Some of the Time

By Ali Grimshaw

(Originally published March 3, 2019)

Sometimes
the light turns red before we have left the intersection
leaving our tail end vulnerable

sometimes
our brakes don’t work, spinning on black ice with
blurred windows of reaction

sometimes
we must go slowly, inching through the fog in faith
blinded by dense thoughts

sometimes
breakdowns leave us on the rainy roadside
unpacking resourcefulness

sometimes
forgiveness shows up like an invitation
an off-ramp never seen before

sometimes
we just need to stay on the road
grip and steer

A Lie for My Boy

By Roy Gomez

(Originally published March 23, 2019.)

I would’ve bet a heart couldn’t ache any more. But I was wrong. There my boy sat, alone, waiting in that silent chapel for someone, anyone, to show up for his dad. Danny gripped flowers. Even wore my favorite tie. The knot was tight, off-center. That too was my fault. I wished I could cry. I was grateful to Bud, though. He was late – almost missed it all – but he came. As shovels of dirt thumped on my coffin, my old cellmate consoled him. Telling whoppers. That hurt worst … my boy feeling proud of his old man and all.

             
R. Gomez has been kicking words around for a while. He lives with his wife and pets on a hillside overlooking Medina Lake directly in the center of the Milky Way.

Unconditional

By Toni G.

(Originally published November 16, 2019.)

He wrapped his arms around me then
his cheek resting heavy on the top of my head
as he hugged me in a kind of embrace
that were he to let me go
my entire being would spill out onto the floor
like rice grains falling from a ripped plastic bag
That was when
I knew
that I
his sinful son
was loved unconditionally
no matter what the vice president thought
about boys like me.

         
Toni G. writes because there’s just so much that needs to be said.

When You See Me Walk

By Nayana Nair

When you see me walk toward my grief,
toward my past,
with my head sinking down,
with my hands full of my own pieces,
stop me dear.
Come to me.
Run to me.
Call out to me
even when you think I cannot hear.
Hold me back
even when you think I cannot be stopped.
Promise me
that you will try.

           
Nayana is an engineer and technical writer who also moonlights as an amateur poet. She says, “Writing for me is a process of self realization and an effort to understand what is ever-elusive.”

Partners

By S.B. Borgersen

Partners were compulsory at primary school: for nature walks, for P.E., and to return to class after playtime.

Partners were picked, most popular first, until there was very little choice left. I, with my missing front teeth and my old black plimsolls, was always a straggler. So were you.

Fifty years later we are still partners. We had so many other things in common.

          
S.B. Borgersen writes because she just cannot help it, she also knits socks, and walks her smashing dogs on the south shore of Nova Scotia.

Darkness

By G. Allen Wilbanks

“Why are you afraid of the dark? Darkness is the natural state of everything. It’s the light that’s unnatural. When God said, ‘Let there be light,’ he was imposing an artificial reality on a universe that had previously only know known total darkness and emptiness, and every force in nature is currently trying to drive us back to that original point of neutrality. Everything around us is temporary, and at some point in the future we will all return to that initial state of nothingness. It’s inevitable.”

“Maybe,” his wife admitted. “But, I still want you to replace the lightbulb.”

           
G. Allen Wilbanks is a member of the Horror Writers Association (HWA) and has published over 60 short stories in Deep Magic, Daily Science Fiction, The Talisman, and other venues. He has published two story collections, and the novel, When Darkness Comes.

Some of Our Fave Drabbles from 2019

By The Drabble

To celebrate the end of the fifth calendar year of our existence, we present some our favorite posts of 2019. While we are grateful to every Drabble reader and writer for helping to make this site such an unexpected success, we want to recognize a few pieces that truly accomplished what we were setting out to do when we began this blog almost five years ago. Here (in no particular order) are a few drabbles we truly loved in 2019. We hope you do, too:

Unconditional by Toni G.

When You See Me Walk by J. Nayana Nair

The Poems I Have Not Written by John Malone

A Lie for My Boy by Roy Gomez

Lonely Photographer by Bello Olabisi

My Father by Dianne Moritz

Partners by S.B. Borgersen

My White Cane is a Magic Wand by Rebecca L. Holland

Some of the Time by Ali Grimshaw

Space Dew by Neil Clark

Your Mother, the Clown by David Derey

Darkness by G. Allen Willbanks

Space Dew

By Neil Clark

When you were in space, you told me the thing you missed most about Earth was the morning dew.

I spent the next decade threading our garden with a thousand webs, tall and broad as the house. I became an expert in 3D light displays. Rigged them so they’d catch the droplets perfectly.

On your first night back, you were quiet, like you were worried your words hadn’t adjusted to gravity.

You slept for eighteen hours and when you woke up at dawn, you went to the middle of the lawn and wept about how you already missed the stars.

         
“I write to surprise myself.” – the author

Lonely Photographer

By Bello Olabisi

Those that say weddings are only stressful for the bride have never been photographers at my sister’s wedding. Relatives call you from every direction to capture their precious moments on film. Guests scream at you to include them in the pictures even though they have no emotional tie to my family. That isn’t the worst part to me. What truly hurts me and stresses my heart beyond its limit is knowing that with every smile, every tear, every memory I capture with the snap of the camera, future generations will never see, never know, the lonely brother behind the camera.

           
“I write because it is one of my ways of giving back to the society. It is really comforting knowing that someone out there understands your experience and pain. It makes you feel less alone.” – the author

My Father

By Dianne Moritz

My father was not
a strong man,
so I’ve heard.
He boozed,
caroused
with woman,
Mother said,
words rattling
like pebbles
in my toy maraca,
till I wanted
to scream my ears off.

One summer day,
he grabbed
his billfold
and left us …
Smooth as stone.

          
Dianne Moritz, seeks understanding of her troubled relationship with her mother. She writes poetry and picture books for children since retiring from teaching in inner city Los Angeles.