Snow crunched soft underfoot. A blanket of ice gagged the babble of streams, hemmed pine needles to branches, encased untouchable red berries. Fir and spruce bowed to the rush of wind--their leaves whistled catcalls and applauded still after the gust had disappeared in murmurs of frost.

She had caught me that way, too, with the snap of a pair of stilettos and swish of her too-tight skirt, blinding, as the sun sheers away the snowdrifts.

But the sun always sets.

"Where did you say the deer was, buddy?"

"Just over the trees, Charlie. It's a big'un." Her husband followed like a brow-beaten canine, scrounging for something that would allow him to cling to the shredded remains of his marriage. But Charlie was only a niggling thorn in thoughts that dwelled on the woman.

She had avoided me at first, a deer cautious to the hunter's ungainly footsteps. In time, wine thawed her frostbitten tongue, and we had embraced in my cabin. The sweaty haze of post-coital no-nothing talk drummed in my chest as we held each other, when she had first mentioned Charlie.

"Dang, Bill. Never woulda thought you'd bag one out here. Season's almost over, right?"

"I got lucky," I said. "That, and I waited for hours up in a tree, freezing my balls off, for the right moment."

We had the same interests, Charlie and I. The same taste in women.

I had already dug a hole as deep as I could before my nails scratched permafrost, her name upon my chapped lips, and the black lie of his friendship stinging my eyes in the freezing temperature.

Claustrophobic, emerald boughs extended their spiny arms around us.

My orange hunter's cap brushed low-hanging branches; snow licked my collar and sent a wet stream down my jacket as we ducked deeper into the thicket.

The snowfall kissing my neck was the same as the wintry ones she had gifted me the last night I saw her.

"I'm sorry, Bill," she had said, the fire illuminating her bare chest an orange tint. "I can't live like this anymore."

She leaned over and embraced me, lingering long enough to extinguish the love I had been stoking. In an overstuffed armchair, I sat paralyzed, searching for words my tightening throat wouldn't allow me to speak.

Pausing at the door, a purse over one bare shoulder, down jacket in hand, she smiled like a bounding fawn discovered causing mischief.

"You'll forget."

As she opened the door, a winter blizzard blew the fire low. Her bangs danced on her forehead and snowflakes flecked her dark hair. She left, transforming into a ghost in the night, a single purple hair tie abandoned on my nightstand.

"Here we are, Charlie," I said, pointing to a pit as large as a wild boar, just deep enough to bury secrets, and dappled with crusted dirt on all sides.

Charlie knelt beside it, shaking his head.

Producing the purple ribbon from my pocket, I let it fall into the hole. Charlie stared, bottom lip quivering in disbelief. He reached forward, but withdrew his gloved hand. "Do you remember her name?"

I shook my head. "I buried it here." So many years ago. "With her."

Charlie sighed, moistened clouds of air purling around his cheeks and over his thinning hair. "That's where she's been all these years, then? A ditch in the woods?"

"The forest is vast, and it forgets. But I can't. She's still a memory, even if I can't remember her name." She had wormed inside me, though the years had made her face was a blur and her name a whisper in the reeds. "Your wife was beautiful."

"A mask for the devil." Charlie grimaced and stood.

I pointed to the ribbon. "She got us both good."

Charlie took out his wallet, fumbled with it, and produced a similar purple ribbon. He tossed it on mine.

I took out a zippo, the flame sparking to life with a flick of my wrist. "I told you you'd catch up with her someday."

Charlie just stared at the ribbons, tears welling in his eyes. "I just wanted to hunt deer."

"To hell with the deer."

The flame touched to the ribbons; they burned quick. We scuffed snow over their remains. I didn't feel better, and from Charlie's harried expression, neither did he.

"She wasn't human, Bill." Charlie shoved his hands in his pockets.

I nodded. "Who would believe us?"

Charlie shrugged.

"Same time next year, then." I slapped him on the shoulder as I stepped around him to lead the way back to where my jeep waited, engine running.

"Same time next year, Bill."

