May 25, 2023

Cinders: A Love Story

By Keith Hood

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Perhaps we should not have done it. He’s been sitting in the closet waiting for her since 1993. His cardboard-colored container resembling an oversized Chinese take-out box with the requisite thin metal handle. The texture of his ashes, the texture of his life. Course bone. Teeth. Slag. Volcanic man. Volcanic ash. He died at sixty-nine. She died at ninety-six, outliving him by twenty-nine peace-filled years. Before placing her on the floor next to him, we remarked on the finer, more sand-like quality of her ashes as if she were waiting for a gentle ocean wave. Let the arguments begin.

About the Author

Keith HoodKEITH HOOD is a former janitor and window cleaner. He retired from a job as field technician for a Michigan electric utility after 32 years avoiding electrocution. Keith’s prose and poetry have appeared  in Blue Mesa Review, Quick Fiction, Flash Fiction Magazine, 50 Give or Take, and one sentence poems. Keith’s photography has appeared in Ontario Review, Helen: A Literary Journal, The Grief Diaries, Storm Cellar, and F-Stop.

Related Flash
Creature from the Black Lagoon.

I Don’t Like Anybody

By Kathryn Kulpa

“It’s August, Saturday, and we’re tired of summer. Watching Creature Double Feature on Channel 56. Me and Danny and Angie.”
Room crowded with books and knick-knacks

Cleaning House

By Bill Merklee

Months after the accident, we’re clearing out your house. It’s a daunting task for such a small place. Books everywhere. Endless vinyl but no turntable. Shelves of souvenirs from the same places as the stickers on the back of your charred and crumpled Jetta.

Green inflated pool ring.

If It Is Ever Summertime Again

By Thomas O’Connell

It is the raft that you inflated for our daughter to float upon, drifting around the clubhouse pool. The raft is the last place where your breath remains.

Pin It on Pinterest

Share This