Thursday, July 28, 2011

ANGEL ZAPATA ATTUNEMENT = "WHEN A WRITER MEETS A WRITER COMIN' THROUGH THE WRY"

ANGEL ZAPATA
  ATTUNEMENT =


"WHEN A WRITER MEETS A WRITER COMIN' THROUGH THE WRY"

~ encounter by Absolutely*Kate


Location: GEORGIA
Action: VITALIZING
Remembrance: FOREVER


Roll camera. Hampton Inn.
Pour coffee. Keep it comin.
Here come our protagonists now ~


It was a dark and stormy night . . . No, No, NO!  It was a HOT and abundantly sunny day. "You never get used to the heat, no matter what they say," offered up the non-cliche mortal from the Big Apple who fell in love with a Georgia goddess peach and rolled with his big heart to the rockin' rhythms of deep down South where Ray Charles croons and the Waffle Houses proliferate on desired streetcorners like ... like ... trees. Well, that's what Angel assures me and after finally meetin' up with the savvy dude from swirlcomestances of fate proving (once again) There is no such thing as a coincidence . . . I wouldn't ever doubt this guy's astute utterances. 

Astute?  Big time.  
Bridging multi-genres?  Absolutely. 

ANGEL IS NO APPARITION. Magda photo
Impressive? In a quiet sense of time where time passes by and you wish it never to fizzle and end -- yeah, that kind of impressive. A time your thoughts zap and zing and you feel the moment tug as warmly natural as the hug you just came out of when you met the man not needing a strut to walk his character through the doors of a normal day hotel lobby. He's dressed like Johnny Cash with a train o' thought a'comin. You sense a kinship with writers knowing writers right out loud everywhere. You dash ideas and listen to the said and the unsaid and the quantum mood fuels the air and the coffee in the big container marked robust keeps on a'comin'. You experience attunement in the laughter that whoops out in simultanea when our camera-man takes meticulous to new art forms. You wonder if such emanates as an inner response mechanism which psyches remembered eons before we ever approached this meeting, this moment. 


INTENSITY MEETS BEHOLDER~ Magda photo
He
put
a
spell
  on
me,
did
AZ.

 Yes, I met Angel Zapata, legendary more-than-horror writer, emotions evoker, poetry man of brushstrokes in the colour of linger. Yes, that's precisely and prolifically what his words do. If you've read him, you already know. If you've yet to read him, you're getting ready for the stuff that treats (and tricks?) are made for. His word paintings linger past mists, graves, holograms, screams, howls, soft sighs and below the rumble of psyche rising. The linger stirs thought patterns around and I believe commands them (gently) to resonate out in a whole new array. Gazillions of gruesome and graceful Zapata words in supremacy linger for your carouse at his dark delightful outtasite site, A RAGE OF ANGEL. Evidence of alchemy, how his mind churns mere pentanglings to meaningful magic, exists at the latest rage for scribes, his tight terrific creation of ~ 5x5

FACT: Five by five is the best of 25 possible subjective responses used to describe the quality of communications, specifically the signal-to-noise ratio. As receiving stations move away from an analog radio transmitting site, the signal strength decreases gradually while noise levels increase. The signal becomes increasingly difficult to understand until it can no longer be heard as anything other than static.


Thus 5x5 Fiction is that told (and presented), loud and clear. I told you the fella was astute, didn't I?  Doesn't take a wikapedia or a wiki-horror trove Angel told me a clever guy is keeping cross currents on, to multiply that equation. It just adds up. 


That all summarized, sit back, imagine getting to know the more a respected colleague, a fellow presenter of writers on the rise. Across a little table in a big space is all the genuine gracing the gust of an Augusta moment. That's hanging out with a writer whose depth of deft can be sensed without sensing . . . is only scratching the surface of the itch he's turning out in Writers' Worlds ~


Panic Press presents, The Man of Shadows, a horror short story collection by Angel Zapata. From the wicked predilections of children to the varied manifestations of evil personified, The Man of Shadows will have you running for the light. Click to purchase on Amazon.


