a smile cannot convey much emotion,

as one can be a simple facade,

their mind can be full of commotion,

telling them that they are very, very, flawed

ask any actor about their acts,

they will all tell you that they are all fake,

and when they can’t take it, they will be very lax,

so when you don’t see someone, assume they need a break

a disguise for one can be varied from few to many,

from a smile to a laugh, to excitement over an event,

but for sure there are quite a plenty,

they are always, always frequent, and always with intent

many people are easily fooled by these,

a smile can easily hide tears and sadness,

but to catch on to a mask, it is not a breeze

and it will certainly lead you into one’s madness

I thought I was diving into an gigantic ocean

When it was really a puddle

Barely the size of my shoe

I was too busy

laughing at everyone else

To notice

that I was the one who was the fool

For I see now

that your Love was far too shallow

for Me to dive into

I was foolish enough

to think that I had finally found Love,

But once again the  “love” I found

turned out to be a crow that I had hit with a stone

Oh well,

We’re Broken people now

We’re All broken People now

You’ve become a ghost

Fading from my

Mind,

Heart and

Soul

Becoming more transparent

Every day

I forget your voice

How your hands feel

What we did each day

Each day for so many years

The years that became

A chapter of my life

Misty memories

Dimming a bit more each day

No more colors

But shades of black and white

Slowly becoming gray

“Will you play in the sandbox with me?” she requests, offering me an extra tiny pink pail. Her eyes are chocolate brown and her smile is infectious.

I am about to say yes.

But she’s a girl.

She obviously has cooties.

Of course I don’t like her.

“No.” I say instead and run off to play football with my older brothers.

But when I reach, my brothers say I’m too young to play and only use me to bring back balls that fly out of the playground. It’s boring, and not as fun as building sandcastles. But at least, I am playing with boys. We don’t have cooties.

My oldest brother is the meanest and he kicks the hardest. I hate it when he kicks because I have to run all the way to the end of the park to retrieve the football.

Sure enough, he sends the ball soaring across the playground. My middle brother looks at me expectantly and gestures towards the ball.

“I’ll get it.” I say and rush off to look for the ball.

My brother may have sent the ball to another galaxy, because I couldn’t find it anywhere. But what I did find, was the little sandbox girl crying beside the sandbox as a bigger boy, much bigger than me knocked down her sandcastle.

“Stop that you big bully!” I yell and pull at his fat arms. He is strong and pushes back, sending me flying to the ground.

The little girl calls for help, but it is late in the evening, and at this part of the playground, there are only kids, kids like the little girl, too scared and too young to help.

It rests on me to save the world from this mean bully.

I do what I do best, what runs in my family, I kick him on the shin.

The big bad bully starts to cry and I feel mean, but the other kids are cheering and the little girl is smiling. And then after the bully runs off to complain to his mother, the little girl suddenly springs up to hug me.

“Thank you.” she says as she suffocates me. Although it feels oddly nice, I push her away gently.

After all she is a girl and everyone knows girls have cooties.

“No problem.” I say, standing straighter so I am at least a foot taller than her.

“Will you play in the sandbox with me tomorrow?” she asks hopefully.

It’s hard to refuse. But my boyhood code of honour allows for only that.

“No.” I say and regret it instantly as she lowers her head in disappointment. “But you can play football with me if you like.”

Her eyes light up like firecrackers at New Year’s and she hugs me again. It’s more comfortable this time, and since I find a way to breathe, I do not push her away.

I say goodbye to her when her father comes to pick her up after a while, and my frantic older brothers come along to take me home.

“Where’d you run off to kiddo?” asks my oldest brother as we takes my hand and starts walking. “You had us worried sick.”

“I couldn’t find the ball.” I explain.

“Forget the ball. Are you okay? You look like you fell down.” says my middle brother while dusting off my pants.

“I fought a bully. And won!” I say triumphantly.

“Someone’s bullying you?” demand my brothers instantly.

“Not me, the sandbox girl.“I say as we continue walking.

“Sandbox girl?” they ask perplexed.

“Sandbox girl.” I confirm.

“Looks like shorty has a girlfriend.” concludes my middle brother. He laughs at my scowl and ruffles my hair.

“Is it bad?” I ask and both of them stop to laugh at me.

“Not bad at all, kiddo. You’re just growing up.” says my eldest brother sagely. He is sixteen so he probably knows about this stuff. “It happens to the best of us.”

“Yeah it’s okay. However, as your closest relatives, we reserve the right to make fun of you for the rest of your life.” cackles my middle brother. He may be fourteen, but I swear he gets more annoying each year.

