Month: April 2022

Earth is My Home

Feeling solid, stable, beneath my feet,

some say the earth spins and soars in the void.

Here, near the Great Lakes, I have made my home

near Erie and St. Claire, then Michigan.

Dirt and rock and salted water, with a

thin layer of air. Iron at the core.

This is where home is.

Home is here on Earth.

Cities dot the surface of the land

while arbitrary lines and squiggles define

nations and states, forcing allegiance on

heterogeneous populations.

It’s a lost cause these days.

Earth is now home.

March of the Papery Traces

Note the small hole is the leaf third from the lower left corner. Photo from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula somewhere in the east.

They stood up and brushed the bits of damp twigs and moss off of the seat of their jeans. They lifted the forest green backpack to their left shoulder, then wriggled their right arm into the other strap. There were no papery traces of these events. Only unreliable neuronal traces. This was way before the days of the selfie stick. Way before the days of the ubiquitous cell phone camera. Way before the possibility of becoming the person whose soul lived inside their body. Way, way, way before the days of hormone blocking therapy. In fact, even for them, it was hard to think back to that scene without naming self as he.

Mom probably thought that the solo trip would reinforce the manly aspects of Marco’s personality. Were that true, mom’s idea failed. Miserably. That was the weekend when Marco became March. Not Marsha. March. From then on, only March would do.

From the Mid-Michigan Word Gatherers Prompt: Papery Traces 14APR22

Several members of the group said they liked this piece. Many of them are newer members who don’t recall my early flash fiction and who don’t care for the Knomo Choicius stories. :>(

They challenged me to write the novel. I offer this to anyone who wants to keep going with it. Acknowledge this link, please.

But maybe I will keep going a little bit. Here’s the beginning of the next chapter…

Some say that Jesus was not a man, but the ultimate androgynous being. That Jesus truly understood the human condition, in its fullness. At 17, March wasn’t sure about all the suffering stuff. But the idea of androgynous wisdom? That was worth investigating.