Angel's premier collection, The Man of Shadows shows man not myth exploring greater fear factors. When we met, I pulled no punches in sweet resource management; pulling forth a colourful array of sugar packets to illustrate tableside the prolifics and ramifications of writers sailing higher the destinies of writers in the upcoming HARBINGER*33. I told you the man's astute, didn't I? He saw the enrichment of the final chapter, "THE TREASURE CHEST" a brimming coffer of availability of the books and sensations of 33 stellar authors featured in stories and as personnas on the starboard side, as well as 33 heralds' glistening gold where their writings are told (and sold). He heard these heralds' voices at the rail ~ 33 salutes from writers to writers sailing destinies. He telescoped his "Aye" to eye the magnitude of 33 ports of call where multitudes of authors stretch their scribing tendencies. The quantum promotion/publishing touting his well-deserved talents and oh so many more is the stuff authoring destinies are made for ~

Writers Sailing Writers' Destinies
A Herald of Greatness to be.


~ Badge of honour by Laurita Miller
Hitting horizons. Then exceeding them.  Billowing sails with wonder taking on far-reaching fair winds. Angel Zapata, I predict, shall exceed any genre his AmaZing mind expresses to the worlds he is destined to reach. 


ABRACADABRA BACKATCHA ~ Zapata pic
Believing in believers, I realize the import of happening to be in Angel's home port on a trip taken to bolster family. There's no such thing as coincidence, and my hero Dad is on target once more in teaching by example ~ The true riches we carry are the people we are fortunate to know the more in our lives' journeys. I'm fortunate to know the wonders of writers. I'm fortunate and grateful to know Angel Zapata yet the more, and that Harry Sanderford rogue surfer/cowboy who phoned right into our meeting of the energized minds. Now I wonder how that happened? 

So when are you and I going to encounter?
Trust your fates to those winds.



There are days you just meet Angels. ~ Pilarcik pic

<-- What HE said before she said is still hanging up on his raging walls right here!

~ Absolutely*Kate,

returning next weekend with ~
  THE VILLAGE SMITHY
. . . as time travels on . . .


Friday, July 22, 2011

"COME TRY YOUR LUCK . . . " ~ As Absolutely*Kate tells the tale of THE VILLAGE SMITHY {Epic*sode 8}



COME TRY YOUR LUCK

{ Just ahead of back-in-time with
   THE VILLAGE SMITHY }

~ As regaled by Absolutely*Kate 

ALL PRIOR EPIC*SODES FLOW JUST BELOW


The room at the top of the winding staircase with the mahogany rail looked like a room at the top of a winding staircase. It had a beveled paneled door. It sported a matched pair of glistening gold numerals. It wasn't painted a loud colour, no, not by a long shot . . . but it regaled raucous sounds pounding it down -- from the inside out.
 
From the inside of the room at the top of the winding mahogany railed stairs at The Narragansett Social Club, one could see the sea. One could hear the sea, smell the sea, sense the sea. On notorious nights when moonlight waltzed her shimmer of a silver strand upon the upper reaches of high tide -- one did not see upon the sea what entered the tunnel from the channel on the shore beyond the boulders into the cold stone cellar of The Narragansett Social Club. Twas the darker nights that the skillful silent oarsmen selected to row their spirited cargo to the tunnel which held the hoard which seven smug smugglers had hauled on board. 
 
This night, when Liza followed her deceased mother's most fondest friend, Captain Horatio Bennigan, up the twisting secret staircase to the room beyond the room of the door marked with the gleam of golden numerals, waves pounded incessantly against the moonless shore. Liza heard the waves, as well as the raucous patrons of Room 33, careening their cries, their insatiable thirsts, their adamant orders, "More! Hurry good man! More!" 
 
