits song "Small Change"!!! Excellent addition!

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  8. some great imagery here I could picture the scene easily

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  9. Wow!! This is sooo sharp. Brilliantly expressed

    Much🌼love

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  10. Nice, Izzy. For a minute you had me counting up the rented rooms I've lived in. Six before I was drafted into the Army I think, and two apartments, could be a couple more in that three years after dropping from college. One thing about living in a small town, you know most every person. You make your reputation, if it's messy you'll be stuck with that until you move.
    ..

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  11. Rich in imagery and mood! Love how it drew me in!

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  12. The birds got me too... A few years a go I was writing late at night and I would hear a mockingbird in the tree outside my window. It was haunting. Beautiful writing

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  13. Memories of the town, made me think I may have grown up there, too?

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