Friday Flash Fiction

A Squirrel Sonnet, by Guy Fletcher

21/1/2022

A squirrel scurries across the road
narrowly avoiding a roaring monster
unlike many of its counterparts.
I can only but stare in awe
at its acrobatic motion
as it ascends a steep fence
to reach a barren winter tree.
If it limped like me a predator
would indeed have a rich feast.
Sometimes consciousness is a curse,
too much time to ponder whilst the squirrel
has a purpose which I envy:
a wondrous sight, graceful and swift too,
it descends the tree... and disappears from view.

2 Comments

The Devil's Advocate, by David Chek Ling Ngo

21/1/2022

6 Comments

When you conduct a viva voce,
you can play devil's advocate,
have a licence to kill,
pick holes in everything
while sounding smart,
and in the name of scientific inquiry,
post questions–intelligent or not–
you yourself have no idea how to answer,
but expect an answer to
with the right kind of rigour,
for you’re now the devil's advocate.

6 Comments

Mollification, by Sterling Warner

21/1/2022

3 Comments

We initially kissed as a compromise
no long-term commitment nor strange bed
in the morning—only fractured choices.

Weeks—months—passed by without consequence
company well met bred contentment—not expectations--
till autonomy’s strings frayed in the quest for more.

Days and nights should have nurtured negotiation
yet enhanced concession’s battle ground, a place
where stalwart adversaries met halfway to nowhere.

Summer freedom found autumn chill too much
to endure—we conceded independence and solitude
left us incomplete, found solace together priceless.

3 Comments

2022, by Marjan Sierhuis

21/1/2022

8 Comments

Go soar to new heights
I just know you can do it
2022: memorable

8 Comments

When the Fog Came, by Alex Blaine

21/1/2022

2 Comments

When the fog came
it came in thick and fast
couldn't see the ground
under my feet
my hand in front
of my face

2 Comments

Life Play, by David Chek Ling Ngo

14/1/2022

9 Comments

She pulls herself back
only to be launched anew,
with a leap of faith.

Inevitable
it seems as he tries to keep
his spirit alive.

[Photo credit: Tan Eng Hock]

9 Comments

Dreechit Decembers, by Sheila Ash

14/1/2022

7 Comments

Fog, rain, drizzle, drizzle,
Fog, rain, drizzle, drizzle,
Rain, rain, fog,
Rain, fog, rain,
Drizzle, fog, rain, fog, drizzle,
Fog, fog, rain, fog, fog,
Drizzle, fog, rain, fog, drizzle,
Fog, rain, drizzle, drizzle,
Fog, rain, drizzle, drizzle.

7 Comments

Fog in Bute Park, by Guy Fletcher

14/1/2022

4 Comments

It emerges suddenly from a blue sky,
silent and sinister, melting the frost,
the castle barely visible,
even more gothic than before.
It is a cold January fog
that chills my bones and chills my very soul
with not a single tourist here to stroll

just a man and dog and jogger.
The only visitors to the Gorsedd Stones
are seagulls who screech a lament
as a squirrel leaps up a barren tree.
Yet this mysterious vista does not last
and the wintry sun returns to the scene
as if the gloomy fog...had never been.

4 Comments

Shy Dusk, by David Chek Ling Ngo

7/1/2022

7 Comments

[Photo credit: David Chek Ling Ngo]

Playing hide and seek,
she tries to hide her beauty
behind her pipa.

(Note: Held vertically, the pipa is a traditional Chinese string instrument that has a pear-shaped wooden body )

7 Comments

The Community Vaccination Clinic, by Michael Leach

7/1/2022

3 Comments

we wait in this full
room for our COVID shots
‘Brave’ plays on the screen

3 Comments

The River, by Guy Fletcher

7/1/2022

4 Comments

"I feel certain I am going mad again." - Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf suffered with the mind
facing many a mental collapse
and spells of contentment made this disease
all the more unbearable,
cruel voices echoing inside her head.
Virginia was obsessed by water
writing "To the Lighthouse" and "The Waves"
observing the hypnotic breakers bend
as they crashed on the Cornish shore.
But then bombers flew over from Germany
and the "furies" returned
yet her books shall not be forgotten.
She headed out on a bitter March day,
the river Ouse...taking her life away.

4 Comments

Holiday Poetry Submissions...

7/1/2022

0 Comments

...have now been transferred to this page and appear below this post. Thanks to all for your contributions while I've been having a break.

0 Comments

Her, by Alex Blaine

7/1/2022

1 Comment

Her lips her smile
her cold feet
against my skin
her nails driving
down my spine
her rusted locks
flapping in the wind

1 Comment

A Poorer, Yet Richer Christmas, by Alyce Clark

7/1/2022

1 Comment

In Christmas’s past, the coins jingled much more-
As we carried our packages home from the store.
“Bigger and better,” we practically cried,
Now, “less is more” we gratefully sigh.
Tables were filled with sumptuous treats.
No cost was spared for our time-honored feast.
Now we’ve pared it down to our most favorite dishes.
Enjoying God’s love with these granted best wishes.
Our hearts have grown full- while our wallets hold less.
No spectacular gowns, we’re more casually dressed.
Warm memories and smiles when we think of the past.
And now we know the true meaning of Christmas, at last.