Hustling Harvey Hooper, the boisterous bartender's lanky son, hurried the stairs two at a time to descend to the cellar, to reach the room where the rum and amber whiskey stalwartly stood by. The hurry of Harvey's hustle to turn the tides against Prohibition elbowed Liza's waist with careless haste of his ambition. Her silver beaded purse fell to the stair. Her uncle's curse harangued the air. Coins spilled. Tempers flared.
 
"Be damned you oaf! That's my niece you're accosting - I'll have your job you senseless scalawag!"
  
"Sir, I meant no harm. The casino crowd is rowdy. This is the only passageway through and I'm doing what I've been sent to do. Clear the way I say!"
 
"Why you impertinent upstart! On your downward dash, you thoughtlessly shoved my niece -- "
 
"I did not!"
 
"I saw it with mine own eyes you lying misfit -- "
 
"She lurched directly into my way -- "
 
Liza, never a lurcher, lunged her way into the heated hotheads' disarray. "Stop it you two! And Uncle, pull back that punch! Dismiss that glare! Don't you know it's bad luck to argue on the stair? Why, it goes against time eternal's  -- "
  
The seaworthy soul of the captain courageously cut in rather than reveal where the wrath of Liza's agitation was beginning to begin. Hot on the hunch for a night of winning hands he intended to remember precisely how to play, he was not about her tipping her hand to reveal why they had come here this particular day. Instead, he calmed his countenance, stooped down to help Liza scoop what she was gathering. His horizon-hardened gaze did not fail to glean the gleam from something shiny swiftly concealed into the flapper frock's ruffled elegance. Duly noted, he gruffly advised, "Lizzie Gal, don't be so loose with your mentions of time. Those of our lot must be cautious in our careful. Otherwise luck will wan, the wrinkles of best times traveled shall warp. We won't be worth the persistence of our future's existence." He paused, lowering his whisper more softly yet, "Darlin', understood?"
 
On the periphery, with a huff, Harry Hooper hustled by. He was not about to give those two his time of day.
~ ~ ~

Meanwhile, back in the serene village of Essex, ten years before this day came to be, time trailed forward and aft. Townsfolk did what townsfolk did. Aye, the living was good along the verdant village green. Jim Casey's brass band was attuned, and played on. Clarinets cleaved clarity and tubas resounded, deeper in base understandings of stanzas conveyed. On Main Street, that bustling thoroughfare of here to there, all was as it should be. The butcher's superb sense of humor ribbed his comrade when he swaggered his bluster through the door next door. He chuckled to challenge his buddy the baker's kneading profits from profiteroles; said he was rolling in the dough.
 
Just a shop away, caring not a flicker for their hearty har-hars and harrumphs, the cocksure candlestick maker consulted cunning charts. Eerily he chanted ~ 
 
"Her wish come true. Her luck fall through. 
Her wish come true. Her luck fall through. 
Her wish -- "

The sudden shadow in the doorway beneath the forest green awning blocked the evening dipping sun. The towering visage which held back that lambent light meant it could belong to only one. A strong voice of few chosen words impounded purpose. The mighty village smithy did assuredly stand.



"Candlestick maker, what do you know of where the new gal has gone? It's spoken in the village you saw her last. Tis said you taunted with your Wishing Candle lit. Tell me now of your chicanery. Tell me straight Chadwick. Dare you not leave out a bit."

~ ~

A decade hence, angling a pretty pre-determined gaze across the teeming gaming tables in the room beyond the room numbered lucky 33, Liza studied well the whirl of the roulette wheel. Something akin to inner will, bespoke within the simultaneous Essex village exchange. It gripped her tightened, held her precarious heart still. Sensing danger, yet feeling safe contrasted how she ebbed her flow to feel. Best concentrate instead on the gaming room. Here was a place she already knew the deal. And what was to conspire time after time forward playing out on upon portentious tables. 
 