He could never know what had really happened to his wife after she left me that night in the cabin. How brown fur had sprouted from her skin as she sprung for the forest. How my fingers trembled as I curled them around the bowstring. How the metal shaft had penetrated her lithe body; how she had dragged blood and bits of brown and white fur to the very spot we had burned the remnants of our memories.

And how, under the moonlight, I had dug a hole and buried her right there, a deer in form, a woman in mind.

The body had long gone. Life continued, though empty and hollow. No matter how many deer we killed it would never be enough, for my hooved angel already lay, frozen, beneath the crystalline ground.

END

"How are you doing today?"

Like you, I receive this greeting two or three times a day, especially from a coworker at the start of another workday. Sometimes the five-word question is sincere, but most often it is a mundane way to say "hi."

And the standard reply is usually just as routine: "Fine. And you?"

However, I decided years ago to break out of the rut, and answer the "how are you" greeting with a different word: "Smooth." (As in no problems, no difficulties.)

I often receive a raised eyebrow or a smile. But the first time a female coworker heard my reply, she was momentarily speechless. In the vacuum, I asked, "How are you doing?"

She paused and said, "Lumpy."

I changed the subject.

Exiting the pale grey coffin mouth

Heavy in October’s quiet morning moan

Sing deluged seawater epics

Over leafy burning phantoms

Yellowing pilgrim rage

Her sun slivered eyelashes

Bat blood blistered castaways

Burning rose tipped alms

Demure flame

Atop mascara mountains

Her thundersquall boots

Chained to heated gravity

Disturbed ballet

Leaping volumes

Out the black frosted heel

Keeping sacred sleep

Where untamed silhouettes

Spear naked openings

Sashaying swords to ghost husk trees

Choral flower battles

Reedy hymnal dreams

And sound is mute chambered gold

By her spirited marble steps

That kiss moorland halo

To such a sun swaddled beautiful death

Wrapped diamond cold

But pressed fathoms deep

Under cathedral skies

Crushed velvet twinkles

Her wild dance

Eternal snow

Bittersweet lodgings

Ashes and afterglow.

Dear God,

I realize that I am nothing more than a fancy bag of salt water with an electric current running through it. And yet I know you listen when I pray. Thank you for caring about me.

Love,

Your disobedient kid (but I'm trying)

Dear Big Guy(s) or Big Girl(s) or Big Guy(s) and Girl(s) in the sky,

This letter is to inform you that your services are no longer required or desired. Of course, it isn't easy to end this love-hate-wipe out entire populations because you get your celestial knickers tied in a knot relationship that has spanned millennia, but we both want different things and we've been going in different directions for quite a while now. WelI, can't say it's been fun, in fact, it's been downright dangerous to be involved in this relationship with you, but it's time for us to cut our losses and say, "Goodbye." For the record, it's not us, it's YOU that's the problem!

Now, before you start whining about what you'll do without us, let me just say that you haven't been truly invested in a healthy, loving relationship, in well...ever. You don't communicate, you're moody and prone to extreme violence, you're neglectful in your responsibilities, and you've allowed country music to exist. Don't believe me? Well here's some things that've led to this breakup.

1. You don't communicate clearly. How can we know what you want unless you take the time to tell us. Oh, and talking bushes, the Virgin Mary's image in a piece of toast, and the books that are supposedly your word don't count as effective communication! You haven't used the burning bush thing since the Bronze Age and even then, it was only seen by one guy! The image of the Virgin Mary in a piece of toast, stigmata, and crying statues aren't a big deal. I once had a fried potato skin that looked like Mount Rushmore. It doesn't mean that Abe Lincoln is trying to send me a message about how he doesn't like how his birthday is used an excuse to sell Toyotas at, "Prices that'll assassinate the factory MSRP." The holy books? Well, first they read like stereo instructions. Second, books can be manipulated and changed to coincide with the whims of those in power. So, it's only logical that the King James translation of the bible is very monarch/keeping the elite in power friendly. There's no way to insure that we're getting the real low down on God's will. Ya Dig?

