Author: spectrum

Whoa. Did you see that tumbleweed go by?

Yeah, this “blog,” isn’t much of a blog right now. A real fixer-upper, I’d say. To remedy that, we at Spectrum came up with an idea. Each week, we’re going to post works created where the magic happens–during Spectrum meetings.

Every Monday night, Spectrum meets, and along with celebrating how awesome we all are, we write. Or draw. Or some combination of the two.

This week’s prompt (selected by your favorite e-board members) was:

Who’s coming around the corner?
What is their secret?
What are they carrying?

Our members got to work. Here’s what they discovered:

– Anonymous

 

Co-op is coming—it’s right around the corner. With it, it’s carrying adulthood, the power to shove weaker words from a resume, and the opportunity to play “I have my life together” dress-up in a pencil skirt. It’s secret? It’s absolutely, completely, smiling-through-your-teeth-til-your-face-hurts terrifying. Get your leather portfolios ready; they make the strongest shields.

– Holly Van Hare

 

Lament of the Newly Published Author

She’s there. I can feel it
Sense her,
Faint smell of spearmint gum
And Dove shampoo
And coffee underneath
The gum.
Or maybe him,
Crinkling a plastic water
Bottle and
Striding in
Grey sneakers toward
The revolving door,
Clutching the
Book under one
Arm,
The book with
My name on the cover.
The corner
Approaches
My heart is
Thundering
And it drowns out
My steps on the
Concrete
Underneath me.
I turn
A deserted street.
I keep walking
Toward the next corner and
The next.

– Ivy Pepin

 

— Elke

Nobody liked Ramona. I’m not 100% sure why. It could have been her frizzy hair, the way her nose was always slick with oil, or the way she spit when she talked. We had tried to get rid of her in our group. Ignored her. “Forgot” to invite her places, and even made snide remarks in hopes she would take a hint and go sit somewhere else during lunch. She was a human hang nail. Painful to watch, but still holding on tight. It was going to take a serious act of public humiliation to rip her from our group – it was just a matter of time until we figured it out. Middle school can be so cruel.

Her home is a sinkhole. Things go in but never come out. It, like her life, kind of just collapsed in on itself. Those childhood china dolls she found, orphans dumped in an alleyway, they went in, never against to have the sunlight gleam against their glassy, empty eyes. The boxes of her memories are stacked to the ceiling; she says they are arranged by year, but no one believes that. They say a neighborhood boy once threw a ball through her window and entered to retrieve it. He, like the ball, was never seen again. Maybe he was simply lost in the labrynth of her mementos and knickknacks or crushed by the remains of a life that was stacked so high but still came tumbling down.

Under a blesséd golden dawn
And rolling grey in pale azure
I caress my life to its very last
When Earth has died
And seas seal their hearts
I shall sail this curséd vessel of stone
To distant shores
And anchor my soul to the bones of murdered Gods
Torn asunder in depths unfathomed
Under a blesséd golden dawn
And rolling grey in pale azure

Prompt: Write about the life of a bus driver

4:30 am. I don’t know why I always feel so inclined to look presentable for work; there isn’t really a change for promotion, or advancement. My tie isn’t going to impress some big wig CEO and score me a promotion. Guess it just goes back to what my grandpa used to say. So as a step out of the shower to the sound of my timer ringing for 5:15 on the nose, I check my reflection and repeat once again, “Clothes make the man.”

Shaved, showered and shined, coffee imbibed: breakfast consumed, I start my daily grind. This life ain’t glamorous, but I don’t mind the noise. Besides, it pays the bills. 6:00 am I start my first run, and by 8 I’m done. All over town, visiting the same destination five or six times in a day. But then I’m done. I get to spend the rest of my day at the office, really just killing time with my co-workers. James, he’s the one I like the most. We call him Ol’ Jim: man’s got to be rounding 70, and me? I’m only 28. Jim used to be a boxer: won the golden gloves back in the ‘60’s when he was younger than I am now. Talk about feeling unaccomplished, but in this economy, anything to pay the dept. He says he used to work as a handyman. Always compliments the way I dress. Guess I remind him of the good old days.

 

By 1:30 pm we’re back on the grind. This job is delicate. Have to be right on time. No mistakes, no excuses. Pull the same route as I did in the AM, and then home for the evening. But hell, I’m only 28, evening is a foreign term. So I head down the road to the Lone Wolf. Tim is always there, picking up chicks. I don’t know how the man does it, but he’s got more game than me. Lone Wolf is a good name for this bar. Everyone comes here alone, but you don’t always leave alone. And there is always the chance of finding…

 

Prompt: Write about a school bus driver in both the 3rd and the 1st person

“Theeeee wheels on the bus go ’round and ’round, ’round and ’round, ’round and ’round…”  Judy let the song play.  It wasn’t that it was her favorite song; in fact, it was her least.  But she let it play, so she could slowly shuffle her way out of bed and answer the call just at the last moment.  “Uh-huh?”  “Judy, head down to the bus terminal.”  “But Boss, it’s snowing?”  “Snow, sleet, snow, or shine-”  “Yeah, yeah, I got it.”  Judy scratched her armpits and brushed her hair quickly with her nails.  She had already fallen asleep with her uniform on and figured she could take a shower later.  “Hmghrogh… why make the bed when im just going to sleep later?”

***

Dear Journal,

Remind me to never to listen to Craig again.  School was cancelled, to the surprise of none of the other bus drivers.  But no one told Ol’ Judgmental Judy till I picked up a bus from the terminal.  I even drove to Jason McKnalles’ house up on the hill too.  Waited an hour up there for the brat, thinking he was just late as usual.  Kid never came out, and neither did the rest of town.  I looked down onto town from the hill above.  It didn’t move.  Not one inch.  While I sat, parked, the town stood still for a day.  But no day still for Ol’ Judy.  No day.