 After the Walk, by Lyn Aylward (England) 2023. Click on image for artist site. Join us for biweekly ekphrastic writing challenges. See why so many writers are hooked on ekphrasis! We feature some of the most accomplished, influential writers working today, and we also welcome emerging or first time writers and those who simply want to experience art in a deeper way or try something creative. The prompt this time is After the Walk, by Lyn Aylward. Deadline is October 11, 2024. You can submit poetry, creative nonfiction, flash fiction, microfiction, or any other form creative writing you like. 1000 words max please. The Rules 1. Use this visual art prompt as a springboard for your writing. It can be a poem or short prose (fiction or nonfiction.) You can research the artwork or artist and use your discoveries to fuel your writing, or you can let the image alone provoke your imagination. 2. Write as many poems and stories as you like. Send only your best works or final draft, not everything you wrote down. (Please note, experimental formats are difficult to publish online. We will consider them but they present technical difficulties with web software that may not be easily resolved.) Please copy and paste your submission into the body of the email, even if you include an attachment such as Word or PDF. 3. There is no mandatory submission fee, but we ask you to consider a voluntary donation to show your support to the time, management, maintenance, and promotion of The Ekphrastic Review. It takes an incredible amount of time to curate the journal, read regular and contest submissions, etc. Paying all expenses out of pocket is also prohibitive. Thank you. A voluntary gift does not affect the selection process in any way. 4. USE THIS EMAIL ONLY.
Send your work to [email protected]. Challenge submissions sent to the other inboxes will most likely be lost as those are read in chronological order of receipt, weeks or longer behind, and are not seen at all by guest editors. They will be discarded. Sorry. 5.Include AYLWARD CHALLENGE in the subject line. 6. Include your name and a brief bio. If you do not include your bio, it will not be included with your work, if accepted. Even if you have already written for The Ekphrastic Review or submitted other works and your bio is "on file" you must include it in your challenge submission. 7. Late submissions will be discarded. Sorry. 8. Deadline is midnight EST, October 11, 2024. 9. Please do not send revisions, corrections, or changes to your poetry or your biography after the fact. If it's not ready yet, hang on to it until it is. 10. Selected submissions will be published together, with the prompt, one week after the deadline. 11. Due to the demands of the increasing volume of submissions, we do not send out sorry notices or yes letters for challenge submissions. You will see what poetry and stories have been selected when the responses are posted one week after the deadline. Understand that we value your participation as part of our ekphrastic community, but we can only choose a handful of the many entries we receive. 12. A word on the selection process: we strive for a balance between rewarding regular participants and sharing the voices of writers who are new to our family. We also look for a variety of perspectives and styles, and a range of interesting takes on the painting. It is difficult to reproduce experimental formatting, so unfortunately we won't choose many with unusual spacing or typography. 13. By submitting to The Ekphrastic Review, you are also automatically joining our subscribers' list. Your submission is your permission. We don't send spam and we don't send many emails- you will not receive forty-four emails a day! Our newsletter occasionally updates you on some of the challenges, news, contests, prize nominations, ekphrastic happenings, prompt ebooks, workshops, and more. 14. Rinse and repeat with upcoming ekphrastic writing challenges! 15. Please share this prompt with your writing groups, Facebook groups, social media circles, and anywhere else you can. The simple act of sharing brings readers to The Ekphrastic Review, and that is the best way to support the poets and writers on our pages! 16. Check this space every Friday for new challenges and selected responses, alternating weekly.
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 Lady Writing a Letter with Her Maid, by Johannes Vermeer (Netherlands) ca. 1670–72 The Sun Ray Painting "Okay, the last thing left is the painting,” the maid told Fiona. “I want it to stay in the house, it is in the perfect spot. The sunrise and sunset gleam, glow on it like a heavenly light selecting it for more,” she replied to the maid. Fiona had become violently ill and was deteriorating fast. In her final moments she and her maid, Jolie, were writing her will. They gave the animals and part of the gold to Fiona’s son, and the clothes and the other half of the gold went to her daughter. Jolie, however, did not know Fiona planned to give the property, including the painting, to her. They had grown up together as kids and knew each other inside out out. She always thought the sun rays on the painting were like Jolie, a ray of joy adding to the dull. Fiona wanted this to be her final farewell and thank you for all that Jolie did for her. She wrote it in her will when Jolie left the room and died shortly the next morning, while the sunrise was on the painting. Tessa Lawrence Tessa Lawrence is 15 and goes to high school in Ohio. She likes to read, write, and play basketball. ** The Missive and the Messenger She writes, perhaps, in the language of lovers- Her hurrying hand, hot with urgent grace, Pens her impatient passion that hovers In ribbony rivulets of ink traced Across the empty paper's sunlit space. The other woman waits, a messenger With listless boredom furrowing her face. Her eyes flit from floor to window, hands spurred To complete her lady's letter for her; But she refrains, and prepares herself to Deliver the missive to the monsieur Whose eager hands await the overdue Words that tease, scold, and seek flirtatious play- Utterances of feelings far away. Stefanie Kate M. Watchorna Stefanie Kate M. Watchorna is the author of the short story "Koivu," which was commended in the 2022 Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize. She is also the author of "An Encomium to the Victors," which was a finalist for the 2021 Giovanni Bertacchi VIII Premio Internazionale Di Letteratura, and "The Glory in Rome," which won third place in the 2022 Giovanni Bertacchi IX Premio Internazionale Di Letteratura. ** The Tug of Other Rooms There’s trouble on the cobbles, I can hear it. There is light and I’m a moth, and though my lady locks the day away, I’m straining at the bit; I hear the merchants’ calls to market, I could make it - if she hurried - with my basket, tuck the larkspur in in bunches, rearrange it on her table when, much later, she will heed her sleepy room. I hush the gloomy day away - it’s only rain again - and take up paper: paper boat, you go your way; canals are highways, and my thoughts can fly to Spain or to some other sunny clime: I have a rush of things to say. There’s love in looping cursive, in a tongue that isn’t mine that makes me bold, that lets me enter hallowed halls by stealth, a language of connection for my friends cannot speak Dutch, nor I the murmured mews of French. I sing a silent song of city streets; she’s sneaking envelopes to places she has never seen except in black and white: The white outside of clouds is ripe, my foot is tapping, oh, if only she would open this old window. The only way in which we two are like is in our dreaming, in how neither one of us is rooted here: this cosy room cannot contain us. The flowers are for me as much as her, reminder tiny of the fact that fields exist; and if it weren’t for those old paintings in the hall of cattle lowing, then the hazy fields I’m storing in my memory might have faded. Go, letter, sing your Latin, swift as Hermes, conjure Rome in homing syllables: I’ve found a patchwork school in correspondence. Let my missives not betray me - how I sometimes need to use my dictionary - let them sit in quiet magic, light the writing desks of other ladies sharing my unerring ache for less domestic praise: the ache is dulling; in its place this new cascade of ever kinder commendations for my mind will tide me over ‘til the next epistle wings its way to me. Caitlin Prouatt Caitlin is a Brisbane-born, Oxford-based Latin and