2. Your moody and violent when angry. Floods that wipe out all creation, fire and brimstone that destroys cities, and back to back hurricanes show that you're not exactly even handed. I mean, what's up with Florida and the back to back hurricanes? Does the South owe you money or something? Look, I'm no fan of the states where it was once okay for people to own people, but picking on Florida? Florida is the state equivalent of that kid that got dropped on his head repeatedly as a newborn. Give our country's limp phallus a break. Picking on someone too intellectually impaired to fight back is just plain mean.

3. You're a deadbeat parent. Look, I get it that us mortal adults do bad stuff so we deserve what we get. The wage of sin is death and all that. BUT CHILDREN? It makes ZERO sense that a 2 year old has to fight cancer or dies needlessly in a war. What great sin can a 2 old commit that is deserving of death by cancer or a bomb? These deaths are pointless. If you are indeed omnipotent and omniscient, fix it! Oh, don't give me that, "We mortals suffer so that we can learn to be better people b.s." If you are creator of the universe then you created a faulty product. Punishing children so that their faulty parents learn a lesson is totally denying responsibility for the faulty product YOU created and needlessly making innocents suffer. Besides, if you know everything, why allow faulty mortals to leave the factory to begin with? I mean, Ford didn't intentionally design the Pinto to explode when rear ended. If they knew that would happen before the car hit the sales lot they would've changed the design so that the issue was fixed, right?

So, humanity is slowly breaking up with you, God(s). Churches are hemorrhaging members who figure out that their worth can only be found in the collection plate and that the lessons they're being taught from the pulpit run contrary to the values and actions of presidential candidate the pastor is demanding that they vote for. The Old Testament sadism that led to the wholesale slaughter of (if it to be believed) the entire human race minus an incestuous family on a boat is being seen for what it is. Finally, humanity has started to figure out that no amount of wisdom to be gained is worth the death of children who're too young to even say, "Sin" let alone commit such an act.

I'd like to say it's we're sorry to end this, but after enduring centuries of genocide, slavery, war, rapine, and cruelty, I can't. Your suitcase is packed and the Uber has been called. We wish you luck, but please stay out of the business of creating sentient beings because you're not very good at it.

First of all, I know you don’t exist, at least for me. I stopped believing in you a long time ago, without even realizing. I only know that on some regular day - a day that I heard about ordinary death news, I saw cruelty, I experienced injustice - I quit believing.

If you exist, if you’re out somewhere in endless space, please take our sufferings away. If you’re real, I don’t want to believe that you see all these and still do nothing.

Some people say that you existed, but you lost your power. Is this true? Did you lose everything that you had and maybe that’s why you don’t care? If you’r not fictional, at least this version of your story can make me believe in you. Otherwise, I don’t want to worship a god who sees the world now and remains silent.

Hello, long lost friend,

I cannot remember how long ago I spoke to you (apologies for not using divine capitalizing of my words if I speak about or to you but I simply have no feeling of hierarchy, even when a holy hierarchy, in my system of speech, writing, or thinking), and therefore doubt if you remember me, or, for that matter, care to listen to me at all.

What have we done to what you in whichever way have created.

Now that I mention creation, a colleague of mine honestly believes that Earth as we know it suddenly, as if with a snap of your sacred fingers, was there. No big bang and gradual emergence of stars, solar systems, and planets, but Boom!, without further ado, there is Earth in the universe. Can you imagine? Ha! But, blessed are the ignorant, I'd say. Frankly, I do know that you, or better Matthew in your name, wrote differently: blessed are the poor of spirit, referring to the modest of mind, rather than the ignorant. So, admittedly, it is I who thinks that the ignorant are blessed, and, taking it a step further, should be forgiven for the silly ideas that erupt from their simple minds. Do you know that there are - in this era - masses who claim that Earth is flat? Another Ha! You must be heavily disappointed in the way the human race has evolved.

