Posts Tagged ‘Mind’
Jan
Addiction
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Juliana knew it was psychological. But the distress of withdrawal was real.
Her travel wanderlust was more than an indulgence. It was a craving deep in her cells. Journeys broke the shackles of the mundane and had become the embodiment of her independence.
Her last fix was fifty days ago. She kept distracted with work and avocation diversions. Yet, her mind would drift to the need, and normally steady hands would tremble.
When the seductive siren called, Juliana’s immobility became a shrinking coffin. Claustrophobic and suffocating.
As the taxi dropped her at the airport, she was able to breath. Freedom.
From Guest Contributors A.L. Gabriella and Billy Ray
Jan
A Philosophic Mind
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
He returned the edition of Kant to the library, unread again. He came out bearing Sartre’s “Being and Nothingness.” Surely he could make a last effort to master existentialism.
He decided to sit down on the bench in the high street to watch the passersby.
“How foolish they are,” he mused, “going on so unreflectively with their trivial business.”
“Not a philosophic mind amongst them,” he scoffed.
“They probably think I’m just an elderly man sitting here with nothing to do,” he surmised.
How wrong he was, for, unnoticed by the passing multitudes, no one thought about him at all.
From Guest Contributor Ian Fletcher
Nov
Numb
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
“I’m so sick of pain, Gene. I wish I couldn’t feel at all.” With a shaky sniffle, Emily stroked the black fur of Gene’s chin, eliciting his tractor purr.
She may never fully recover, the doctors said. They called it transverse myelitis. Emily preferred less polite terms.
Gene‘s glowing eyes slid closed. Emily’s followed.
She awoke to a ringtone, heart pounding. Her thoughts reached for the phone inches away on the sofa.
Not a muscle twitched. No sensation, as though her nerves had died. The phone fell silent. Gene‘s stare blazed with yellow light.
Gene…
In her mind, Emily screamed.
From Guest Contributor Michelle Cook
Oct
Expired
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Lucie hears the police officer’s voice so clearly in her memory. We’re sorry, your husband has been hit by a drunk driver and he’s unresponsive. Come to the hospital immediately.
She’s helpless, afraid, when she sees John still, and bleeding from his head.
Lucie stares out the window watching the birds fly, chirping in unison. The clouds give way to abundant sunshine and she waits for the doctor, impatiently biting her nails.
The doctor’s words are imprinted in her mind. Internal injuries. Needs surgery immediately.
“Mrs. Giovani, I’m very sorry. Your husband expired on the operating table.”
The sky darkens.
From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher
Sep
God, The Eagles
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
God how I loved “Hotel California.” Which was more than a song. The rooms had feather beds and cozy quilts you’d think came from the Amish people. Those people, straight and true. Me, I’m a scotch on the rocks girl, down at the hotel bar most nights singing along with those guys. “Desperado” comes to mind. My kids weren’t half as much trouble as I let on. All of them stellar now. So stellar I don’t know what to say to them anymore. And the way they don’t call, I figure they don’t know what to say to me either.
Linda Lowe’s poems and stories have appeared in Outlook Springs, Gone Lawn, Dogzplot, Right Hand Pointing, New Verse News and others.
Sep
Illusion
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
“Do you love me?”
“Yes. I do love you. Don’t you trust me?”
When his love was gone, the reality hit him and it was very harsh. He wanted his love back in his life but it was impossible. He didn’t know what to do, where to go. He had lost everything. His love was gone forever. When things became unbearable, he lost his mind. He could feel those eyes staring at him. He could hear them laughing and screaming. When things went beyond the walls he tried to resist but failed. His dreams turned wet and became an illusion.
From Guest Contributor Sergio Nicolas
Jun
Drowning Memories
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Alex listened to the waves crashing against the shoreline while seagulls flew above, searching for prey. The sun beamed on his face and he wished he had worn a hat.
He walked the beach, the hot sand stinging his toes. Boats sailed in the distance and he wondered what it would feel like to be free of land, but that thought dissipated. His mind shifted to when he almost drowned and his father pulled him from the water shouting his name, punching his chest until he spit up.
His father was now the one drowning, of a disease called cancer.
From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher
Apr
His Girl
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
He returned to their place, behind a shrub. Where they as teenagers
watched practitioners exit a church. Where he kissed away her tears
after her father walked out, showering affection on a stranger.
She, the girl he played tag with in childhood. The one he dated
through high school. The one he wrote to after he moved out of the
city, and her letters stopped abruptly.
He watched between raindrops clinging to leafless branches. She exited
the church on the arm of another man. Wedding procession followed.
Rainstorm may have passed, but the storm in his mind had only intensified.
From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs
Krystyna is a writer of poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. She
resides in Edmonton, Canada with her husband and stuffed animals and
many friends.
Dec
Human Beings Are The Only Wild Animals
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Whenever I fly into a foreign country, I’m afraid I’ll be dragged into a room and forced to answer questions I’ll fail to understand. “You can do better,” the examiner will say, just before firing an electric current through the alligator clips attached to my ears. By the time I’m released from custody, I’ll be bent, shriveled, gnome-like, and afflicted with tremors. These events repeat themselves in my mind on a loop, every recurrence worse than the last, now involving sleep deprivation, now an inmate orchestra playing a German requiem, now corpses sprawled half in, half out of broken caskets.
From Guest Contributor Howie Good
Howie’s latest poetry collections are I’m Not a Robot from Tolsun Books and A Room at the Heartbreak Hotel from Analog Submissions Press.
Dec
Miracles
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Steve wasn’t one to believe in miracles. He understood too well the depravities of the human heart. More often than not he was victim to the world’s machinations. That’s how fate had led him to the streets.
So when the woman offered a hot meal, he expected some sort of catch, likely in the form of a lengthy sermon. When she offered a warm bed, he called to mind images of harvested organs and sexual servitude. When she claimed through phony tears to be his mother, he fled at the first opportunity, certain it was another conspiracy plotting against him.