Another sip of her gin, drinking in the scene, calmed her nerves and current reality drew her in. Again her eyes danced a merry waltz growing accustomed to the spins of the roulette wheel. Round it went with gleam, its sheen. Who knew where it stopped, who knew who would win. Ah, Liza knew this spin, where the tiny tell of the silver ball would rightly fall in. She'd been here during before and would come into profitable times here in yet again, but now, something sharply cautioned to pay much more attention to the present of the now of when.
 
"Why, that's her! Right there. Took up all the stair. And the grizzled gent at the poker table near her accused me of disrupting them. The brazen nerve! I tell you Al, it just ain't fair!" Harvey Hooper was still hot around his holler and collared the fellow he'd been introduced to at the dice table. His tirade would have continued but the other man's mind was adept at tuning out the extraneous, concentrating instead on what was relative to the matter.
 
Albert glanced the indicated gal up and down when she swiveled gold fringe of her violet beaded flapper frock 'round and 'round. She seemed to transcend time, such as her motions spun in lights fantastic. A quick glance secured time was on his side for the companions he had walked in with were otherwise occupied. The dashing Robert Gilette and the fair Fairbanks couple huddled deep into conversation at the red leather bar. Gin flowed. Frosty iced glasses clinked. He caught the characteristic tinkle of Mary's adoring laugh at some comment Douglas must've made. Yes, his time was his.
 
As Harvey Hooper huffed his puffery off, whining with chagrin, the taller fellow let his gaze meet even with that of the gal with the determined grin. Odd sensation, he sensed her somehow familiar with him. Bolstering his innate charm the more, Albert's hand waved to the gaming table before him with a flourish of his suited sleeve. He led with the line his calculations had long deduced led to accuracy of  luring the ladies in ~ 
 
"Come try your luck?"
 
"Pardon me?"
 
"Care to join me? Try out a roll of your luck?"
 
Liza smiled. She knew this scene. It had played well before . . . for both of them. "You mean, will Luck be a Lady this night?" Inwardly she grinned as lyrics of her favorite RatPack tune from times well forward cautioned her not to blow on another man's dice, no matter how relatively outstretched they appeared. "Lordy, lordy," she preened, as the man with uncountable stars in his eyes held her gaze and teased, and leaned and leaned. 
  
She'd challenged him with these lines before. It had aided and abetted him well then, it would again. Fully, she fluttered Maybellined lashes, "But good sir, I hardly know thee. And dare you think God will be in the details of a fair win?"
 
His chuckle rumbled the room. Pity most never recalled him for the charmer he could be, rather dusty tomes of scientific history. "Dear lady, you may call me Al. And remember this well ~ God does not play dice with the universe -- "
  
Robert Gilette turned from the bar and saw him first, naturally enamored with a pretty girl. This one had some sensuosity of the femme fatale about her. Interesting, quite interesting, but they needed to confirm the next day's sailing plans. Priorities were priorities after all with the yawl. Heartily, his stage voice boomed out, "Einstein there you are. Care to introduce me to this gorgeous gamblin' gal?"


  
RELAX. WHAT'S TO COME
IS NOT A ROLL OF THE DICE.
IT'S ALL IN THE CARDS.
IT ALWAYS IS YOU KNOW.
THAT'S WHAT MAKES IT 

SUCH A BIG DEAL.
  

TIL NEXT WEEKEND'S

RETURN TO THE VILLAGE SMITHY
ON THE VILLAGE GREEN
~ AND ~


THE NARRAGANSETT GAMBLING SCENE.
WHO WILL COME UP ACES?


Does it take an Einstein 
to figure this one out?

~ ~ ~

THE VILLAGE SMITHY
 
As regaled by ~ Absolutely*Kate  

   
  
 

Click here for lucky  Epic*sode 7 ~ "The Narragansett Social Club"
    
© 2011 ~ Author Absolutely*Kate
 in a small-town large state of mind
currently on ~ shore leave  


Virile Village Smithy ala Wolfrage
Lucky roulette wheel ala Kathy


Photo representation of the former Narragansett Social Club of the roaring 20's
 
 where Absolutely*Kate presided back-in-time for "shore leave".  
Now dubbed the Ocean Rose Inn, it sits proudly at the helm of Ocean Road
keeping good watch upon the sea.