Greek teacher. When not tutoring or looking after her toddler, Caitlin writes poetry, with a particular interest in how rhythm can contribute to an image. Much of her poetry centres on her experiences of being a parent, but she also often returns to Classical themes. She enjoys having a go at the Ekphrastic Challenge to hone her craft. ** pigmentum that first summer, the sky was always azurite. it was the year of riotous blossoming; hydrangeas spilled in clouds and waves across the arboretum and along the stone lanes in shades of weldand smalt and madder lake, the palette my mother wanted for your bouquet – wanted in vain, because we married in April and spring arrived too late. but you folded your hennaed hand over hers and twenty minutes before the bells tolled you walked into the forest when no one was looking. I was halfway to the trees when you emerged laden with wildflowers in lead-tin yellow and carmine and indigo, entrusting an armful to my mother as you passed, and married me with the hem of your verdigris dress dyed ivory black in mud and yellow ochre with pollen and all night long I watched you, spinning like a galaxy in the arms of your sisters, laughing up at me with a face of smudged charcoal and fading vermillion, and there has never been anyone more ethereal than you, not in all the years of your god’s green earth. after decades spent tethered, you wanted to roam, and so we climbed until there was not much further left to go, and there we nested, in that cabin of red ochre flagstones and lead white windows and facing the valley, the bedroom whose ceiling you painted ultramarine with a smattering of stars. that July, when the days were longest and you spent them outside, I’d hear you singing from a mile away, well before you were within sight. surfacing from the vivianite haze of conifers and ancient oak, your hair was a silver blaze; by the time you’d crossed the pasture, you shone like a comet, fool’s gold and lazuli and russet smelting down from the sky to frame your face. whenever you kissed me that season, your eyes were never the same colour twice, tinged every time with an incandescence I am still struggling to name. Lalini Shanela Ranaraja Lalini Shanela Ranaraja makes art in a wilderness of places, most recently Katugastota (Sri Lanka), Rock Island (Illinois) and the California Bay Area. She has written about defiant women, red-tailed hawks, best beloveds, mothertongues and luminous worlds for Wildness, Hunger Mountain, Strange Horizons, Ekstasis and others. Discover more of her work at www.shanelaranaraja.com. ** Out of Focus Placid, pellucid, private? Look again. That pearly woman is in fact my aunt, Writing another list. You like the pane I’m sure – the way the light comes in aslant, So clean. And I must be her modest maid, Lost in my maiden dreams, cool as a plant, Clothed to the neck and wrists. But maids get paid! Look at her scribbling: Lemons, herrings, cheese. The tiles are hard. Notice that carpet, laid Over the table: Turkish, if you please, Thick as a pelt. Oh, Anneke, don’t mope! One morning I’ll jump up there, bare my knees And dance my hoops off. We must make more soap (I must, that is). Now squint behind her head: I know it off by heart. He stretched his scope There, Meister Jan: no more pale drapes; instead Two half-dressed girls, a baby, and – quite plain – Two bodies bare as Adam! And more bread. Or maybe Eve. I’d ask him to explain, But I’m a girl. Yes, Aunt. And I’ve a brain. Passionless, prudish, patient? Look again. Ruth Baker ** Longing How lucky you are: the light shines on the words I whisper as I gaze slant through the window half-hidden from light I was told to avoid. You consulted the book then discarded it, and I, I divulged the words of love, those you are too refined to form even in the movement of your lips. You can write, but not feel. Your lace cap and pearls, they engage but do not pierce. You have me stand in brown, in shadow, when I might have sat in blue velvet fronting you as teacher, giving you the sentiment I whisper now, heart splitting. Only my gaze frees me, frees me to dream of elsewhere, somewhere I may learn to write. Carol Coven Grannick Carol Coven Grannick is a poet and children's author whose verse for the growing and the grown appears in a variety of print and online journals, including Loch Raven Review, Synkroniciti, The Orchards Poetry Journal, Babybug, Ladybug, The Dirigible Balloon, and elsewhere. Her novel in verse, REENI'S TURN, debuted in 2020 (Regal House Publishing), and her series of ekphrastic poems appears in After Light Darkness Rose, Another Day, an independently published Artist Book. Her new blog celebrates and shares the presence and meaning of poetry in everyday life: https://www.bitsoftheworldinverse.com. ** After the Pearl Earring Went Missing It’s a bit tiresome to stand frozen in one place for so long, but maids have little choice. I have a hard time remembering which hand is crossed on top. Both my feet and half-smile ache. Still, looking out at the sunshine, watching the children play and birds fly about the canal beats scrubbing floors. I’m lucky to be the prettier maid in the house – now that earring girl is gone. Poor Cook must handle the kitchen alone. Mistress, of course, is not actually writing a letter. She must stay perfectly still like me, though she may be composing an apology in her head. Let’s face it, we all miss THAT girl. Mistress just never expected to. Master valued the girl’s mastery for mixing paints and stretching canvas. Now he must do it all himself if we’re to keep a roof over head and food on the table. Mistress shows her patience by offering for us to pose. How foolish to pitch the girl out without proof of the theft! Imagine my surprise to find a pearl under the girl’s bed last week. I decided it best to drop it in the canal, not stir up more trouble. I’m keeping a secret for Master, too. While we pose at the window like ladies of leisure, the children left a penny, a crayon, and a wad of paper on the floor beside the table. It’s not visible from where we pose, but Mistress will be mortified that he captured the mess on canvas. Alarie Tennille Alarie Tennille graduated from the first coed class at the University of Virginia, where she picked up her B.A. in English, Phi Beta Kappa key, and black belt in Feminism. Retired now, Alarie delights in having more time to read, write poetry, and hang out at The Ekphrastic Review. Her latest poetry collection, Three A.M. at the Museum, has joined her earlier books on The Ekphrastic Bookshelf. Please visit her at alariepoet.com. ** Vermeer on Main Street America I’m stuck in my boss’s office while she finishes writing a letter. “Almost done,” she says, “then you can run it to the post office.” Her pen scratches at the stationery while I stand staring out the ground-floor window at Main Street. That’s when I hear a low rhythmic rumble and a distant blare of brass. Soon a marching band parades into view to the quick cadence of a familiar tune. “Hey, look,” I say, pointing. “Shh,” my boss says, “almost done.” As the drum major leads the way, I open the window, lean out, and shout: “What’s the occasion?” “It’s Johannes Vermeer’s birthday,” he says, turning to show me a painting in his hands. “Cool,” I say, “but then why are you playing a Sousa march?” But the drum major has already passed by, trailed by twirlers who send their batons spinning skyward like tiny silver satellites. Flutes and piccolos trill high, saxophones and trumpets resound, and the sousaphones’ flared forward-facing bells swing side to side in unison. The percussion section brings up the rear, and each boom of the bass drum rattles the windowpanes. Then the rows of plumed hats recede down Main Street, and the music fades. “Done,” my boss says, handing me a sealed beige envelope. When I step outside, I glance left toward the post office, but turn right instead, in pursuit of the waning melody. DK Snyder DK Snyder’s work appears in Unbroken Journal, Cease, Cows Magazine, Shotgun Honey, and elsewhere. She is a writer, a lawyer, and lives in Virginia. ** Lady Writing a Letter With Her Maid So I sez to him I sez that’s lovely fish, I bet rain is on its way tonight, did you see those clouds unless Hille just forgot to clean the glass again, the butcher’s boy came around twice No one forgets a fletch of bacon unless they’re in love, did Maritje pass your other note to her mistress, lovely turban, earring just a bit much but the heart, I know, the heart wants What it