Friday Flash Fiction
  • Home
    • About Friday Flash Fiction
  • 100-Word Stories
  • Longer Stories
  • Poetry
  • Authors
    • A-C
    • D-F
    • G-I
    • J-L
    • M-O
    • P-R
    • S-V
    • W-Z
  • Submissions
    • 100-Word Submissions
    • 500-Word Submissions
    • Poetry Submissions
    • How to complete the Entry Form
    • Writing Good Flash Fiction
    • Contact FFF
    • Appeals/Feedback Request
    • Technical Stuff >
      • Terms & Conditions
      • GDPR Compliance
      • Duotrope

Demisted, by Sandra James

29/7/2022

 
My poem’s gone, I’ve lost it
It won’t come back to me
I wrote it on the shower door
As it steamed up while I washed.

I quickly dried and powdered
And dressed myself with haste
Then hurried back with pen in hand
To find the steam all gone.

That new demister took it
Stole my words and clever rhyme
It won’t come back now quite the same
My chance for fame has gone.

Winter Wears On, by Michael Leach

29/7/2022

 
The longest winter week ends
with continued cold weather.
Clad in a turtle
-neck & blanket, she reflects
the setting sun’s rays.

Feeling like Tithonus, by Guy Fletcher

29/7/2022

 
The old man in a wheelchair
suddenly recalls the story of Tithonus
whose lover Eos asked Zeus
to grant him eternal life.
But a crucial request she omitted
was for him not to age like Dorian Gray
and so grew older each cursed passing day.

The old man in a wheelchair
remembers youth as if it were yesterday
yet forgets what was said five minutes ago
such is his harrowing condition
and now he feels like Tithonus
as he wipes away a lonely stray tear
and carries on existence....year after year.

Great Ball of Fire, by Ivan Ristic

29/7/2022

 
Our meltdown souls
Inside burnout bodies
Hiding from the Great Ball of Fire.

The sweat runs down the spine
Like ants crawling on the skin...

We don't need hell
When we have a place
In the sun.
All we need is pray
For rain.

First Flush, by Marjan Sierhuis

29/7/2022

 
First flush of morning
The water glistens like jewels
atop rippling waves

Picture

WaterAid by, Liz O’Shea

29/7/2022

 
Swollen belly, sticky eyes
And flies, flies, flies
And his eyes
Hold no surprise
That we watch him suffer before he dies.

Is this a child of my God
My HMV, McDonald’s, Ikea
Have I got room for both my cars God
My I’m alright Jack, get on your bike God
My let’s not drink tap water it’s not pure enough God.

How can you, how can we, how can I
Watch him die.......
But we do.

Prayer For Uncertain Times, by Rashna Walton

29/7/2022

 
Because you're centred in Love
Love can find you and encircle you
Because you speak gently
Softness pads your heart
Because your heart has filters fine as silver thread
Only pure light can enter
Because the commerce of your heart is kindness
The universe will open its storehouse to you
Love and trust
Trust in Love

The Kitchen Gardens of Cardigan Castle, by Guy Fletcher

22/7/2022

 
To be honest not much remains
of Cardigan Castle by the Teifi
transformed from wood to stone by Lord Rhys.
I pass by his wooden statue
and giant seat where an eagle perches,
centuries ago you could hear the sounds
of music and poetry performed in these grounds

which seem to drift in the sultry summer air.
I saunter to the Kitchen Gardens
now restored to their former glory
producing apples, soft fruit and vegetables
with common white butterflies flickering.
It is these gardens which thrill me the most,
in my mind I picture many a ghost.
Picture
Picture

Gothic Poem, by Mary Wallace

22/7/2022

 
Whisper, my love whisper, come close as the mist creeps in,
With only the night to hear us,
And moonlight to dance on your skin.

Whisper, my love whisper, through lips turning cold and blue,
Scatter your lies in the wind love,
As my blade draws the life from you.

Gently, my love gently, there is time before we go.
Lay ebony hair on my shoulder,
Sleep soft in the reddening snow.

Louder my love, louder, deceive with your dying breath
Your words held no truth in life love,
Still I long to hear lies in death.

Whisper, dark woods whisper, cold mist impede the moon's glow
Keep our resting place a secret,
Beneath the crisp white falling snow.

A Mother's Tears, by Rosie Wee

22/7/2022

 
Silent, intruding, pulsating, you came.
Took him on the cusp of youth like a thief.
Sent voices and lies to make him comply.
Rob him of memories, leaving fragments.

There was a time he won prizes for me.
There was a time when lilting symphony
Pervaded the night, Fiddler on the Roof.
Passers-by laugh and mock, “Where is your God?”

A montage of life’s vignettes filter by.
Despondent, bewildered, I make my way.
Frigid concrete, silent, cold, looms ahead,
Fragile dewdrops trickle on nature’s palm.

If I fall on bended knees, implore you,
Schizophrenia, would you return my son?

Mother Earth, by Dorian J. Sinnott

22/7/2022

 
And when I gave myself to the Earth
I felt nothing but peace;
surrounded in perfect harmony with her balance.
And no more did I bear
the chains of mankind;
heavy and hateful with greed.
For she gives and she takes
what she needs and desires;
fruitful for her children upon her.
For there never had been
a closer place to the divine;
than when I felt the warm breath of the wind beside me.

