Movie Night

We’re watching men on the screen sprint along a parapet overhanging a sinkhole. They look down at the spot where the earth opened up, and see their shock reflected in the face of the moon. One actor inches forward while the audience holds its breath. “He who jumps into the void owes no explanation to those who stand and watch,” my man intones. Why must he always quote others, trying to pass off their words as his own? I’m sick of it. “Goddard said that,” I snap. “So?” he says before he vacates his seat, the movie house, my life.From Guest Contributor Cheryl Snell

Cheryl's books include poetry and fiction of all sizes.

Exit Stage Left

A young lady reminded me of the theatre, a single spotlight illuminating an actor on stage; blackness all around except for her brightly lit face and dust particles dancing about, defying gravity as they floated in all directions.

I also thought about a woman, a wife and mother, watching television, a solitary figure in a dark room. Her life’s work was behind her, trying to distract herself from reality by watching mindless entertainment and wondering what people had to do with themselves when they weren’t doing anything else.

Now, I'm nothing more than that dust particle floating my days away.

From Guest Contributor J. Iner Souster

Walter

Walter was one of those fellows that if you saw him putting a nickel into a beggar’s cup you knew it was just a blind for taking out a dime or quarter. So when he offered to take care of everything for me and another friend we didn’t have to be clairvoyant to know that he was scheming.

Walter was living proof that friendship between two people depended upon the patience of one. Some friends aren’t really friends at all, just a good actor. Even with all his faults, the most difficult thing I ever said to him was goodbye.

From Guest Contributor James Freeze

Eulogy for Lead

My grandfather liked to paint lead miniatures, redcoat British riflemen and coal-colored Zulu warriors with brilliant spears. He would wax poetic about square formations and Michael Caine, talk about each individual figure as though they led deeply introverted lives. On hot summer mornings I'd wake with my child's eyes and see: all those soldiers shifted from their positions, playing out an historical drama that only my grandfather knew. Grandfather survived the brutality of the Pacific Theater. Now he lays forever asleep, something inanimate, molded by ancestral pressures unknown, moved with care, another lead actor in some endless recursive performance.

From Guest Contributor John K. Webb