Furthermore, not only my colleague but much of humanity, and surely its majority, is pretty ignorant if not plain stupid if you ask me (you don't ask me but I'll go on telling you anyway). For, once again, look what we have done with your world, the world that you - probably - destined to be ours.

My parents, may they rest in peace in your kingdom of heaven or vibrate blissfully in the quantum dance in which their ashes were taken up, are the real blessed not to have lived in these times. My parents were of the worrisome kind, afraid of the invisible and, as was proven to me through my disobedience, non-existent dangers that they imagined were hidden in dark street corners, behind bushes and scrapwood, in the use of the tiniest drop of alcohol, and even in the eloquence of people that crossed our family's path and whose motives were not completely clear to them. For my parents, in their fright, to see this world, our world, on fire would have smitten them down in despair and depression.

It is true, we're burning up the place. Assuming your omniscience, you are no doubt aware of what our obsessive materialism and uncontrolled desire for wealth have done to our climate. I have little hope that we will be able to, literally, turn the tide. It is no longer, if it ever was, in your hands but in our hands but alas, we woke up too late. And we? "We" still being a minority, an intellectual elite that Plato may have envisioned as those destined to form the government that knows best for the people they govern. In our times, my old friend, this elite seems to be as ignorant as the people they govern. As if waking up from mind-numbing hibernation, all that these 'elites' do now, I am sorry to say, is too little too late.

Was it only that, that what we did to the climate, you might maybe think that it is part of evolution, an evolution that would, be it not very naturally, extinguish one of the many living species that you, possibly, planned to inhabit Earth. We are no more than the rat, the rainword, the lamb, the owl, or the lion. At least, I sincerely hope that you did not - despite that whole Adam and Eve story over which fabrication I assume you did not have any control - see us, humans, as the crown of creation. And if you did, well, then I can only pity you deeply for what our so-called world leaders display in shortsightedness, greed, lust for power, and incapability to leave principles of religion behind in order to overcome conflicts and to prevent bloodshed over borders of countries, for example.

If you had a plan, I am sure this was not it. Currently, and I guarantee you it is not fed by my parents' fears, I am depressed over and disappointed in my fellow men and me. I thought we'd know better, I'd thought we'd do better by now. But we don't. We are far from being the poor of mind Matthew envisioned (modest, humble, and clear of mind), and you maybe hoped for.

I have no power to change things for the better, save spread little ripples of kindness in the small universe of family, colleagues, and friends I live in. But in the back of my mind I know, that also is too little too late. Deep in my heart, I think, and yes, fear that we are lost.

Humanity has nothing to be proud of.

I am truly sorry to not have written on a more cheerful note.

Your friend,

Milton

Dear God,

No need to tell you how I feel, as you already know. The real question is: how do you feel? I imagine pretty down given how all your believers, let's call them the Three Abrahamics (religions always do things in threes), can't stop butchering and raping each other. By the way, why do they keep telling me that if I don't join them, there'll be nothing to stop me from butchering and raping? C'mon now, I've never done either, nor do I have any intention to. In any event, hope you can take Sunday off, given it's your day. Or do you take off Friday, Saturday, AND Sunday? It's confusing to know which of the Three to follow, ain't it? And within each, there's all those sects, one condemning the other for not doing this or that right. Whew, sucks to be you. Not that it's great to be me, but I'll take being me over being you any day. Anyway, be well, don't let the bastards get you down, and hang loose. The best is yet to come.

Love,

mishmash

10/12/2024

Dear God,

Please make these unending wars stop. Please end the plight of the hungry. And, on a personal note, please end this insufferable writer's block.

I know I should not elevate my petty problem into the league of worldwide catastrophes. But I sit here with nothing to write about. I feel my prose is just drivel. Unremarkable. Just another grain of sand on a beach somewhere. Who would want to read my stuff? This is the pits. Why should I even try to write? Why...?

My bad, God. Sorry for the pity break.

Now, about those wars and that hunger. If you could just...

Maybe if I could write something to my representatives, my friends, anyone. Something that would inspire a solution to problems. Maybe I could...

Thank you, God.

Yours,

Sandlot