If I am honest I don’t mind if my brothers crack jokes, it seems that’s the worst they will ever do. Besides if I want them to stop, I only need to tell Mom.

I am only six, but I think I like Sandbox Girl.

Because I don’t care if she’s a girl or if she has cooties. I want to be her friend.

#childhood

#slice-of-life

#first love

#sibling

#brother

#sandbox

#six

#children

#innocent

#girl

#boy

#sweet

#heart

It was a selfish game

of Russian roulette.

I knew which gun had the bullet

and I handed it to you knowing

it would break me.

I set us up for failure; I saw it

and played the game anyway.

I had too much passion,

too much love

and wanted what wasn’t real

and you broke under

the pressure of it all.

I broke both of us that way.

-A.e

I didn’t get to go home

Aunty had to get me

In the office I sat alone

Wondering why mommy can’t get me

Aunty told me to get in the car

I asked where to

She said not far

Mommy couldn’t get you

We got to her house and I saw daddy alone

I asked why he was crying

He said mommy wont be home

Mommy is sick, but no longer dying

Dying?

Mommy was fine when I left for school

Daddy must be lying

Lying went against our rules

He said mommy got sad

Mommy did something bad

Mommy wanted, but couldnt smile

Mommy wanted to go away for a while

He said mommy will be back soon

She’ll be back soon

Gus looked out through bloodshot eyes between the bars of his prison cell. The beckoning calls of the vibrant scarlet and golden magic of fluttering leaves, seen through his window beyond the barbed wire, reminded him that he would never see the outside world again unless it was a furtive glimpse in the distance. He felt severed from life as the bones of leaves portrayed the dust of autumn’s flesh. Already, the fading amber lights in ashy yellows signified autumn’s end. Soon, it would be winter again and he would pass one more year in his cold, dank cell. Snowdrifts sporting jaunty winter clothes would be beyond his reach. It would once again feel as if spiky icicles were stabbing his heart in frozen shadows of sprinkled regret He dreamed of inhaling the brisk air and feeling human once again.

Sluggishly in his numb stupor, Gus watched two muscular death row inmates dance around each other like sweat-soaked ballerinas. Hen-scratched tattoos marked their time spent swinging their mallet fists into each other’s faces, turning noses into bloody pudding and teeth into smoothies. Inmates clustered around, shouting out bets while guards ignored them.

Gus remembered being the victim of this cruelty many times when several inmates ganged up on him but there were other pointless savageries as well. Often guards messed with him for their own amusement. One of their favorite ploys was the old “fake visit from Mom” when they would tell him that he had a surprise visitor. Even though he realized it was probably untrue, he still felt like this was the bright spot of his whole month and fell for it every time. He would do his best to clean himself up and wait patiently at his cell doors for the guards to escort him to the visitor’s room. “Oh wait,” they laughed, “we got the wrong Johnson!” And they would laugh and laugh.

Gus sighed as he struggled to remember what normalcy had been in the past but it was becoming only a vague memory. He was ashamed as he realized that vulgarity and meanness was becoming a part of his personality because he felt he was becoming ice bound, trapped in glacial recesses of his body. Anger festered as he began to formulate a plan to kill one of the other prisoners who tormented him. Secreting a magazine in his cell, he pulled out its center staple and then removed the waistband from an old pair of underwear, making it into a catapult. Next, he removed threads from his underwear and wrapped them around the staple to make a dart. Removing one of the advertising cards from the magazine, he reinforced the dart and then dipped it into a noxious mixture of human feces and urine which he heated in the light from his window concentrating it to transform it into a dangerous poison. Then, he rolled up the magazine until it was about 2 inches in circumference and attached it to the bars of his cell. As the hated inmate walked by, he retracted the catapult, inserted the deadly dart and shot it into his neck. Although the prisoner yanked the dart from his neck and said nothing, sepsis took over in the next few days and the inmate died a lingering, painful death.

Hate in chills of cold sweat began to take over Gus’ persona as he felt himself becoming a different person. Knowing he would be in this prison for many years before his death penalty would become instituted; he began to devise other methods to kill both prisoners and the treacherous guards. There was nothing to lose!

Gus closed his eyes as he remembered why he was here. He had been the cherished only son of parents who had finally given up on him and never visited. He wistfully remembered making snowmen with his Dad as he watched flurries of snowflakes outside his window.

