You see these balloons.

They’re going up to you.

To show you that I still think of you.

You are a part of me.

I’ll hold on forever.

I am sending you the colors of the rainbow.

To show you the joy you brought me.

I’m giving it back.

I’ve had it too long.

The only thing I need now is you.

Your hands in mine.

Your eyes.

Reaching into my soul.

I can remember you singing.

Your gentle song a lullaby.

You see these balloons.

Every year they go up.

So you’ll never feel alone.

And we’ll always be together.

Mermaids splash and sing their song

While elves tinker with gold

Giants raid and roam along

While fauns dance, young and old

Unicorns prance so merrily

Fairies flit to and fro

Dragons swoop so carelessly

While gnomes make flowers grow

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is your first art prompt. People got back to me saying they were interested in doing this, so here you are. This is "Reflection" by paperdragon1967. Write a poem, a song, give this girl a story. Thanks for your enthusiasm, everyone.

Fair sailing,

-Circe

It moved.

It morphed.

It now is the 255-character story.

And it resides above, on the tab called SHOUTS, as in shout-out your 255-characterstoryallinonebreathifyoucandoit.

Just joking.

It's a new idea: Try creating stories that are 255-characters long. Why 255? I don't know. I really don't. If you find that too short we can lengthen it, a little.

TRY IT OUT: youngwritersproject.org/shoutbox

Dad I figured it all out, I think. I know what I want.  You won't like all the places I want to go, probably. A summer in Texas, a winter in Lausanne, another in Minneapolis or Saint Paul. A spring taking care of children in Capetown. Another taking care of artifacts in Washington.

I'll spend my autumns at home though. I'll always spend my autumns at home. 

You won't like, either, the way I don't want to change the world, just my space in it. I want to learn fluent French because it is where I come from. I want to dress in men's shirts and buy myself a small forest green pickup and buy all my furniture at Goodwill, furnish a small house with only half a bathroom and unfinished walls and floors that I have to wallpaper and cover with art. I want a loft that I can fill with stars if I open the window, and a bed full of quilts because it is cold as hell iced over in the winter. And I want a garden in the spring, that I made by myself, with a walkway I paved over by hand. 

I don't want to be ambassador to Italy or Russia or Israel anymore, Dad. Or some sort of big whig editor or some sort of beautiful business woman with a sharp tongue. I want a blue collar job, maybe to bartend at the local pub on weeknights and write for the Herald by the article. I want to know what it's like to be tired at the end of the day, everyday, and wake up each morning and still feel it. 

And most of all, I want to save up my money and buy myself a little bookshop on Main Street in downtown Somewhere. I want something quiet with good coffee. I want you to visit me and whoever I find to keep my company along the way, and come and see the little children we'll have and the way they'll look just like you. I want you to love me even though I want something old-fashioned and simple and full of just books and tulips that come back each year. 

Somewhere out along the lines

of universe and curves of time

amidst dusty scattered skulls and spines

I seem to have lost a friend of mine.

I dropped her at her destination

(she'd long been bound for other nations)

but by our arranged visitation,

she was not done with exploration.

the first sister I could have kept—

when we parted ways, I think she wept.

But by her choice, as New England slept

she left, to freer lives accept.

Am I pretty?
All my friends say, "Totally!"

Am I sexy?
Cosmopolitan says, "Hell yes".

Am I smart?

My teachers tell my parents, "Very intelligent."

Am I boring?

My boyfriend says, "Never." 

Am I pretty?

I say I'm average.

Am I sexy?

I try, but I swear my boyfriend's exaggerating.

Am I smart?

I have the basics I suppose.

Am I boring?

I'm not as adventurous as those other girls...

Am I insecure? 

I'll admit that.

for so long the words would

tango,

waltz,

pirouette

straight from my mind

through my fingers

excitedly

onto the paper

barely contained

by those parallel blue lines.

now the words stumble.

confused, they have trouble

even walking now,

let alone grapevine.

I imagine them getting lost

within me.

bumping against the walls of

my head,

my chest,

like the lights are turned off,

but they aren’t.

when they do find their way

through that labyrinth

that maze

they emerge as alphabet soup

jargon

completely and utterly

wrong.

I’ve tried to close

my eyes and reach

inside,

tried to pull off their

blindfolds

and push them,

shove them,

drag the words

with my pointer finger

in the right direction.

but they don’t seem to

respond.

maybe I should try

dance lessons.

Firefox error message apologizes:

Well this is embarrassing

 

Tells me it can't

take me where

I need to go

 

That little red kit