Poetry & Short Stories

Dedicated to my Mother and all the other mothers in my life. As the years pass and time moves, I begin to understand, I begin to approve, Of the days you gave, of the time you spent, In raising me in the way to go, the way I went.   The Word gone out is not in vain, It’s come back two fold again. In the early hours and the late nights, I hold my baby, in the dark, out of sight, And think about the love you gave, seen and unseen, And I thank you for the mother you’ve been.      

  Curiosity Killed the Cat By Grace Pringle Curiosity, they say, killed the cat, but I would beg to disagree, I have seen the birth of curiosity and it is life to me. As I walk and as I talk, I see it wishing it were free, In the “I wonder…”  and the “what?” and the “could it be’s?” The mystery, the intrigue, I must know! What’s in this cave? Where does this stream flow? What’s he doing? Where did he go? Oh, not knowing vexes me so! How it whispers how it taunts, always demanding what it wants. When ignored, when resisted, it lingers and it haunts The sensible thoughts, the best talks, and jaunts. Perhaps I should be weary of curiosity’s pitfalls, The effects might be meddlesome and disastrous after all. But oh! Seeing and not knowing is hard on the eyes. And now I know why cats have nine lives.

One Heart When you held me close and we said not a word, The pounding of one heart is what I heard. I could not decide if it was yours or mine, It must have been our hearts combined. – Grace R. Pringle True Story.

This is a short story I wrote on the idea of growing up and losing the innocence of childhood. We Did “I want to go up there.” Kate told Jimmy who was lying on his back next to her in the grass. “You can’t,” he informed her with a sigh “you need wings and it is very cold in the sky. The clouds are mushy and wet too.” “I’ll ask for wings and a raincoat for Christmas.” was her even reply. “How are you going to ask for those when you have no one to ask?” “I don’t know, but I’ll think of some way.” Kate closed her eyes and drank in the sunlight that penetrated her eyelids, “I’ll learn to fly and you will too.” —–~*~—–  “Jimmy,” Kate stood in the backyard, watching him throw a ball at the fence with all his might: BAM! Catching it again when it came back to him: THUNK. “Jimmy,” Kate repeated “why are you doing that?” “I’m mad.” He told her and threw the ball again. BAM! “Why are you mad Jimmy?” THUNK. Jimmy caught the ball and gripped it until his knuckles turned white. “I’m mad because I’m sad. Everyone is gone away and no one is coming back.” BAM! THUNK. ‘What about your brother and mother?” “They’re gone.” “And your father?” “He can’t come back. He would want to if he could but they put him in the ground.” BAM! THUNK. “Why did they do that Jimmy?” “They won’t tell me,” BAM! THUNK “they tell me I’ll understand when I’m older but I want to understand NOW.” BAM! THUNK. BAM! THUNK. Kate put her small hand on his arm. “It’s okay, Jimmy, I don’t understand it either. I’m not going to go though, I’ll stay here.” “I know,” Jimmy dropped the ball at his feet and his shoulders sagged “But I don’t know how long you will be here before you go too.” —–~*~—– “Kate,” Jimmy tilted his head back to look up at the night sky above them “do you want to visit the stars with me one day?” “Yes, Kate nodded “one day I would.” “Why do the stars make me sad Kate?” “Because they remember all the things we have forgotten.” “What have we forgotten, Kate?” “If I knew that, the stars wouldn’t be sad.” “Do you think we will remember one day, Kate?” “Maybe, but I think that every time we remembered what we forgot a star falls down. So, perhaps it is a good thing we forget, if we didn’t, there would be no stars.” “If we visit the stars I am sure there are some things we will not help but remember. Do you still want to go with me, Kate?” Kate was quiet for a long moment and then she nodded and whispered, “I will because it is worth the risk.” —–~*~—–  “Jimmy,” Kate was confused “Jimmy, Why can’t we? I don’t understand.” “I have to go, Kate, I have to go away.” “But why, Jimmy? You said we were going to visit the stars.” Jimmy shook his head. “They are too far away, Kate.” “But what about learning to fly and understanding all those things we don’t know?” “Kate, no one can learn to fly, and I understand those things now. And Kate… I don’t want you to understand them. You need to stay the way you are. I WANT you to stay the way you are.” “And what way is that, Jimmy?” “Innocent, Kate, believing you can fly and that you can visit the stars.” “We CAN do those things, Jimmy!” Jimmy closed his eyes and shook his head again. “This is why I have to go, Kate. If I stay you’ll change, I’LL change you and I don’t want to. I love you the way you are, Kate, I don’t want you to become like me.” “What is the matter with being like you, Jimmy?” “You would not understand, Kate.” Kate’s voice dropped to a lower note, “Because you won’t let me, Jimmy.” “The Jimmy you know no longer exists, Kate.” Jimmy hung his head.  “What are we, Jimmy?” “I don’t know, Kate.” “I know, Jimmy. We are halves, halves of a whole. So, you see it is you who do not understand. If you did you would understand you and you would understand me and you wouldn’t go.” “If we are halves, Kate, who split us apart?” “We did, Jimmy. We did.”

