Redemption Songs
I mean, rabbits, they're all virile, and mouses are so disarming and cute, and ... skunks have their pheromones, and squirrels have their agility, and so on, but ... chipmunks? we're like the in-between species. we don't really got anything."
'Til We Have Faces
But he wasn't able to express it like the mouses and chipmunks and squirrels were. surely, the arctic fox knew this. he couldn't be that dense. surely, ural could smell the hint of alabaster's fear, as well?
Driven to Thirst
"then you know how squirrels are. you know you can trust me," the ambassador said, doing his best to smile. jinx did a bit of a twitch.
Begin to Mend
(Author's Note: This episode takes place about half a year after 'Victory for the Romantic Muse.') Her head was on a pillow, and with the fabric of the pillow-sheet being the same color as her fur (a soft, milky-white, a snowy-white), there...
Milty
It was all hustle-and-bustle outside, today. Everyone working. Everyone shopping. Everyone going. The sound of too many cars on the salted, chilly streets, with all those drivers driving so crazily. Engines sputtering. And a few...
Scotch Pine
It was late. The outside barren. Bare. And white. Nothing of summer, or even autumn, remained. All a memory. All waiting to happen again. All in respite. Out there, the glitter-glistening icicles, like recently-invited guests, hung from...
Gothic Cathedrals
It was November, the Monday before Thanksgiving, and the always-noisy, mechanical hustle-and-bustle of the nature-less city seemed to slow, as if holding its breath in baited anticipation. The skyscrapers going all googly-windowed, as if jabbering with...
Beautifully Tethered
A breath taken. Lungs filling, and a heart beating. And mind unfurling (like those morning flowers do). 'I see and smell and hear that You are, indeed, ushering in another day, my Lord,' was the just-waking, mental prayer. Thought up at...
Kenapocomoco
On the banks of the Eel River, the 'Kenapocomoco,' the 'Snake Fish,' on a farm near some narrow, leaf-floored woods, a farm near wider, more open fields (of would-be corn and soybeans and alfalfa), Rhine and her husband lived. A few miles from her...
Bon Hiver
It fell in flitter-fluttering flakes, like a million parachutes. It fell in a slate-grey, later-day light, the open horizon all hazy (where did it start, and where did it end), and all the naked trees, with their sky-reaching limbs, trying to...
Hoosier Tomatoes
They were sitting side-by-side on the kitchen counter, foot-paws bare, toes wriggling, not quite reaching the off-yellow linoleum of the floor. Cast in the soft, golden glow of a singular, sixty-watt bulb, which was hung in a fixture above the silvery,...
Scurry-ful
Nighttime. And an 8:04 yawn, and a 28-degree whisker-twitch, with warmth wafting from the closed oven, and gourds (yellow, green, and orange) in the middle of the kitchen table (in lieu of once-displayed flowers). And a ladybug crawling, barely...