Thursday, July 14, 2011

THE NARRAGANSSET SOCIAL CLUB ~ As Absolutely*Kate tells the tale of THE VILLAGE SMITHY {Lucky Epic*sode 7}

The Narragansett Social Club


{ Just ahead of back-in-time with
   THE VILLAGE SMITHY }

~ As regaled by Absolutely*Kate
 

Greetings! 
Wish you were here! 

Liza scratched the trite right off the back of her postal card hastening for the morning's mail. Greetings! Wish you were here!   "What was I thinking George? He'll never receive it. Will he? How could he? But George, tell me true, don't hold back. ~ WILL he?"


"Lizzie gal, stop blustering your wondering and start believing. I made a deathbed vow to your darlin' mother I'd finish your training, and that I will . . . but honestly Toots, we're going to run right out of time if time after time you rail on against the the Why and How of things timely. Must you perpetually pester?! These things simply, thus strongly, are'Why ask Why?' I always bellow to recalcitrant deckhands, as well as reminding them at watch . . . 'HOW will always present itself to the watchful.' Now come on girl. Get a hurry on it. Scrawl your way through that picture post card like you understand what somersaults to the heart are all about -- Yes, yes - don't protest the obvious. I see when your horizons get all moony there's a male involved.  Now Lizzie, I'll meet you in the lobby. And post haste young lady. Fore and aft in forty minutes! Oh, and prissy yourself up right fancy tonight, too. Have I a swell surprise for you!"
 
Salty the chuckle that rumbled the echoes along the long hallway of the seaside inn. Sultry the sigh that spiraled the space of the well-appointed suite where red velvet cascaded past a bygone village green presence to the ocean view's blue today. Today though, was gold fringe embellishing ten years off yesterday, which she understood, but wondered honestly how her new friend back in Essex, the village smithy, really would . . . or could. Could he? And was he as old as that day or this day and does wisdom stretch or just catch up to you? Oh bother, at times, traveling time boggles the mind, but at times -- the times one does not dull in over-ponder, smooth arrivals become discoveries which tumble anew to old remembered rewards. 
 
But now ~ here and now and back to then ~ What to say, what to say? The solid comfort of Captain George Horatio Bennigan, tall, dark and not at all gruesome, (as many claim who fear him), fit the stalwart finery she'd always intuited a doting 'adopted uncle' would be and had been. Funny that, for the last time she'd seen him, touched tentative fingers tenderly up his face, cried tears in tandem to the hollow of his eyes  . . . was the morning in May of Mother's funeral; then each subsequent anniversary, for nearly a quarter of a century. For a five year old though, that mountain of a day was arduous to climb. Still, Uncle George had lifted her, her spirits, and her sensibilites that time and many times. He held her tight, pressed to charcoal grey lapels with not only the suitable charm a gentle giant of a rogue unexpectedly doles out to his cherished ones. More in keeping to his brooding nature though, his own pain surged like a sea at storm and railed out dauntless urgings, whispered fast and fierce to tiny ears. This man among men could manifest. He wished big things into those tiny ears. He told little Liza and later, lady Liza that they would meet again and again and yet again then, when time and timing came best to be. He also told her wishing him, should make him appear.

That had been her wish, to counter the cunning she'd encountered from the cocksure Candlestick Maker's flaming dare back in the village of Essex, where she had begun the beguine of a better, less battered new life to be. To be free from what could still come at her, no matter which huff-and-a-puff matter of a steam train through time she traversed. A life of plentiful possibilities  molding strong, molding sure as -- sure as the plenishing hammer upon the anvil of the mighty village smithy. 
 