Turn Left Or Get Shot, by Alex Blaine

22/7/2022

 
Armed militia
behind enemy lines
Just a small
cardboard cut-out sign
Cops killing kids
over the music they play
And the media
blindly points the finger

Waves, by Marjan Sierhuis

22/7/2022

 
Waves pounding the shore
Clouds drifting across a blue sky
Inner peace is mine
Picture

The Falcon and the Cathedral, by Guy Fletcher

15/7/2022

 
The mellifluous tones of a choir
emanates from the old cathedral
unappreciated by the falcon and chicks
which have made their home
in a crevice on the ancient walls.
The magnificent falcon flies away,
swoops on a pigeon, unfortunate prey.

Its wing span is impressive,
face fierce with hooked nose,
talons yellow and ruthless
so there's no escape for the pigeon,
a terrible beauty in motion
bringing the feast back to the holy nest
as another hymn is sung with zest.

Dance Pandemic, by Michael Leach

15/7/2022

 
[After the Florence + the Machine song ‘Choreomania’ (written by Florence Welch, Jack Antonoff, and Thomas Bartlett) as well as Autumn de Wilde’s accompanying photo of Florence Welch]
We spin as noon sun
strikes the green heart of Stonehenge
on summer’s solstice…
The world just spins on + on
while seasons bleed together.

Stellar Marie, by Sterling Warner

15/7/2022

 
Removing eyeliner enhanced distant stars
lurking inside pupils, framed by violet
irises that changed color like flushing fish
gill tissue exposed to oxygen, drowning in air.

Marie envisioned floaters moving, teasing
her apprehension of real and hallucinatory
images as annoying as darting fruit flies
gnats and mosquitos daring her lens to focus.

Glaring at dawn lights, squinting at sunsets
Marie’s cataracts flashed and fell like a personal
galaxy gravitating towards collapsing black holes
of fleeting imagination, discernable sights.

Tribute, by David Dumouriez

15/7/2022

 
I will arise and go now, and go up to the john,
For last night’s curry did me, and I’ve been holding it too long.

Shipwreck, by Mimi Grouse

8/7/2022

 
Sunken, rain-slick rust and steel
cadaver of the ocean;
Foundered on the main by riders
of the seas of their own glory.
And waves and fish and whales
splash a fillip to the fools
abandoned to themselves and brine,
counting nothing here.
No-one cares what tongues they speak
or how many, or how well;
The only voice that matters
is Humility.

Backwards, by David Dumouriez

8/7/2022

 
Would it not be bettered
If we lived life in reverse
Our folly could be fettered
We could consequence traverse

We could consequence traverse
Our folly could be fettered
If we lived life in reverse
Would it not be bettered

He Who Walks Behind the Trees, by Dorian J. Sinnott

8/7/2022

 
He speaks in wonder to the earth,
through luscious fields of green;
bathing in the light of Midsummer sun,
through lands one could only dream.

Down by the bubbling brook,
across the moss covered hills;
he waits in forests overgrown,
for eyes who do believe.

He is the watcher of all life,
the guardian of sacred things;
he is the Green Man of the woods,
who walks behind the trees.

And in his cycle of life and death,
he turns with him the Earth;
each morning and night, each beautiful season,
rejoicing with the song of rebirth.

The Cabin, by J. Iner Souster

8/7/2022

 
A decrepit cabin stands. Aged and descending
extreme decrepitude runs its course.
Ten by ten feet of forgotten space. One table and one chair.
Weathered with thoughts and dreams of white,
metallic and collapsable. A table still standing
as a chair lay folded upon the littered ground. Never the study to sit.
A cluster of pastel particle boards. A haphazard collection
of wilted yellows, pale blues, muted oranges, and cloudy, olive green
placed over missing boards and gaping holes
vomited up from reclaimed lumbers. Three exposed windows.
metal framing and an idea where the glass had once called home
all of its fractured pieces long since vanished,
returning to sand or lost to spells salvaged fragments
Reflections of things meant to be. With just enough for the light to get in
Barely enough for my light to peer out.
To stand the stillness of hours, lost in thoughts from another time.

Listen, by Marjan Sierhuis

8/7/2022

 
By the babbling brook
with shut eyes, please listen closely
for happy chatter

Reconfiguration, by Michael Leach

8/7/2022

 
Configuration
Cartooning
Inorganic
Fruition
Fiction
Tragic
Actor
Fact
Art
Oi
O
i

Summertime, by Marjan Sierhuis

1/7/2022

 
Birds are heard singing
Fragrant blooms perfume the air
Isn't summer grand?

Lady on Whitmore Bay, by Guy Fletcher

1/7/2022

 
Picture
Early on a summer's morning
I view a middle-aged woman who halts
as she wanders over the golden sands
of magical Whitmore Bay.
She makes the sign of the cross
softly talking to herself
and then she's on her way again
to the sound of a seagull's lament.
I saunter to the water's edge
observing placid June waves sizzle
and stars which seem to sparkle in the sea
then venture to Marco's Cafe
where the same lady sits as if a ghost,
maudlin eyes fixed on the South Wales coast.

<<Previous

    Poetry

    This is the section where fiction prose becomes something else. We still expect the poems to be short, though – sonnets, perhaps, or around that length at the very most.

    Poems submitted should be
    no longer than 160 words
    and contain
    no more than 16 lines.

    100 words remains the approximate target.

    Please submit using the Poetry Submissions Page.


    Picture

    Archives

    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014

Picture
Website by Platform 36