wants, miss, if you will pardon my saying so, true if you hurry and finish I’m sure as eggs is eggs I can cross the straat before dark and your father returns to call you for dinner, it’s fish tonight, miss, it’s Them I was saying, if you remember, what looked alive and swimming, a basket’s as good as the sea to a blind herring and, are you even listening, no don’t write herring, sorry miss, it’s just that She is at her window across the straat, the lace curtain pulled back, yes, by her pale hand, miss, no don’t start over, I promise she’s waiting just like the butcher’s boy at the kitchen door, hurry, fold it kiss it only I will know Angela Kirby Angela Kirby earned a BA in Creative Writing from Duke University. She is a 2024 Atlanta Journal International Poetry Merit Awardee, 2022 Second Prize Winner of the Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry, and two-time winner of the Anne Flexner Memorial Prize. Publications include Nimrod International Journal, Roanoke Review, The Light Ekphrastic, and Humber Literary Review. ** The Letter (The Dutch tulip bulb market bubble was one of the most famous market bubbles and crashes of all time. Also known as tulipmania, it occurred in Holland during the early to mid-1600s when speculation drove the value of tulip bulbs to extremes. The rarest tulip bulbs traded for as much as six times the average person’s annual salary at the market's peak.) Anouk stands by, her arms folded, the Delft morning sun stroking both her face and that of her Mistress. It will be some time before the Master is back from his business trip. He took the carriage and two horses. Something big is going on in Amsterdam, and the Master had that worried look on his face. Very worried. Today her Mistress has made a decision. That swashbuckling low-life (that’s what Anouk silently calls him) is only after one thing. No, not that. Money. And her Mistress has a lot of it. The Master has made a fortune with tulip bulbs. He took over her Mistress’ business when they married. It’s hers, really, and ‘low-life’ – Anouk was sure – knew exactly what he was doing, what with his fine words and pretend admiration, his constant attention with small gifts when the Master was out. Anouk had heard rumours from other maids in the market. Her Mistress had always been kind, and Anouk loved her dearly. So, one day she took her courage into both hands (she’d been with her Mistress since she was 13 years old) and the two women had talked. And now her Mistress was writing the letter. It would be a diplomatic masterpiece, not an admission of guilt, but a firm rejection of the money-hunting Mijnheer’s advances, and Anouk would soon leave the house, letter in her apron pocket, and a smile on her face. Rose Mary Boehm Rose Mary Boehm is a German-born British national living and writing in Lima, Peru, and author of two novels as well as eight poetry collections. Her poetry has been published widely in mostly US poetry reviews (online and print). She was three times nominated for a ‘Pushcart’ and once for ‘Best of Net’. Do Oceans Have Underwater Borders? (Kelsay Books, July 2022), Whistling In The Dark (Cyberwit, July 2022), and Saudade (December 2022) are available on Amazon. Also available on Amazon is a new collection, Life Stuff, published by Kelsay Books, November 2023. A new MS is brewing. https://www.rose-mary-boehm-poet.com/ ** Common Bond Here’s go-between, heart-write insight, strict discipline within the room, indiscipline unfolding soon, an intimate geometry. Floor tiles and lines in vertical - is scripted text sans serif too, as centrigugal test is weighed? Made middle cast, a vocal point, whose lips can tell a tale or two, while middleclass, in brighter light, writes featherlight of daring, do? Maid’s glance anticipatory of stories laid beyond the glass - her fantasies of mistress’ ways mingled with prospects of her own, that smile revealing mind at play. How long her longing arms self-grasp before enfolding supple parts? Desire in mouth and finger tips, does one imagine, one suggest? There’s commonwealth before our eyes; no pandering required it seems. This common canvas bolt with Lute (just as twice thieves bolted, this loot, two versions of Ireland’s free state, which ground was never black and white), uncommon in its derring-do? For what withal can word ‘with’ mean; the servant present, so with her, but not co-author, writing with. Had they conspired, shared confidence, the message, messenger and her? Would both enjoy their wicked days? Stephen Kingsnorth Stephen Kingsnorth (Cambridge M.A., English & Religious Studies), retired to Wales, UK, from ministry in the Methodist Church due to Parkinson’s Disease, has had pieces curated and published by on-line poetry sites, printed journals and anthologies, including The Ekphrastic Review. He has, like so many, been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. His blog is at https://poetrykingsnorth.wordpress.com ** Dancing on their Shoulders, Watchin’ All The Words Go By “Little darlin’, it seems it’s been more than a year since the cold, lonely winter kept sunshine from view, so please, do-do-do draw the curtains wide, dear-- it’s alright. You see, here comes the sun. Let’s renew! See how soft it breaks through without breaking the glass, It’s brilliance unstrain’d, pouring in as if rained from the heavens above upon each of us, lass, twice bless’d by the brightness and warmth it has deigned. Now I’ll take up a pen with more power than a sword-- though I’ll write with a wife’s due compliance to voice love’s refrains, yet with modest accord, while I dance on the shoulders of giants. Sweet ’Melia, don’t wander the streets once it’s gone but stay home, suff’ring megrims the way we girls do, for the feathers and gowns you prefer to put on for a strut through town once nearly ruined me, too. Ken Gosse Author's note on text sources: “Standing on the Corner” is a popular song written by Frank Loesser and published in 1956. The Beatles song “Here Comes the Sun” written by George Harrison, released in 1969. Shakespeare’s poetry from Romeo and Juliet and from The Merchant of Venice. “The pen is mightier than the sword" was coined in these words by Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839 (also known for “It was a dark, stormy night …) “The shoulders of giants.” Originally from William of Conches in 1123, perhaps best known from Isaac Newton’s 1675 letter. Thomas Hardy’s 1866 poem, “The Ruined Maid.” Ken Gosse prefers to write rhymed, humorous verse using traditional forms. First published in First Literary Review–East in November 2016, since then he has been in The Ekphrastic Review, Pure Slush, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Home Planet News, and others. Raised in the Chicago suburbs, now retired, he and his wife have lived in Mesa, AZ, over twenty years, usually with rescue dogs and cats underfoot. ** Reading Between the Lines Eva is used to waiting. Her whole life is subordinated to her mistress's requirements. She glances at the window to pass the time and sees Pieter the messenger outside. He's waiting for the response to his master's latest love letter. Eva notes how the sun gleams off his gaudy blue satin jerkin and that the feather on his cap is outrageously long, how it flicks up and down with his lively head movements as he jokes with the other serving boys in the yard. She notes his shapely calves in the snowy, showy white hose. At least this time she won't have to chase him away from the kitchen door and the gaggle of giggling scullery maids. That was the time she'd had to search for him to give him her mistress's reply, and she'd found him holding court with a simpering, appreciative audience. Even the old cook, Griselda, had had a girlish red blush high on her cheeks and an unfamiliar rictus that could possibly have been a grin. Eva knows Pieter has a way with the ladies, much like his master. She worries that her mistress has fallen for a rogue, a known womaniser. Her mistress refuses to listen to her father's warnings about Franz de Rooij, twice widowed and looking for a new wealthy bride. Her mistress is on a second draft, wanting to reply with some of the wit and playfulness of the letter Pieter brought her. The first draft is lying crumpled on the floor. Eva's expert eye notes that the tiles need a sweep and a wash. It's something practical to keep those flirty, flighty scullery maids busy. Eva tries not to think too much about the future. She expects she will go with her mistress