Liza was aware yesterday how the customary speed of light sparks flew and her accompanying whirring whoooosh resonated in new frequencies to those left behind, in time. She heard harrrumphing gasps chopped out of the Butcher's routine day, and next door, her mind's eye saw the scene near the village green which startled the Baker stubbornly stacking sticky buns into a precarious pyramid for his pungent window display. When several toppled to the tiled floor, a small boy elbowed a larger boy and the twosome dared to make delicious their day. Her day though, was yesterday impacting tomorrow. The past's future, Mother admonished, shall show you how far you've come.  Best take the whereabouts-of-inner-knowing in the back front pocket nearest you.
 
So many tucked in thoughts of her funny laughing Mother who embraced life and its magic with purpose.  Mother seldom bought into the common thread of not tangling history. "History was made to be remade! History's a tapestry of multi-threads, colours, hues, layers, intricate textures too. Why Liza, what your skill does with it compounds the finer perceptions interweave! It's alright, darling daughter. History presents itself better that way. Someday you'll see. Just give it your all. Remember though, never turn your back three times in a row to shortchange time. Time presents itself midst its own best aplomb."  Yes Mother's voice came close, so close. It always did when Trouble presented itself.
 
When she materialized her arrival, stating her purpose, George calmly countered the cocksure Candlestick Maker to be trouble incarnate. Over her single gimlet and his several gins in the main lounge of The Narragansett Social Club where he summered, nearer his vessel, the Incorrigible, safe-harboured in Newport,  her mother's dearest friend recounted on one hand and then the other that he knew the curmudgeon from several guises back and two a century away. He had always been and will be bothersome he warned, arching his bushier eyebrow, the right one. That was his second, first and third natures. Happens everytime a human-plus feels he or she has been slighted of what they deem their inner right. Though that premise holds no promise with the shadows of the Chadwick clan, known prevaricators and scumbags of scurrilous scumbuckets. Such was, is, will be their lousy lineage. Bad grudges fan flames.

~ ~ ~ 


Liza hurried her pen, but said instead what she didn't know how to say ~
 
Will ~ The ocean is delightful and the only place July should be staying at. I'm here with family and so enjoyed your  family last night at the delicious dinner of stew I was invited to by you. You saw, I'm quite sure, my bowl gobbled clean at both helpings. You've wonderful sisters William, and they look out for their younger brother with ----  Damn! Out of space and out of time with her mind's inky ramble. George was going to soon show her the secret staircase to the casino lounge behind the gold numerals 33, by pressing the pine panel in the upstairs parlour. She'd known this future deal when she was younger still, but . . . you always go along to see how time can take another wriggle if you can shimmy it right. 


Best finish off writing this card today to see if the good morrow's mailing made ahead go back to yesterday. She rallied for coherency. She championed charm. She closed with aplomb ~

I must dash for a refreshing afternoon splash! 

~ Cordially,
~ L. Chronoss 


She'd deal with the chicanery
of the cocksure Candlestick Maker
tomorrow when she returned to yesterday.

He wouldn't know 
what blew into his pretentious powers
when she got through smoking him out.

Absolutely. No sirree for you Bub!
Best though now, don those fancy flapper duds,
fling on a gay string of creamy poils. 

Make pretty with the night,
and Uncle George's gambling plight.

Liza lived to make entrances,
long remembered after . . . this long day.


{ Pity Liza's fine  flapper frock was sleeveless.
She might've done well to tuck in an extra Ace.}


THE VILLAGE SMITHY
 
As regaled by ~ Absolutely*Kate  

   
  
 

Click here for  Epic*sode 6 ~ "Make a Wish. I Dare You."
    
© 2011 ~ Author Absolutely*Kate
 in a small-town large state of mind
currently on ~ shore leave  


Virile Village Smithy ala Wolfrage
Luscious Lady Ace ala Signnetwork


Photo representation of the former Narragansett Social Club of the roaring 20's
is currently where Absolutely*Kate is presiding for "shore leave".
It is now dubbed the Ocean Rose Inn and sits proudly at the helm of Ocean Road
keeping a good watch on the sea.