This is one of my poems that I am pleased with. It’s about how I feel when I hear a crow’s call in the early morning. It’s an eery sound and hauntingly beautiful feeling. Ode to the Crow by Grace Pringle Ode to the crow in her sturdy nest, Ode to the morning’s peace and rest. Ye be a bird of dark intent, You are the silence’s torment. Yours is a lonely lament, A call to shake, rip and rent, The dawn’s slumbering calm. Early light in the waking night, The morning and darkness unite. Stirring softly and glowing bright, The peace takes flight, Shattered by a harsh bird’s cry. Ode to the crow, ode to the morn, One cries out in scorn, The other, to be born.

Back when I first met my husband he sent me a story that he wrote using only dialogue, which inspired me to write one of my own. This is what I came up with: Thinking too Much   by Grace R. Pringle  “What have you been doing?” “Huh?” “You, what have you been doing.” “Me?” “Yeah, YOU.” “I’ve been thinking.” “For the past hour? The whole time? What in the world could be so important to think about so much?” “That’s the thing, there is nothing important anymore. I was thinking about how there should be more important things to think about.” “What are you talking about? There are plenty of important things.” “For YOU maybe, not for me.” “Come on, there must be something, at one time or another, which you thought was important.” “Sure, but that was before, I’m talking about now, what’s important now.” “That’s easy, it’s all still important, just because time has passed doesn’t mean the importance of important things has changed.” “That’s because you think important things are important, see, I just think unimportant things should be important because they aren’t.” “Alright, fine. As long as you still acknowledge that there are important things to think about.” “Do you think thinking is important?” “Of course, why wouldn’t it be?” “I dunno, it just seems that there are other, more important things to think about instead of thinking.” “I think that all depends on what degree of importance thinking is on.” “But if something is important (whether or not it is very important or just slightly important) isn’t it all still important and should be treated as important even if the other thing is more important?” “Yeah.” “You stopped.” “Stopped what?” “The flow of conversation. We were talking and then you said ‘yeah’ and you stopped.” “I couldn’t think of anything else to say, you were going in circles. At least… I think you were.” “Why didn’t you just say; ‘you’re going in circles” then?” “I thought it would be rude.” “Then you should have said “I don’t mean to be rude (or do mean to be) but either way, you’re going in circles.’” “That would be your statement, not mine.” “Well, it would have been yours if you had said it first.” “I would not have thought of it because it was meant to be your thought, not mine.” “How do you know it was meant to be mine if you had said it first?” “That’s stupid, there isn’t such thing as “what could have been” it happens the way it happens or is thought the way it is thought and there are no exceptions because there was no other way to go about it even if there appears to have been.” “That’s what you think, it isn’t what I think.” “Doesn’t one of us have to be right? I don’t think there can be two rights about a one, don’t you?” “I have not thought about it. Mostly because I wasn’t sure if thinking was important enough to think about thinking it.” “Let’s just say it is all true and leave it at that.” “But it has to be solved; if we say there are two rights but each of us is convinced there is only ‘one’ doesn’t that create a paradox and collapse time and space and thought and all that is important about there being “one right?” “I don’t know… maybe we should think about it.” “I was before you asked me what I was doing.” “… And you only spent an hour thinking about it?”