Derelict #WritePhoto

Inspired by Sue Vincent’s Thursday photo prompt, May 25, 2017

ruin

I remember the laughter, the children running around in the high grass, the blue sky, the warm sun. I remember the joy of a shared summer day, with all of them: an old fashioned family, uncomplicated, and happy. I still see the cakes on the little table, the soft drinks, the bees flying high above the roof. It was then.

That was before, before we were invaded, before the monsters came. And now, so many years later, I have come here, and see the depth of our loss: the small house derelict, the silence of a deserted village. This is now.

And now, we keep those memories in our hearts, as we go on, fighting.

May 25, 2017 8

Purple #DailyPost

Monday Prompt

IMG_20160826_195949203

We see the birds gather and fly, first as a small group, then swarming in a dark cloud, defying the glowing sunset. As the coulours change, as the sky turns from blue into purple, then into the deep hue of the coming night, they fly higher, for a short instant, to finally dive, back into the trees. Violet strikes appear in the sky, time seems suspended, the fleeting memories of the day prepare us to the silence that follows, to the peace yet to come.

March 27, 2017 1

Empty #writephoto

empty

Inspired by Sue Vincent’s Thursday Photo prompt, 23rd March

I woke up in the open: behind me the sun was setting, and I could see, on the ground ahead of me, the shadow of a large tree. Some old wreckage appeared half buried, atop a small tumulus, and beyond it I could see the reflecting mirror of an estuary. In my mind some vague memory was floating, telling me that I knew this place, and I knew its significance. But I had forgotten what that was, who I was, and where I was.

Images were flashing in front of my eyes: a beach, a river, a bridge, a garden, a stream… Then there was the cave, something had happened there. When? I did not know; what? I did not want to know. Was I still in the same time, in the same world? Was I supposed to be looking for someone? Was I a fugitive, or a predator?

Once I had read a novel, a story about a non-Aristotelian world. There, time had another meaning, the hero was killed, was reborn, and killed again. The forces against him seemed invincible, and yet he kept coming back, brought back to suffer another death. Was I caught up in one of these loops, surfacing in another place, not knowing for what reason, or for what purpose: was I being manipulated, or was I the manipulator?

I looked around: I was on the edge of what may have been a cultivated field, some time back, but now, there was no trace of whoever had lived and worked here. When did I have last seen another human being? Then, it struck me: was I still human?

March 23, 2017 7

Reflections in a Mirror #WritersWednesday

tumblr_oe407uity61ssfi6qo1_540

We retrace our steps, without intention, it just happens: suddenly we see ourselves, there at that terrace, one evening, or there, along those walls, pushing our bikes. It’s later at night, and the Neue Gallerie is not yet closed, we meet there, in a concert of bright lights and laughter.

That was three years ago, then it was Spring; how fast time goes in this City? Those ghosts are us, or perhaps, we have become them. We know those streets, we can follow our shadows. They, us, look at us, interested and tender, those younger faces, ours, so familiar, now observing us from the other side of the mirror.

But which side are we in?

Photo: inspired by the beautiful blog https://streetberlin.net/, street photography. berlin. kulturforum. 2016 © martin waltz

January 11, 2017 2

Fortune #DailyPost

Sharing is Caring

We are but small pebbles in the midst of a big storm, rolling, rolling, until we fall into the great void. On the way we hold on to our memories, our feelings, our fears, our hopes. Sometime, for a few seconds, we encounter peace. It does not last, pebbles are not made to rest.

Photo: Böcklin, Toteninsel

December 20, 2016 4

Moody #DailyPrompt

The sound of bells,

as dreams from a distant past –

a wall covered with vine,

swallows in the icy sky

sombre mood…

From the Daily Post

December 18, 2016 1

Vanish #DailyPost #Berlin-Spandauer Schifffahrtskanal

Along the canal…

It’s a nice relaxing walk, some three kilometres from our place, soon on the bank of the Spandau canal, formerly Hohenzollern canal, following the Mauerweg. A small cemetery lies there, it must have been, for years, in the no man’s land between West and East, and the graves are those of senior officers of the Prussian army who were active before or at the start of the first World War.

This place is eery, as the Wall has vanished, bar in a few places (one can see still a watch tower entirely preserved, surrounded by new buildings where families and children now live.) Yet one feels that other presence: there was a border once, and thirty years before then it was not the City we now see. The province – Land – that has survived, is no longer Prussia, it is back to being Brandenburg. The founding myths of the new republic, “wir sind das Volk”, gloss over the historical complexities. What we see, or guess at, is the multitude of ghosts who haunt the space, all the way to the Reichstag.

December 5, 2016 0

Echo #DailyPost

Can you hear?

tumblr_ohi6w3xpna1s5neh1o1_540

This place does not feel empty, not as empty as I would expect it to be, without you. In truth I can hear your steps, your voice, I can sense your scent. You are here and you are not. You are real, and you are not.

Is it echo of my memories, echo in a mind now turned to the void?

Image: Alina Noir, via afroui

December 1, 2016 0

Faded #DailyPost #WritersWednesday

On today’s prompt

tumblr_o92qeiw8dr1qz4txfo1_540

As I look at those pictures, at the colours beginning to fade, and those faces not yet totally forgotten, I recall those instants I never seized, all those years back, before peace reached me. And peace, I owe to you, my love, you brought me down to reality, and to acceptance of the world. Yet I cannot entirely forget that other life, those other lives. These places still impregnated of the then recent disasters, the long wars, the signs of destruction still present all around us. Europe was then still on her knees.

From time to time, an article, a book, a scent, brings me back to those years, to a youth full of longing and unhappiness. The world was young… no, it was the old world, but we were young, naive, and dangerous. The calamities of today pale in insignificance compared to what was then the daily life of our parents: the sheer poverty, the cold, the threats, and the still smoking ruins. Yet there was also hope, born from the deep soul of their hearts.

Written in December 2012 (Peace)

Image: Nino Migliori. Periferia. 1950s ~ via semioticapocalypsesemioticapocalypse.tumblr.com

November 30, 2016 0