  

IT'S ALL IN THE CARDS.
IT ALWAYS IS YOU KNOW.
THAT'S WHAT MAKES IT 

A BIG DEAL.
  

TIL NEXT WEEKEND'S
RETURN TO THE VILLAGE SMITHY
ON THE VILLAGE GREEN
WHERE TIME IS
POUNDING ON.   

Or . . . is it?

          

Friday, July 1, 2011

"MAKE A WISH, I DARE YOU" ~ Epic*sode 6 of THE VILLAGE SMITHY ~ As told by Absolutely*Kate ... (flash fiction)

"MAKE A WISH, 
I DARE YOU"

   
 
~ Epic*sode 6  through time  . . .  ~

THE VILLAGE SMITHY
 
As told by ~ Absolutely*Kate  

  

Click here for  The Beginning  ~ THE VILLAGE SMITHY
  
 

Click here for  Epic*sode 4 ~ "Rogues All!"

      
Click here for  Epic*sode 5 ~ "What If and The Tan Valise"

                


Smiling through years of  fears and sorrows conjured more cascading colours in yesterday's tomorrows for Liza than most folks contemplated kalideoscopes for. She had burst on scenes with a sizzle of raging reds, been bigger than the blues, and in several segments of time travels, she'd strutted her stuff as the real deal ~ in teal heels nonetheless! 1982 and 2049 were particularly portentious years for teal heels.  Retro is what retro is after all . . . why sometimes, even what it was.  
  
Yet Liza suffered no fools. Never did. Never would. Her valiant nature pulled nary a punch or left jab at yellow bellied, green-with-envy ghouls. They had not a ghost of a chance, and her spirit held steadfast, rarely lowering to murky levels. She'd innately sensed the incarnation flickering from one of the three rowdy rogues roaming the village green of Essex, her new town for settling down. Would it put a damper on her indomitable spirit? Liza thought not, not in the overall . . . but with precaution in her pocket, proceeded with senses at their keenest as she strolled her first serious carouse around what the streets of Essex had to offer.
 
~ ~ ~
 
The church bell at the top of the touch-the-sky white spire pealed at the quarter-hour. Liza liked that. Order in time, time after time. Took the edge off studying the sheaf of parchment notes concealed beneath the maroon satin lining of the tan valise her funny mother had cautioned to keep e'er near her.


Your What-If will be known
when you face it, daughter. 

Then and only then
will you make all the right moves.

Face adversity as adventure
to advantage. 

Foes will fear you. 

The true . . . you'll know them too -- 
Tis all in fathoming depth of eyes to soul. 

Mother's admonishments were scrawled in her flourished but hurried handwriting in fountain pen blotches upon torn pieces of the cream linen stationery which had sat atop her splendid dressing table. Bits of notes were scattered or neatly pinned with intricate brooches throughout all she was to study and commit to working memory past mere here and now. Relativity was to be visualized, matter to be made myth. The edge of infinity itself seemed caressed by the knowledge her heritage bequeathed her to study, learn and keep safe until she recognized the solemn point of passing wisdom on. 
  
At times clarity, akin to charm, such as the white-spired church bell's peal, resonated within her as the mind's sky, which is precisely and presciently where she presently fashioned her beloved funny mother to be. (The laws of nature intuited she'd be blue skies, nuttin' but blue skies. How could it be otherwise?)  

At other times -- well, the chronos principles involving warping time's complexity caused chaos with her tentative theories. By impassioned profession, a lyricist acquainted with regular rhythms, verse and attunement, it made her sensitivities hurt to be saddled with such responsibility to carry on until . . . until she knew her What-If. Then, and only then could she pass it on. Twas necessary though, in mere here and now to reflect, to perfect, to affect the time travels which more than just the puff of steam trains took her. Nourishing the spirit the better to handle all the clatter about matter though . . . that was essential. Tending to one's true spirit, always is.

