Photo by Gina Hamm
Sea-salt Soliloquy
Micro-Fiction
When Mum said, “Make a wish” when Dad was blowing out his birthday candles, he can’t have wished that we would stay here forever. ‘Cause here we are moving on again. Mum always says he’s a restless soul. He can’t stay put, not anywhere. What did he wish for? Did he wish he was a boy again, like me? Did he wish he didn’t have to pick blackberries? That’s what I always wish for.
I’m scared of the blackberry bushes. I often think I can hear a snake lurking under there. And something’s going to grab my feet and drag me down. Those bushes are so scratchy, like when our cat gets a fur ball stuck in its throat. But now the berries are shriveling up ‘cause they choke on the salt air.
Maybe it’s like the tar baby story. “Please don’t throw me into the blackberry bushes.” Only I really, really don’t want to go anywhere near them. Brer Rabbit might’ve tricked Brer Fox, but it’s me who’s being outfoxed living here ‘cause I just can’t get comfortable.
If I were a blackberry myself, I would put the thorns away. They make me think of those big metal balls with spikes that ancient barbarians, like Asterix, used to hurl at their enemies. Everyone seems to be enemies around here. When I see those dark thunder clouds, it’s like Dad’s face, more stormy than the sky itself.
Don’t know what they get so angry about, Mum and Dad, but when they start to argue, I know to make myself disappear and hide in the sand dunes. Only there the sand blows up and the dry tumble weeds prickle my ankles before they roll away to who knows where.
Sometimes I think I should be bold and strong like the blackest of blackberries. And then I would run away. I’d go sailing on that blue, blue ocean, all cool and smooth. That’s what I like best—floating on the waves until the skin on my fingers shrivels up, like the blackberries.
In my bed in the dark nighttime when no one can see me and I feel all alone, I cry. I taste my tears as they run down to my mouth. I lick the salt off my lips and taste the sea. And I think to myself that if I cried all night, I might float on my own waves of tears and just drift away.
The Author
A PhD in educational psychology, Jill has previously worked as a consultant and university lecturer, emphasizing the place of creativity in achievement.
Jill’s writing draws on landscape and human nature and their relation to each other. Her poetry has been used in collaborations with artists and with film-makers and with musicians to represent marginalized or small voices and to focus on environmental issues.
She has published individual poems in collations - chapbook (NSW Government Arts Council), in magazines, online (for the National Library, Royal Botanic Gardens...), WA Poets Inc.
Her published education books, in addition to many keynotes and journal articles, include Think about Creativity and Think about Mentoring, two poetry books — Lullabies and Honeyed Ramblings https://www.originimprint.com/honeyedramblings.html and the recently launched poetic memoir Mother of the Child.
http://www.originimprint.com/motherofthechild/ from Dymocks, Booktopia and national distributor Woodslane, https://www.woodslane.com.au
Jill Froster