Wildernesses, tractors and poetry

Have had rather a peculiar day today - it feels most unsettling, though perhaps I'm just overtired? As it were. Or maybe it's the existential shock (if shock can be existential) of having to go to work tomorrow. Heck, I'd only just got used to being off. Anyway, the lovely news is that All Things Girl webzine have accepted my short story, The Wilderness Room, for publication in April, so that's cheering me greatly through it all. I'm especially pleased as it is rather off-the-wall as a story, so I wasn't sure they'd like it - I'm so glad they do! I'll let you know when it's up on their site, and would love to know your thoughts. And, of course it rather helps to make up for the two rejections I've had over the weekend for other stories, which I've turned round and sent off into the ether once more. While I was in the mood, I've also submitted some more poetry to a new magazine, so we'll see how that fares.

Talking of matters literary, here's this morning's meditation piece:

Meditation 97

Something about snakes:
dark poison seeping
through the blood,
swallowing life

piece by piece,
the onward fragile journey
of us all.
And then the bronze

serpent glinting in gold light
high on its distant branch
as evening drifts in.
Think how its empty eyes

echo the healing moon.

Bizarrely, Lord H and I actually saw a grass snake when we ventured out for a little pre-lunch stroll this morning, so obviously it's a day for snakes. In all shapes and sizes. It's also a day for tractors - I've written my third ever haibun and it's about ... um ... tractors. I'm not entirely convinced about it, but hell it's there. And sometimes that's all you can really say about a piece of writing. I suspect I'll have to think about it again later. But not today.

I've also managed to write another 500 words or so of Hallsfoot's Battle and am beginning to work on end scenes. That's not actually because I'm there in real-time (so no need to cheer) but because I'm leaving the very difficult and wide-ranging (well, one hopes, eh ...) battle scenes and jumping over them until the end. Ah the joy of not having to write in linear time - sometimes that's a lifesaver for cowards like me who haven't got the nerve to face the tricky sections yet. I think I'm going to have to feel strong in order to do them. Ah well, don't wait up, eh.

This afternoon, I can feel the siren song of a nap calling me, and I also feel an urge to do a puzzle or two. Though I do have to prepare my homework for next week's Bible study or I won't have a clue what's going on. Not that that's ever stopped me having an opinion, of course, and the right opinion at that. Ho ho.

Tonight, it's the return of the glorious Lewis on TV, and I'm so looking forward to two hours of murder, charm and gentle wit to round off my Sunday. What more could you ask for?

This week's haiku:

The calm morning brings
a day of gardens and song
drifting through the skin.

Today's nice things:

1. Short story acceptance
2. Poetry
3. Hallsfoot end scenes
4. Napping
5. TV.

Anne Brooke
Anne's website - a snake in the grass is worth two in the bush ...