when, inevitably, she marries Franz de Rooij. Her mistress is almost twenty four and there hasn't been a clamour of other suitors so far. Jan van der Valk, the childhood sweetheart, had been killed at sea and her mistress had been inconsolable until the handsome and urbane Franz came along. Eva knows her mistress, as the only child of a successful merchant, will command a generous dowry. She knows her mistress has already started making an inventory of items for her trousseau. What's the point of worrying when it's out of your control, Eva thinks. Her role is to keep her own counsel. Adept at reading over her mistress's shoulder she knows that de Rooij intends to travel around Europe's finest cities once the marriage contract is finalised. That might be some consolation for leaving behind the security and status of the current household. Another thought insinuates itself as movement outside once again catches her eye. The annoying but somewhat diverting Pieter would be there also. Emily Tee Emily Tee is a writer from the UK Midlands. She particularly enjoys ekphrastic writing and has had some pieces published in The Ekphrastic Review Challenges previously, and elsewhere online and in print. ** Daydreaming I wonder what species of bird chirps outside the window, wooing its mate with a nuanced melody? If I had confidence to warble my feelings, perhaps Henry would notice me, I could bring him a kneeler out there in the garden to keep the sandy loam from soiling his trousers and perhaps... Yes m'am, I'm paying attention. Elaine Sorrentino Elaine Sorrentino has been published in Minerva Rising, Willawaw Journal, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, The Ekphrastic Review, ONE ART: a journal of poetry, Haiku Universe, Sparks of Calliope, Gyroscope Review, Quartet Journal, The Raven’s Perch, and Panoplyzine. She hosts the Duxbury Poetry Circle, was featured on a poetry podcast at Onyx Publications. Her first collection of poetry, called Belly Dancing in a Brown Sweatsuit is in production at Kelsay Books. ** A Cold Morning with a Warm Story It was a cold winter morning with the maid looking out the window at the fresh snow that had fallen on the ground. Her master was writing a letter to her husband who had left to fight in a war for England and she was concerned for him. The maid was looking at the snow until her master said to her, “If you want Violet, you can leave for the day. I have nothing else to ask you to do.” Violet tilted her head at her master “Are you sure?” Her master chuckled, “I can always call you if something comes up.” Violet looked back out of the window. “I know but since your husband left to fight in the war I like to stay and help you out with little and big things.” Her master stopped writing the letter and looked at Violet, smiling. “Are you saying that I am too old to do normal house chores by myself?” Violet shook her head “No, I just want to make sure you are all good.” Her master laughed at this and pointed at the painting behind them “Do you know the story behind which that painting was made?” Violet looked at the painting for a little bit before replying, “I am afraid not.” Her master got up and walked to the painting saying, “It’s a family painting from my ancestors and that a man had to go to war but the man's wife was pregnant with a child and the man wanted to stay with her, but the woman told her husband that she would be fine and so her husband left for the war, still scared for his love. After the war the woman came to greet them and to show them his new son and he said to his wife that she was right and from there on he never again doubted his wife.” Violet was beside her master as she told the story and after the story Violet smiled and said, “Do you need anything master?” Her master shook her head and so Violet walked to the door and grabbed her coat and left her master’s house. Samuel Verhoff ** Inside/Outside Axis "Not to have love was to accept a kind of death before you began." Anne Perry, A Darker Reality Is her future in the painting on the wall behind her? Like mirrors of the present figures wear Golden Age dress, but in the fore-front, mythically added naked bodies suggest a biblical context, like a new world from the past, a place where a man and a woman could be Adam and Eve in a Genesis without figs, their leaves a coverup Queen Victoria would say was un- necessary. Beneath the painting in the background a young woman sits at a desk where she could be writing a love letter; while her maid, standing to her right, hides her impatience to be walking -- out- side -- through the garden at the exact moment when the land- scape gardener rises from a flower bed where he's planted tulips, red blooms that will bleed their colorful passion onto the petals of white companions -- & he adds purple, a dream of sunset that offers 2-lip gold. Is colour an afterthought in 17th century Dutch Painting? A wish? Words in a letter she, a messenger, is eager to deliver? A world, it seems that is just beginning when love is the heart's notepad. Laurie Newendorp Laurie Newendorp lives and writes in Houston. Twice nominated for Best Of the Net, she has been honoured multiple times by The Ekphrastic Challenge. ** The Letter The sheer, cream white curtain hung lazily over half the windowsill, parting just enough to reveal the intricate stained glass behind it and the blend of gold and cerulean at the focal point Her housemaid’s low-heeled buckle shoes clicked on the cool tile floor as she shifted her weight from foot to foot Her neck ached from the strain of being hunched over her desk for the entirety of the day Each knot woven into the textured cloth draped over the table tugged on skin of her forearms, As if it had its own opinion of what she should write that it desperately wanted to convey Letting out a frustrated breath, she threw a pointed glance at the useless crumpled letter-writing manual she had cast to the floor in a short-lived moment of melodrama Reasonable explanation as to why the words she intended to write died out on the tip of her pen escaped her, and every drop of ink that happened to make it onto the paper was merely a boiled down rendition of what was in her heart She gently traced her weary fingertips over the dried calligraphy ink his name was coated in at the very top of the letter This was the only component of substance she had come up with that elicited a smile from her pursed lips, but just this once, she was determined to be the instigator of his joy Brilliant rays of light infiltrated the room and demanded her attention, seemingly mocking her struggle with their god-given ability to captivate with ease She carried a sharp tongue rather than a witty one, so she always harboured a deep envy of his ability to conjure a laugh or light conversation out of thin air Suddenly, her pen slid off the thin manilla paper and onto the bothersome table dressing, ripping her out of the daydream that had sieged her mind Looking down defeatedly at her lack of progress, she laid eyes on an entire page covered from top to bottom with the appreciation, confession, and devotion she had been wanting to share with him since the day of their first clandestine meeting Anticipation shook her hands excitedly as she attempted to carefully fold and seal the letter in a crisp, plain envelope sealed with vermillion wax and warm adoration. Anna Hepler Anna Hepler lives in a small suburb of Virginia with fickle weather and beautiful fall foliage. She has a passion for writing poetry and hopes to pursue a career in literature in the future. ** The Letter “Quite a kerfuffle outside,” the maid murmured as she gazed out the window. The other woman, who was sitting down at a table, hummed in response. She was paying utterlty no attention to the chaos outside, completely within her own world while writing a letter. “...Ma’am?” The maid tapped the latter’s shoulder. “Oh! Um, yes, Agatha?” the latter jolted. “I think you should take a gander outside, Miss Adeline.” Adeline lifted herself from her work - literally and mentally - and glanced outside. Upon looking, her eyes locked onto the large fleet marching through the streets. “Blimey,” Adeline murmured. “How on earth did I not hear their cries?” “You’ve been within your own world, Ma’am,” Agatha alluded. “Is this the revolt the men spoke of during supper yesterday?” Adeline pondered, tilting her head with a slight worried expression. “It’s probable.” Both of them watched as the foreign troops continued their march towards the castle. Almost a minute later, they watched their king, James II, flee upon a horse. “...That was quite anticlimatic,” Agatha said with a raise of a brow. “Indeed, Aggie, indeed,” Adeline sighed. “Shall you return to your letter now, Madam Adeline?” Ava Chapin Ava Chapin is a freshman who is a self-proclaimed "writer in progress." ** The Letter I tap my pen on the edge of my hand, waiting for Elizabeth to speak. “But I must decline your offer,” she says. I write the line, wondering if the offers to buy her late father’s estate will ever cease. Nobody believes she can run the estate, and I wonder if she herself has any confidence. The silence stretches out and I turn around. Elizabeth is lost in space, her gaze resting out the window, in some faraway place. I put down the pen. “Start a new letter,” she says. “Accept the offer. We need a fresh start. Things will change.” Anna Svatora  Cycles, by Norval Morrisseau (Canada) 1985. Photo by Jodi Green. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. via Flickr. Join us for biweekly ekphrastic writing challenges. See why so many writers are hooked on ekphrasis! We feature some of the most accomplished, influential writers working today, and we also welcome emerging or first time writers and those who simply want to experience art in a deeper way or try something creative. The prompt this time is Cycles, by Norval Morrisseau. Deadline is September 27, 2024. You can submit poetry, creative nonfiction, flash fiction, microfiction, or any other form creative writing you like. 1000 words max please. The Rules 1. Use this visual art prompt as a springboard for your writing. It can be a poem or short prose (fiction or nonfiction.) You can research the artwork or artist and use your discoveries to fuel your writing, or you can let the image alone provoke your imagination. 2. Write as many poems and stories as you like. Send only your best works or final draft, not everything you wrote down. (Please note, experimental formats are difficult to publish online. We will consider them but they present technical difficulties with web software that may not be easily resolved.) Please copy and paste your submission into the body of the email, even if you include an attachment such as Word or PDF. 3. There is no mandatory submission fee, but we ask you to consider a voluntary donation to show your support to the time, management, maintenance, and promotion of The Ekphrastic Review. It takes an incredible amount of time to curate the journal, read regular and contest submissions, etc. Paying all expenses out of pocket is also prohibitive. Thank you. A voluntary gift does not affect the selection process in any way. 4. USE THIS EMAIL ONLY. Send your work to [email protected]. Challenge submissions sent to the other inboxes will most likely be lost as those are read in chronological order of receipt, weeks or longer behind, and are not seen at all by guest editors. They will be discarded. Sorry. 5.Include MORRISSEAU CHALLENGE in the subject line. 6. Include your name and a brief bio. If you do not include your bio, it will not be included with your work, if accepted. Even if you have already written for The Ekphrastic Review or submitted other works and your bio is "on file" you must include it in your challenge submission. 7. Late submissions will be discarded. Sorry. 8. Deadline is midnight EST, September 27, 2024. 9. Please do not send revisions, corrections, or changes to your poetry or your biography after the fact. If it's not ready yet, hang on to it until it is. 10. Selected submissions will be published together, with the prompt, one week after the deadline. 11. Due to the demands of the increasing volume of submissions, we do not send out sorry notices or yes letters for challenge submissions. You will see what poetry and stories have been selected when the responses are posted one week after the deadline. Understand that we value your participation as part of our ekphrastic community, but we can only choose a handful of the many entries we receive. 12. A word on the selection process: we strive for a balance between rewarding regular participants and sharing the voices of writers who are new to our family. We also look for a variety of perspectives and styles, and a range of interesting takes on the painting. It is difficult to reproduce experimental formatting, so unfortunately we won't choose many with unusual spacing or typography. 13. By submitting to The Ekphrastic Review, you are also automatically joining our subscribers' list. Your submission is your permission. We don't send spam and we don't send many emails- you will not receive forty-four emails a day! Our newsletter occasionally updates you on some of the challenges, news, contests, prize nominations, ekphrastic happenings, prompt ebooks, workshops, and more. 14. Rinse and repeat with upcoming ekphrastic writing challenges! 15. Please share this prompt with your writing groups, Facebook groups, social media circles, and anywhere else you can. The simple act of sharing brings readers to The Ekphrastic Review, and that is the best way to support the poets and writers on our pages! 16. Check this space every Friday for new challenges and selected responses, alternating weekly.  The Muster, by Kate Vale (UK) 2024 Passing Is She, bright white in carriage throned, Her troops en masse, strict ranks conform, beneath a Standard pennant flag, as if, as passed, fresh wight in form? Marks fluid, inked, is this tattoo - like passings out to past belong - the military, best of show, prefigured, not as go along. Assembled, gathered on parade, so passing muster, tourist too, the knee high view of passer-by; I hear the sounds, as sight, ring true. Clipped hooves clop, stirrups, reigns that guide? You know that clank - boots, rifles, steel; attest lies with vox populi - Divine right rooted - service zeal? Stephen Kingsnorth Stephen Kingsnorth (Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge M.A., English & Religious Studies), retired to Wales, UK, from ministry in the Methodist Church due to Parkinson’s Disease, has had pieces curated and published by on-line poetry sites, printed journals and anthologies, including The Ekphrastic Review. He has, like so many, been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. His blog is at https://poetrykingsnorth.wordpress.com ** All Their Failed Maneuvering The shades are called to the flag raising with muffled drum roll and their moaning but they are always ill prepared to face such murky gray days over and over in the ever growing army of the doomed. Forced to reenact all their failed maneuverings every battle lost. The outcome of each day's war preternatural and predetermined so far beyond the world they thought they knew. dan smith dan smith is the author of Crooked River and The Liquid of Her Skin, the Suns of Her Eyes. He has been widely published in such diverse journals as The Rhysling Anthology and Dwarf Stars and Gas Station Famous and Deep Cleveland Junk Mail Oracle. He does not know how to cut and paste but somehow survives on the kindness of others. dan's latest poems may be found at Five Fleas Itchy Poetry and dadakuku. ** Forever Changing Painting strong women, in illustrious colours, forever changing. Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher has been writing since 2010 and has had many micro-flash fiction stories published. In 2018 her book Shorts for the Short Story Enthusiasts, was published,The Importance of Being Short, in 2019 and In A Flash in 2022. She currently resides on Long Island, New York with her husband Richard and dogs Lucy and Breanna. ** Equine The time of year? It wasn’t clear; the age? It could have been a hundred years ago or yesterday; the horses? There was Alfred, great and temperamental, Sally, shy and pawing at the ground, and Blaze, just waiting while the others capered round - he wasn’t bothered - and then bringing up the rear was older Ernie - such a gentleman - and Willow, still so spirited and skittish. Or was it Macedonia? Bucephalus a kicking blur as sun emerged from cloud and shadow quickly licked the ground, and all the others followed suit. It might have been a field not far from here where we threw windfalls when we didn’t know much better, when we wanted just to tempt them to the fence. They cantered and they whinnied and they gloried in the free before the capture when the flags were out - the owners made a day of it - and all was rushing midnight, dappled happiness, a bay in mid-abeyance and a stallion disobedient, a flick of silver tail, a trail of movement that evaded being stilled. Caitlin Prouatt Caitlin is a Brisbane-born, Oxford-based Latin and Greek teacher. When not tutoring or looking after her toddler, Caitlin writes poetry, with a particular interest in how rhythm can contribute to an image. Much of her poetry centres on her experiences of being a parent, but she also often returns to Classical themes. She enjoys having a go at the Ekphrastic Challenge to hone her craft. ** The Musters For War Mustering their courage, mustering their faith, collecting together ready to charge, ready to fight, ready to kill, ready to die ordered in order they’re ready to go. These vassals and workers obeying the king obeying their lord, obeying their masters obeying them all. So strangers kill strangers, friends die the same. It’s when they pass muster that death makes the call to muster the ordered at his command. And when they pass muster, that’s when they’ll charge and that’s when they die over and over over and out in order when ordered again and again and again and again again and again and again. Lynn White Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She was shortlisted in the Theatre Cloud 'War Poetry for Today’-competition and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net and a Rhysling Award. Her poetry has appeared in many publications including: Consequence Magazine, Firewords, Vagabond Press, Gyroscope Review and So It Goes Journal. Find Lynn at: https://lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com and https://www.facebook.com///www.facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry-1603675983213077/ ** Miasma A swirl of hooves and manes and horse flesh. The swish swash of desperate men mustering the cattle to beat the fire. The sky an eerie yellow, orange and grey sits heavy all around, ominously peppered with ash and silt. There’s a gravity in the air to furrow the brow of the sternest of cowboy. No time to think. No time to muster courage. Act on instinct and a grave fear. And hope like hell that the God of Wind has a change of heart and blows in another direction. Adam Stone Adam lives and loves on the Bellarine Peninsula in Victoria, Australia - Wathaurong land (Balla-wein). He is an award-winning lyricist and emerging author who thoroughly enjoys short story and flash fiction writing. He is a member of Writers Victoria, Geelong Writers Inc and Bellarine Writers. ** The Muster No gleaming uniforms with gold buttons, no smart hats to match. ‘Just’ a gaggle of tired warriors who came home, who battled it out with the enemy’s tired warriors. But they were left standing. torn cloth, captured head gear, gas masks and shields. Hundreds of young men left unprotected on the muddy earth, in water-logged trenches. A wind assaults those heroes, a wind moves their rags. A single small flag held high-- is it theirs or the one they grabbed as a last moment of triumph from the defeated soldiers? Their queen rides past, inspecting what is left from a once strong and voiceful battalion, young men in their prime roaring their defiance at the outset of their long march towards the killing fields. Will they learn to love again? Rose Mary Boehm Rose Mary Boehm is a German-born British national living and writing in Lima, Peru, and author of two novels as well as eight poetry collections. Her poetry has been published widely in mostly US poetry reviews (online and print). She was three times nominated for a ‘Pushcart’ and once for ‘Best of Net’. Do Oceans Have Underwater Borders? (Kelsay Books, July 2022), Whistling In The Dark (Cyberwit, July 2022), and Saudade (December 2022) are available on Amazon. Also available on Amazon is a new collection, Life Stuff, published by Kelsay Books, November 2023. A new MS is brewing. https://www.rose-mary-boehm-poet.com/ ** To Kate Vale Regarding The Muster Here gathered are your traces cast of yesterdays now glazed as past where stoic stares that never blinked at future rendered indistinct bespoke the faith that fear will call to fierceness that becomes a pall to.evil that would shackle soul to absence of the self control that is its nature by design as image of its source divine compelling fearless sacrifice of life and limb as precious price preserving justice under law as strength the free and brave will draw. Portly Bard Prefers to craft with sole intent... of verse becoming complement... ...and by such homage being lent... ideally also compliment. Ekphrastic joy comes not from praise for words but from returning gaze far more aware of fortune art becomes to eyes that fathom heart. ** Worthy You don’t want to go there said the voices inside my head. But where is there? I wondered, not for the first time. How does one find out where one does not want to go? I came when called but now I am gone. No company follows me; nor does time. I keep casting nets of summoning but nothing remains inside except the outlines of stars, the silhouettes of the shadows of souls that I feel but cannot see. It’s not nothing; nor is it nowhere. But where is it? and why? They said fly the flag. But they knew nothing of wings. Flags are heavy with a hollow silence that reeks of ghosts. They are held by the gravity of earthbound bones, laid over and over again like sacrificial lambs over millions of unlived lives. I came when called but now I am gone. endless bodies spill out, one after the other, bearing the crossroads-- sailing over the earth’s edge into the absence of light Kerfe Roig A resident of New York City, Kerfe Roig enjoys transforming words and images into something new. Follow her explorations on her blogs, https://methodtwomadness.wordpress.com/ (which she does with her friend Nina), and https://kblog.blog/. ** After Kate Vale’s The Muster Young flowers grow in innocent sunburst spring gardens, HERE they thrive in yellows, reds and orange though there COMES a price for maturing, mute and muted, as drab as THE next marching flower purple, gray, colours muster together a BIG hup, hup, hup uniform command toward one more ceaseless PARADE. Daniel W. Brown Author's note: The words “Here Comes The Big Parade” are by Phil Ochs. Daniel W. Brown began writing poetry as a senior. At age 72 he published his first collection Family Portraits In Verse and Other Illustrated Poems through Epigraph Books, Rhinebeck, NY. world. Daniel has been published in various journals and anthologies, and he has hosted a youtube channel ‘Poetry From Shooks Pond’. He was also included in MId-Hudson's Arts ‘Poets Respond To Art’ in 2022-23 and writes each day about music, art and whatever else captures his imagination. ** Muster Must go to war looking good for some reason Scare them off Attract them Feel your Sunday best When you meet them Muster the manteaux The boots on your ground The cutting edge uniform It matters This wool may soon unravel the last thread of civilization This dress Designed to die for. Stien Pijp Stien Pijp lives in the Dutch country side. She is a linguist who works in the field of aphasia and care. A dreamy person who likes to hang around, to read and walk her dog. ** Curious Choice “The Muster.” Where to hang you? Odd tapestry of cold sunshine, Restive lancers, grim polearms. This choice will bemuse my friends. Manly strutting, cocksure bravado! Not my usual fare. Entry wall? An earthy rumpus of welcome. Inviting gusty, good-natured set-tos? Maybe the kitchen? My stews of Ragoos, Bigos, Stifados—burping, bumping. Echoing Bays, Pintos, Draughts—snorting, kicking. Ah, the library. Sink into soft leather, mind purling. Dissolve into dust of Crusades. Or the bath? Deliquesce amid steamy bubbles? How will apricot vapor recast tangy metallic dust? Then again, perhaps the office. To do pendant battle: paperwork vs infidel. Yes! The office! Place of my tantrums, snorting, pawing of earth! Where paperwork bites, stings, nettles Until I whine and bray in a dander. I know why I bought you! Anna Gallagher Anna Gallagher earned a bachelors degree in English and a masters degree in liberal arts from University of Delaware. She has enjoyed reading poetry all her life. After retirement she has tried some new challenges, including poetry writing! ** faire weather a rain-streaked window dulls the pennants blurs riders and mounts assembled on the field no need to attend it never changed an autumn pageant games and mock jousting today they would return mud spattered and loud today the field is muddy some horses uneasy it is a