Last night, across the dinner tables set near the fieldstone fireplace in the main salon of Effie & Marguerite's Rooming House had been nourishing on many fronts ~ delectable beef stew, robust red wine, gregarious townsfolk making her feel one of them in regaled laughter ever after, and . . . yes, dark deep eyes across the village smithy's family's table telegraphing stronger secrets than how best to pound the pressure-points of anvils. Yes indeed, the village smithy was a percussive conundrum who could not be beat. Liza'd bet the bottom dollar she kept tucked in her left shoe that his horseshoes hung so their luck never ran out.


As for a few other bon vivants
who stood out around town ~

The baker had a rye sense of humour. Liza bantered back and forth and forth and back with that jolly gent and he puffed up right plump.
 
Despite incessant flirtations aimed at the village smithy's younger pretty sister Marguerite, Liza learned the butcher had a wife who craved his tenderloins. The ladies in the butcher's neighborhood who lined up behind the fancy glass case in twos and threes and on Fridays, four abreast -- they craved his meat too.  Well, that's what he claimed and cleaved to. Liza felt he had enough attention than to serve up hers.

 
Chaz Chadwick, the cunning candlestick maker though, was an enigma quick to flare. Town-talk told her more. Bastard son of the sweet Belle Fairlight, deserted by a disgruntled cleric, Padre Chadwick who traveled now to undisclosed monastic locations, the misanthropic craftsman of Essex had a chip on his shoulder inflammatory enough to ignite several small villages. "It takes a village . . . " he was oft fond of quoting, "to raise fired up crowds." Many in the town kept a safe distance from how his tempers burned, except on birthdays and special occasions. For Chadwick's offered a particular candle showcased in the front window just under the forest green awning which was claimed could make wishes come true . . . when one just blew.


 

Who's to dispute a wish waited upon? Be that good marketing or providential? Liza realized her steps around the cobbled roads of Essex, over the well-manicured lawn that kept the village green, had led her directly in front of the very window folks had described to her at the dinner in hushed excited tones. They turned their heads left and flounced their attentions right to check no one was listening in. Time after time the twinkling townsfolk regaled and retorted, "It works! It works!" This she had to see. 

Clang, clang, clang at the far side of the village green went the volley of the pounding sensations of the village smithy. Liza had a rising sensation even from a distance he was keeping a watch over where she turned. Turning, she raised her hand to her forehead, shaded her peepers to view him the clearer under the magnificent spreading chestnut tree, and yes, it appeared, even with his plenishing hammer in full forceful swinging rhythm, he had a steady bead in her direction. Soft came Liza's smile, long overdue.  Turning torso and attention back beneath the forest green awning, she studied the curious display in the cunning candlemaker's window. 

Layers, it was comprised of layers and drippings and colours and waxy ooze and there, in the very epicenter, on a raised pewter platter was a magnificent flame . . . now moving . . . moving off the raised pewter platter . . . moving out of the epicenter of the curious window display . . . moving out the door . . . moving as if floating . . . floating beneath the upraised hands of the cunning candlestick maker himself . . . approaching closer, closer, closer still to Liza's widened eyes.

The cunning candlestick maker narrowed the glints in his fierce peepers, raised it higher still. "Go ahead," he hissed. His breath was in her face, hot, insistent. 

        

"Make a wish. I dare you."
                                                      



© 2011 ~ Author Absolutely*Kate
 in a small-town large state of mind 

Village Smithy photo ala Wolfrage
Cryptic CandleFlame ala JoshWept
Mother's memento brooch ala GGHillerud




A FLAME FLICKERS QUICKER
THAN A WISH TAKES FLIGHT,
RIGHT?
TIL NEXT WEEKEND'S
RETURN TO THE VILLAGE GREEN
WHERE THE CUNNING
CANDLESTICK MAKER
MAY FORCE THE LIGHT. 
   
But . . . will he see an old flame?