1 Comment

NOW OPEN TO SUBMISSIONS

4/1/2022

0 Comments

Because of the Christmas Competition, and the editor's need for a long-overdue holiday, no stories are being published here at present.
However, we are now are now accepting submissions through the normal submissions pages.

Short poems will appear here from 7th January.

0 Comments

Idea Thief, by David Chek Ling Ngo

26/11/2021

8 Comments

It flutters across
my line of sight leisurely,
taking me away.

8 Comments

Maeve, by Kate MacDonald-Dunbar

26/11/2021

6 Comments

When you first look at me you might think
here's a person who's lively and crazy.
But looks can deceive, as you will soon see.
because I'm both house-proud and lazy.

I'm aware that clutter's a symptom.
of issues that might be quite grave.
But the remedy here was so simple,
I brought in a lady called Maeve.

With a broom and a feather duster,
she is quiet, her experience shows.
I could, of course, give her a Hoover.
But that would just spoil my repose.

6 Comments

Home Town Blues, by Adrian McRobb

26/11/2021

1 Comment

Walking down dirty streets of windblown litter
tramps folded like used newspapers in doorways
forgotten remnants of a brighter more promising past
turning by the Red Lion towards the duck pond
firemen clean their gleaming red engines shining my memory

Whiteway; the pop factory road by the bomb damaged buildings
dressers hang over broken stairways their drawers askew
mirrors with their forgotten images of a cracked yesterday
being careful not to pick the fallen ornaments from shattered roads
lest you bring more than treasure away, with someone's past

Solicitors office with a larva lamp window, watching the blobs swim
the old pub with its roaring train sign, black beamed Tudor style
sweet shop and bakers with its smells of fresh baked delights
approaching the flats, which watch Bedfont Lane along its length
wondering what its like to live in the clouds?

1 Comment

Frost in November, by Guy Fletcher

26/11/2021

2 Comments

A transient sheet of white
covers the verdant grass
as a robin flickers away
from the semi-barren birch.
People scrape ice from cars
irritable and taken by surprise
but I peer at this world with wondrous eyes

my breath rolling like ectoplasm
with drowsy three-quarter moon
now fading in an azure sky
as the rising sun creates jewels
on fallen golden leaves.
In this wintry weather I cannot but thrive
and my, does it feel good to be alive.

2 Comments

Ode to Friday Flash Fiction, by Dee Lorraine

19/11/2021

15 Comments

No matter where my drabbles take me
No matter where my stories roam
No matter where my poetry’s published
Friday Flash Fiction’s my literary home.
I love your stories, poems, and comments
Sue, Sandra, Sankar, Sivan, Candace, Guy,
Jim, Don, Daniel, David, Marjan, and Fliss
Then there’s Pamela, Peggy, Padmini,
Alyce, Kate, Elizabeth, John:
Fridays don’t get any better than this!
If I didn’t say your name, dear ones
Please know I love you, too
Just being mindful of the road I trod
I don’t want to overstep my bounds or break a triple-F rule
And face Ringmaster G’s ferocious firing squad!

15 Comments

Yarn Over Chain Two, by Mary Wallace

19/11/2021

10 Comments

Yarn over chain two
Tucked into my safe space making gifts
There is satisfaction in the plying of the hook
The play of colours
The pride of creativity

Yarn over chain two
Chant it so the daily numbers can't intrude
Louder to help silence my thoughts
And ease the pain of separation

Yarn over chain two
Still, dark shadows slip into my safe space
My hands create
While I unravel

10 Comments

Flight of the Peregrine, by Guy Fletcher

19/11/2021

3 Comments

It is a beautiful azure morning:
the meandering Wye reflecting the sky
and high up in the ether
a peregrine glides and I yearn
to drift to the white cliffs.
Its wings of magic are extended,
a sight to savour with awe.
They were hunted close to extinction
but now numbers are ascending
which is a rare success for nature,
a magnificent creature
truly a feast for the eyes
gliding gracefully as it searches for prey
both beauty and the beast on this fine day.

3 Comments

Will We? by David Chek Ling Ngo

19/11/2021

6 Comments

Succumbing to the darkness
unleashing its wrath upon the earth,
the sky ceases resistance,
the sun being clouded over with a blinding veil,
the mist descending down like a hungry beast,
and eating up the trees from the top,
which are being wildly pushed on
by strange winds and rain to uproot them,
and fighting back
with everything they’ve got to win the battle,
and will win
because they’ve been pumped
with the belief that they might win
because they’ve weathered the most,
and will survive this one.
But, will they?

6 Comments

An African Queen, by Adrian McRobb

19/11/2021

2 Comments

Nefertiti upon a whim, loved a man once I thought was him
he would made those Nile smiles and kept his court with crocodiles
that man was full eighteen years and kept his conscience with his peers
he who was wise before old Rome, and amused himself with palindrome
her beau was a king of a desert realm, bought her presents made of elm
would this mystery be found in a harem, or in the palace of Tutankhamen?

2 Comments

A Note, by David Chek Ling Ngo

12/11/2021

6 Comments

You have memory of what I wrote,
not about you,
but about someone else,
on a piece of paper,
then torn and crumbled,
but later reconstructed by you
to reveal what I scribbled,
illegible and unreadable,
but meaningful to me,
a recollection
seeming real in my mind,
but fabricated differently
in your beyond broken mind
hoping for a miracle cure,
but twisted up in knots
by jealousy and hatred.

6 Comments

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Short poems will appear here from 7th January.

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