long tradition boys claim manhood with sweat and bruises sit proud in their saddles except once when horses fell and riders were thrown stories vary but all agree it was raining that long-ago day I watch from the window remember he was only twelve Kat Dunlap Kat Dunlap grew up in Norristown PA and now resides in Massachusetts where she is a member of the Tidepool Poets of Plymouth. She received a BA in English from Arcadia University and holds an MFA from Pacific University. She edited two college writing publications as well as the Tidepool Poets Annual. For many years she was Director of the National Writing Project site at University of Massachusetts Dartmouth and is currently the co-owner of Writers Ink of MA. Her chapbook The Blue Bicycle is being prepared for an autumn launch. ** Muster Haiku All able-bodied men must fight for realm in mist – girls eyes in tears. Ekaterina Dukas Ekaterina Dukas writes poetry as a pilgrimage to the meaning and is a keen TER contributor. Her collection Ekphrasticon is published by Europa Edizioni. ** Riding Farther, Beyond Milady, will you ride? Will you travel into the deepest dunes, far from ephemeral water's side? Others, bright popinjays, set their sights towards their homelands in the distant west. Their journeys are much different to ours. They will merely cross distance. We travel farther, to the realms beyond. Milady, do you yearn for your home? Does it call your spirit, summon your very soul? Ours is a home found in the harshest climes, far from markets, far from towns, far from pooled water. Far away from this harrying bustle, the cries that arise around us; the herdsmen gathering their hardy flocks and the wranglers of our steadfast mounts readying all for the muster. We travel far, deep, beyond. We'll leave this wadi fed oasis, a temporary convenience of the physical world. The only sounds we'll hear are the songs of the wind, the sand, and a heart beating deep within each traveller's breast. Lean voices will sometimes rise in stilted silty conversations, prayers, invocations and curses - spare, by necessity only. The sun, the stars and the moon, and our inner thoughts will keep us company, be our guide and our compass. No paper map can capture the shifting sands. Only those who know the deep desert dare attempt our journey. Travelling beyond will lend much time for inner contemplation. Already, perched high in your black headdress and robes, with your stillness, you are apart from the hoi polloi, separate to the scene. Milady, are you ready? Milady, will you ride? Emily Tee Emily Tee is a writer living in the UK Midlands. She's had some pieces published in The Ekphrastic Review challenges previously, and elsewhere online and in print. ** The Mind’s Command before the start of the Battle of Senses The enemy is advancing. Row after row, wave after wave. They will crash into our shores in some time. Their sharpened weapons flash like lightning in the purple sky. Their battle-cries rent the pewter air. But fret not, my dear men. We sweat in peace, in meditation. We have sharpened the saws of our breath, emptied our thoughts and sat in stillness. Mark my words, we will not bleed during this fight. Part the grey curtains of fear. Stand your ground. Mount your horses and elephants to travel away from the land of doubt. Let your courage spiral up and touch the uncharted azure of the skies. Let the spire of your strength silhouette this morning of glory. Let the cathedral of your past be a monument to your faith. Let the russet pennants of discipline ripple through the halcyon winds of the present. It is time. Time for us to emerge from behind the shape-shifting shadows into the open air and breathe, my men. Breathe. Breathe this air, fragrant with victory. Preeth Ganapathy Preeth Ganapathy is a software engineer turned civil servant from Bengaluru, India. Her recent works have been published in several magazines such as Last Stanza Poetry Journal, The Ekphrastic Review, Star 82 Review, Panoply Zine, Visual Verse, Quill & Parchment, Shotglass journal, Sparks of Calliope, Tiger Moth Review, The Sunlight Press, Ink, Sweat & Tears and various other journals. Her microchaps A Single Moment and Purple have been published by Origami Poems Project. Her work has been nominated for the 2023 Best Spiritual Literature. ** A muster of memories Emerging from the mist are figures blurred by memory. A surge of energy sweeps these bodies, becoming and un-becoming, an army of the unseen. Colours create contours and shadows stretch into shapes as the past and future clash in the pervasive present. They move but don't, their essence felt yet not, caught in the tide of existence this muster of spirits dances on the edge of what we don't wish to be. Between night and day secrets whisper in dark hues A muster of memories Nivedita Karthik Nivedita Karthik is a graduate in Immunology from the University of Oxford. She is an accomplished Bharatanatyam dancer and published poet. She also loves writing stories. Her poetry has appeared in Glomag, The Ekphrastic Review, The Society of Classical Poets, The Epoch Times, The Poet anthologies, Visual Verse, The Bamboo Hut, Eskimopie, The Sequoyah Cherokee River Journal, and Trouvaille Review. Her microfiction has been published by The Potato Soup Literary Journal. She also regularly contributes to the open mics organized by Rattle Poetry. She currently resides in Gurgaon, India, and works as a senior associate editor. She has two published books, She: The reality of womanhood and The many moods of water. ** Before the End and After the Beginning Slouching through grey fields and yellow skies the prophet’s life is not sunshine but scorching. Banners stand behind him, standards of an unknown god, lost in the dust and the depression. Hope is a forlorn word in the dust of the bowl that prophets use to carry their peace. Nobody told him about the bit of life between the twin destinies of birth and death. He was foretold. He was destined for an end. Nobody ever gave him a middle to work through. He expected blazes of glory and then death and was therefore unprepared for the plodding of his rugged horse along a rising road. This is the end, but not his. Not yet. Maureen Martin Maureen Martin is an aspiring writer from Ohio. Her passions include Shakespeare, literature and film criticism, overindulging in herbal teas, and working as an English teacher. She is a published poet, with several pieces appearing online at the The Ekphrastic Review. ** Follow Me Closely I shuffle in the saddle, my spine unaligning with every jostle of the horse. I relish the respite when he pauses. Is he as horrified as I am? I gape at the mass of flesh, blurred by the smoke, everything ahead an expanse of formlessness. And my men are behind me. My back groans when I turn around, my fellows are simply shadows. It is better for me that way. Is it blind trust that keeps them in line? Or fear? Do they know that I do not know their names or their wives’ names or if they have sons and daughters? Do they know how it churns my stomach that I have asked them to follow me into their last fight and I do not know who they are? What they like to eat? Who they were before? The opposition will get the lucky ones, a quick arrow or a deep slice from a sturdy sword. Disease will ravage the average folk while the lack of food and drink will hunt down the poor bastards that are overlooked. I yank the reigns, Peacock neighs, and marches us into the thick of the fight. I hear the shuffle of the group behind me. For those that make it out alive, I vow to break bread with you and learn your name, write your story. But for now, please follow me closely. Samantha Gorman Samantha Gorman, a lifelong lover of books, lives in Western Pennsylvania. After taking several creative writing classes, she found her voice and had begun the adventure of becoming a writer. She writes poetry, short fiction, and is working on her first novel. ** The judgement of Ériu, Banba and Fódla They gathered about the green hill in their coloured cloaks and the jingle of bridle and bit. Uneasy alliances were sworn beneath unsettled skies for the enemy ships were slick as salmon, and they filled the trough of every wave, thunder breaking from their wordless throats. Thunder broke from wordless throats as the enemy gathered about the green hill in their coloured cloaks, and the musical jingle of bridle and bit was lost in the roar of the waves. We, in our ships bright as leaping salmon, will bring the sea troughs