Hello beautiful.
A Cooper’s Hawk, I think, come for breakfast.
In this yard, everyone eats.
Like flowers next to a stone wall,
early are the blooms.
The sweetness a reminder
that everything will warm
and turn
and scent our lives
for the better,
however fleeting
the moment.
Colleen Sohn
Tags: My Poetry
The life of a writer is hardly glamorous. I spend the majority of my time home and mostly alone, wrapped in sweatpants and down vests.
Which is kind of silly, considering what a chatterbox and clotheshorse I can be. But, despite my gregarious nature and a sincere love for garments of all varieties, I most definitely prefer this existence to any other.
“I am a loner, a rebel, Dottie,” and someone who inserts song lyrics and lines from movies as seamlessly as if they were from my own little head. That there being from Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. Insert his adorable chuckle here.
That being said, a critical part of my mental health is actually exiting the mind bubble and the house, wearing fancy duds (or just real pants), speaking words aloud, and meeting strangers eye to eye.
So, off I went.
Luckily, I chose a glorious Portland day and found inspiration in the form of signs.
Golly gee whillakers, there are more than enough to shake a stick at.
All kinds of cool things on offer.
Houses, movies, meats, cheeses, and coffee, oh my!
And music, too, hard to go wrong there.
Or perhaps you’d like a slice of coffee cake with a side of tempeh bacon?
I chose Evoe, which completely lacks a sign, but has a monster chalk board.
Lest I exit too far into the real world, I read while savoring one of my favorite sandwiches in the world.
The Gallego, mi amor.
Now I am home again, jiggity jig!
Tags: Portland, Restaurants
Pancho’s Bullet
Cora met Pancho Villa when she was eight years old, at a party with her father, somewhere near her childhood home and the site of a great battle between his army and the Americans. The reason for her attendance, and more importantly, her father’s, a long unsolved mystery.
She often wondered if she’d dreamt it all, the funny Mexican with a larger than life mustache and hat. Were it not for the bullet, taken directly from his bandoliered chest, she’d have no reason to believe otherwise. But there it lay, cool in the palm of her hand, exactly as he’d placed it, so many years ago.
Spied from a distance, she became curious and stalked the great character, stealing glimpses from behind broad legs and skirts, and anything else capable of concealment. Though she never saw him take a drop of liquor, he ate and talked and laughed more than her father, which was quite a feat.
Despite these obvious distractions, the surveillance did not go unnoticed, and he turned and surprised her, facetiously asking if she was an assassin. She tried to flee, but could not, and he charmed her like all the ladies, mustache wriggling like a caterpillar. Before releasing her from his grasp, he ceremoniously removed the bullet and said it would protect her, as it had him against the backstabbing Americans. She didn’t dare tell him she was one of them, born and raised, before running off, quick as her legs could take her.
Since then, it had never been out of her possession, for twenty-five years a talisman and her greatest secret, kept hidden under her pillow, in a pocket, or the folds of her purse. She even brought it into the bath, afraid some calamity would befall her if it wasn’t within reach or the lead pressing firmly into her palm.
Then she met Clement, raven haired and handsome, a dazzling smile wide as the sky, and eyes wild for her, a spinster and hopeless cause, or so she thought. But there he was, smiling and joking at the library, eager for her help, eager for a word to spill from her lips and into his heart.
He was a crop duster, a daredevil of the sky, swooping in craven low loops and up, up again, and more at home there, curls whipping like wings, than nearly any place, save where Cora was.
They quickly found themselves married, and ecstatically so, with warm days spent on bicycles or their naked bodies tangled in clear lake water. In the cool of autumn and winter, she brought home books to read together before listening to records or their favorite programs on the radio. He sometimes took her out in his plane, sharing a glimpse of the world from God’s eye, despite her fears and a sincere belief that only birds were meant to fly. It was at these moments the bullet soothed her most, and, quite possibly, kept them both alive.
Then came The War and Clement’s fidelity to a certain ideal and his beloved country. He would be a paratrooper, and his body, not a cloud of chemicals, raining onto a faraway land.
She hated the thought, hated the epic distance it would take him, and worse still, what might happen. As his departure drew nearer, she wished for an answer, for something to keep him safe, the lead of Pancho’s bullet digging deeper into her skin, and for the longest time not realizing that it was the solution.
Then, on that fateful day, she said her goodbyes and pressed it into his palm, the story of its presence and a multitude of tears soothing her like a balm. He stood, at first mystified that she could keep such a secret, then grateful for all it meant, and hugging her with all his might.
On the day of Clement’s first mission, as the plane climbed higher and higher, Cora rode her bicycle down a favorite country road, missing him terribly. A crow, swirling high above, caught her eye, and as it swooped down, there was Clement, hand firmly over his breast pocket, a magic bullet, and a photograph of his beloved.
…
Art & Letters is a collaboration:
Story written by Colleen Sohn
Artistically interpreted by Maren Jensen
To live in hearts we leave behind,
Is not to die.
Thomas Campbell
