Tuesday, July 8, 2008

I'm trying to participate. I really am.

I've been making myself "write" -- well at least get out words, but I'm getting more and more frustrated and they're mainly strings of curse words. Since I'm not getting much of anywhere with the prompts, I decided to go with the idea of "postcards from the beach" since that Bob fish thing was fun. So this wasn't nearly as fun, but here's today's (and notice not a swear word in sight!)

The heat in the garden was agonizing. It had people doubled over stone toads and melting across wooden benches like clocks in a Dali painting. Giovanni knelt before the birdbath and poured fistfuls of tepid water over his head.

This is the miracle of the birdbath: its water filled eternally from some unseen well. The water was salted, naturally. If priests were to come with their scientists (or scientists with their priests) to test the pH or algae levels or any such variables, they would find the water was the same as the ocean's, the coast a pilgrimage away.

But there were no priests now, just garden-dwellers melting into the landscape and Giovanni -- if that really was his name -- kneeling before the birdbath, the salty water dripping into his eyes. "Sweet Jesus," he whispers, and, "Oh God, the heat."

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