ashore, fill them with blood. Words broke like thunder from the throats of the three queens upon the hill, and filled the trough of the waves with the jingle of horse-music. They opened their palms and let good sense rain down on both sides, coloured cloaks and leaping ships, and the world filled with peace, for a while. Jane Dougherty Pushcart Prize nominee, Jane Dougherty’s poetry has appeared in publications including Gleam, Ogham Stone, Black Bough Poetry, Ekphrastic Review and The Storms Journal. Her short stories have been published in Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, Prairie Fire, Lucent Dreaming among others, and her first adult novel will be published in 2025 by Northodox Press. She lives in southwest France and has published three collections of poetry, thicker than water, birds and other feathers and night horses. ** Lady Grey Poupon Muster muster muster I’m so sick of muster It’s mustard darling now finish up your truffle poutine & go tell papa he’s torn his flag again I’ll mend it when Lady Grey Poupon & her troupe agree to cut their muster Donna-Lee Smith Donna-Lee Smith writes by light of moon and lament of loon way south of 60. ** Wicked Women It was a rag-bag of the young and the old, the bleary-eyed and the hawk-sharp, their horses and donkeys and asses, that assembled that morning. And there were dogs. Dogs of the street, circling for scraps. Curious dogs that had wandered from their guarding posts to sniff around the crowd for any signs of danger. Dogs deliberately brought along by their owners to swell the melee and add yapping and growling to the menace of the crowd. The disorder hid the steely purpose of the villagers. Everyone, be they man or beast, had a focus on the mission they had been set the night before by the Captain. The village was under siege. They had to defend it from the forces of evil. The Captain was the seventh son of a seventh son. With his all-seeing eye, he saw things that others did not. He understood the ways of the underworld and divined messages from the other side. How lucky that the Captain had returned when he did or they would have been ignorant of the threat by forces they could not comprehend. Yesterday evening, he brought the tale of his return journey from foreign parts to the Inn at the crossroads. The road back had taken him through the acres-wide forest to the north of the village. The branches of the trees and the bracken on the floor harboured spirits from the beyond. His attuned ears heard the whispers, heard the voices rising on the breeze, sharing their plans. He was chilled to his core. This morning the Captain, up front of the mob, was in full battle regalia, astride a fine Chestnut mare. Both held their heads high and haughty, both dressed with elaborate white head dresses, evoking the tales of far away that the Captain spun whenever he returned home. Stories of terrifying warriors, adorned with yards of pristine linen, necks hung with beads in all the colours of the rainbow and armed with decorated clubs and arrows, more accurate in their delivery than the muskets the men harboured in their dank cottages. A standard bobbed between the white-flecked steaming haunches of the horses, the bearer making his way to the front. The Captain roared his instructions. On his signal they were to follow him across the plain and into the forest. They were to stay together, keep their animals quiet and their own tongues still. The spirits had ears everywhere. The Captain turned onto the plain and dropped his arm. The gentle yard-horses reared at the pull of the bit in their mouths and the slap on the work-gnarled hands on their haunches. The undisciplined platoon immediately dissipated over the plain, swirling in and out of their lines as the sand might lift and scatter in the sea-wind. They made it to the edge of the forest as an ill-drilled troupe and waited for more instructions. With one finger to his lips and his other hand beckoning them on, the Captain led them into the tinder-dry forest. To a man, they heard the wails as soon as hoof hit bracken. And then the cackling. They froze, stuck to their horses, petrified by the creatures hidden in the canopy and the undergrowth. The Captain ordered a dismount. At this several horses reared and turned for home. Some left frightened men behind, some took their riders with them. The depleted foot soldiers followed the standard deeper into the forest. The clearing came into view as they crested the hill. From below came a dreadful cacophony of shrieks and laughter. And cackles. Hideous, ear-piercing cackles from the rictus mouths of crones. Tough men, like Amos the blacksmith and Elijah the Innkeeper, blanched and shook. These were meddlesome women cast out for interference in the ways of the village. For witchery. Ugly, ancient hags. Hairless, toothless, colourless, shapeless women with spells enough to bring fine men to their knees. Living between this world and the next. No use to anyone yet here were ten, eleven, maybe a baker’s dozen, writhing in malignant ecstasy. And cackling like the devil. How can this be that these disgusting and dangerous creatures cannot understand their lowly status and their need to be grateful? Grateful they had only been banished and not drowned or burnt. The Captain’s headdress could be seen swishing frantically from side to side as his horse circled along the edge of the rise. The men began to dissolve into the undergrowth, quietly slinking down the hill with the hope of escape. Suddenly the Captain raised his arm and gave the signal to charge. His horse, nostrils flaring and mane slicked back by the wind, ran towards the coven. Startled, a handful of the men leapt to their feet and unthinkingly joined the charge. The witches, seemingly oblivious to the danger, continued their rituals and merrymaking. As the Captain reached the clearing the women turned as one and rose to meet the tops of the canopy, their eyes glowing. The horse skidded and stumbled, throwing the Captain to the ground and, knees buckled, it crumpled on top of him. This was their last battle. The men shrank back in horror shielding their eyes to avoid the spells and the spirits boiling the air. At first the heat scorched the dry scrub. Then the flames took hold, licking at the trees, igniting the undergrowth and surging across the clearing. The men were engulfed, charred where they stood or lay, no chance to escape. The crones, gathered unscathed in the centre of the clearing, cackled as the smoke and steam rose through the canopy, the wind blowing in across the plain. The ash fell across the village, petrifying all that lay in it’s path. No-one survived save a small girl child whose mother had been drowned as a witch five summers ago. Caroline Mohan Caroline Mohan is based in Ireland and writes sporadically - mostly stories with the occasional poem and mostly in workshops. She is currently enjoying ekphrastic writing. ** Days on End She lets me in even though I’m a stranger. She offers pleasantries slightly askew, like the sky’s been yellow for days on end, I swear the sun forgot to set! Down the hall that leads to her bedroom, I catch the starchy rustles of the nurse we hired to help her dress and feed her cat. She’s been painting again, a good sign, or just a sign that something reminded her of whom she used to be – the evergreen smell of turpentine or the ochre in a sunrise. My head tilts, a reflex from when my opinion was the first she wanted. The canvas is thick with vertical lines, black in their middles easing to gray, bars of a prison cell or shadows across her carpet. I like this one, I say, but it’s the wrong thing because she’s gone now, drifting to a stool by the window, wrapping herself in a cloudy silence to punish my wandering beyond a stranger’s small talk. The beige cat opens its mouth against the corner of a blank canvas inclined against the wall. Outside the window, the world is the colour of mustard, of my mother’s permanent day. Joanna Theiss Joanna Theiss is a writer living in Washington, DC. Her stories have appeared in Chautauqua, Peatsmoke Journal and Milk Candy Review, among others, and she is an associate editor at Five South. In a past life, Joanna worked as a lawyer, practicing criminal defense and international trade law. You can find book reviews, links to her published works, and her mosaic collages at www.joannatheiss.com. Twitter @joannavtheiss Instagram @joannatheisswrites |
Challenges
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