Depressing him the most was the knowledge that he was innocent, having been wrongly convicted. He cupped his agony (like fallen leaves) in his chapped hands, wiping drops of perspiration from his forehead, knowing he was ready to take control and destroy all those who had damaged him. The future was of his own making as he felt the wickedness of his transformation take hold like the changing of the seasons. He would shape a feared reputation, like frigid snowballs, that would never be forgotten. No longer would he be burdened by memories of his former life! Smiling in anticipation, he was ready to face his world as he wrapped the thoughts of a springtime of retribution around himself in hues of a new beginning.

Have you ever stopped to ask

Or even stopped to think--

Why colored leaves and a soft wind

Excite people's hearts so?

The coming of autumn, the rush of fall

It's regarded abroad as beauty.

Do people really not see

The danger in leaves, not the colors they should be?

Are our minds so befuddled, our senses so muffled

We do not see the clear and present danger--

In a season so treacherous in nature

And so wily in its doings?

It announces the end of summer, as the weather cools

Leaves start dying and we celebrate the colors they create.

Scarves and coats are pulled out and hot drinks made

We savor the cool weather and rejoice in the new season.

Little do we know, that this cunning season

Is concealing the cool of winter with its breezy weather--

And sunny days leftover from summer

Only to open our eyes on the first day of winter.

It is a surprise then, when our eyes are opened

To a raging blizzard and below 0 temperature--

That we do not see the folly in letting autumn decieve us

She is pretty, but she is fickle.

Disguising the death of a season as an 'october'

Pretending to give us respite from summer heat--

Respite from winter cold

When in reality, she is a dying season, not wanting to let us go.

Have you ever stopped to think of a world with no summer

No winter, no spring

Autumn only, with its dying leaves and folly weather?

Dwell on this, and perhaps it is not too late to save you

From the craftiness of her counterfiet season.

Hello, my real name is Sharonda Juanita Briggs, and that is my picture, when I started I didn't know I had to desquise me.

Let me introduce myself to all my family in the Prose. I am the person that love the way you all write and I love being recognized as someone that writes with my heart instead of for show. I love to write. I hated English, but I love my Teacher. I was the only black person in her class and the majority of my classes in high school. Yet, for all of my three years being there I was the only student asked to come back to her class until I graduated. That taught me that it's not your color but your Flare. I loved high school regardless of the circumstances, and believe it or not I only had one prejudice encounter and that was my accounting teacher. She loved making fun of me every day because I was the only black person in her class. But I am the type of person that speaks my mind, and if it's not right, I will tell you it's not right. I told my counselor and she let me do my work from her office the rest of the school year. I had no choice but to pass me, even though she gave me the hardest work she could find. I graduated from her class with an "A-". And my counselor said she didn't have to put the minus on my report card, but she did. I dedicated my doing well, to people like her with that negativity. "You pull me down, and I going to fight that much harder and more to come back up!" I graduated from a Confederate school. I met the nicest people. I am a firm believer that they should leave our statues up of the Confederate soldiers and people. I feel that they are Someone Grandparents and rather we like what they stood for or not, they were still loved by someone then and now. And we were not here then to carry feeling about what happened. That's just my opinion and I really don't care who agrees with me. I have several races in my family and we love each other no matter what. Well, that's how I feel about Prose. Everyone here is so different, but we can all RELATE. This is how I feel about hatred, If you had a glass with old orange juice in the bottom and you wash it out, the glass can be used again and start over. But If you let it rot in the bottom and never remove it, eventually the glass is ruined and you will have to throw it away, and there is no starting over. Simple business. I despise bullies! I wish they put them out of school forever and make them homeschool only. Leave that negativity at home where it started from. Let the children that want a better life continue with all the help they can get without confusion. On another note, I am a 53-year-old woman that was born with arthiritis that loves cartoons. I love comic books and I calm down to color pictures. I have written/illustrated/published 5 children books so far, and I am almost finished another book coming out in November. I don't like drama and ignore negative people. I am the type of person that cares if someone is feeling down. It bothers me. If I can say something to you to bring you up, then I'm on a mission to do that. If I annoy you, I know how to walk away and don't make it worst. I married my wife of ten years, two years ago. I have two children, 4 grands and about 30 godchildren. I love them all. I started a challenge on my website www.fistchallenge4kids.com to put books back in children and teen hands. Please visit it and you will see a lot that relates to me. I I hope to be well known one day and sell alot of books. But for now, I have a hard enough time finding a sponsor. But I am a survivor and God will continue to Bless me as he do. I'll wait my turn. Thank you for letting me vent again. And Welcome to the Prose Family :)