Esther Chilton

This week’s word prompt is

TREASURE

What comes into your mind when you think of that word? Pirates? Gold coins and goblets? Perhaps it’s a loved one you treasure, or a moment in time. It could even be time itself that you treasure. Fact or fiction, prose or poetry, I would love to read your thoughts on this week’s prompt, but there’s no obligation to share your writing.

Here is the work you shared on the last prompt WATER.

Therapy Bits:

I love going to visit Torc waterfall which is in Killarney in county Kerry.

It is so beautiful there, I’ve never climbed to the top, but I’ve sat at the bottom of the waterfall, just taking in the sound of the rushing water.

I love it. So, here is a poem I wrote about experiencing the sound of the waterfall.

I wrote a tanka.

Waterfall whisper—
stones dream beneath the current,
moss clings to silence.
Each drop carries ancient songs
I can only almost hear.

Kim Smyth:

Water is mesmerizing, whether at the beach, or the lake, or watching the river rush by, therefore, I must make my happy and forever place next to a body of water. I even like to get lost sometimes just running the water over my fingers to watch its movement. Hopefully, my death isn’t die to drowning, though I’ve heard its a peaceful way to go.

My Mind Mappings:

Rain had been falling for hours, but he kept driving, chasing time as he headed for home.

The road shimmered beneath his headlights, uncertain and slick. Water crept over the yellow lines, then surged without warning.

He slammed the brakes, but the current had already claimed control. Trees blurred past as the car drifted sideways, weightless.

The door wouldn’t budge. He climbed through the window. Knees scraped, fingers grasping at slick branches above the rushing dark.

The roar was deafening, but his own breath louder still.
He hung there, soaked and shivering, between terror and survival.

Somewhere behind the storm, morning waited.

John W. Howell:

Waking with a thundering head,

Praying that I’m not really dead.

Makes me think next time I otter,

Forget the bourbon and stay with water

Pensitivity101:

Living on the boat was one of the most wonderful experiences of our lives.

There were 17 locks between Stratford and our marina. Pershore was the deepest with Luddington a close second. We got to be dab hands at ‘The Dip’ and using the windlass to open the paddles. Seeing the mist rising on the water in the mornings, seeing swans swim out of the mist as if in an oil painting, watching the sun set from the river bank where there was no artificial light or sound of traffic or just puttering upriver seeing sights inaccessible by road.

If our health was better, we’d go back in an instant.

Teri Polen:

When I think of water the beach immediately comes to mind. It’s my happy place – and we’re going in a couple of weeks. Woohoo!

Nicola Daly:

Twisted Tale

Eyes closed, hair fanning into a halo, she submerges, the ebb and flow of the water a soft caress. Skimming the surface, she turns, and with a flick of her tail, dives. She is a myriad of blues and greens, iridescent in the ribbons of moonlight, the tip of her tail grazing the gently swaying seaweed. She feels beautiful. Calm. At peace –

BANG. BANG. BANG.

What – ?

She breaches like a whale and her eyes fly open.

‘Mum?’ Her son wails through the locked door. ‘Are you still in the bath? Only the cat’s been sick.’

Peter Bouchier:

A leaky faucet
circulatory system from the kitchen
heartbeat of the house

*

Slowly dripping tap
precious blood leaking away
down the kitchen sink

*

Der Wasserhahn tropft
das Blut des Hauses zerfließt
wie ein Wasserfall

*

Robinet qui fuit
la circulation sanguine
de notre cuisine

*

A leaking tap
the blood from the house runs
straight into the sink

Michnavs:

Tide

i am the river you return to—
each time the dam breaks,
each time the banks of your life
overflow with debt
you made for others.

i’ve held the flood—
paid the rent,
bridged your storms,
let myself erode
while you built safer shores
for them.

but this—
this is different.

you ask again,
and i feel the salt
sting my lungs.

why must i be the well
you draw from,
never the one you fill?

you protect her
like glass from the sea.

but me—
i’m always the tide
expected to pull back
without question.

where is my harbor?
who holds me
when my heart
is soaked through?

i’ve swallowed too much—
the silence,
the shame,
the weight of your wants
over my wounds.

and now,
as you ask again,
i am drowning
in the question
you never answer:
why must it
always
be me?

Teleportingweena:

Our prompt is about water. What can I say? I drink water, I wash in water, and sometimes it rains water, but usually not enough around here. However, this one time we flooded!

Here’s a post about a flood we had one year.

These photos are from a few years ago. We had so much rain, it flooded the whole city, and they called it the 100 year flood. It is rare we have so much rain at one time here. Our street was taken over by the playa lake we live next to, and was cordoned off for a long time, as the water slowly receded. There were ducks swimming in front of our house, and duck eggs were washed up into the yard. My husband even got interviewed for the newspaper, with a photo in there, too.

I don’t know if Esther adds photos on her blog re-cap of the prompts, so here’s a link to the post I wrote with the photos: here

Lisa A Paul:

I am a person who enjoys the water, even though my first encounter with the ocean was unpleasant. I was two years old and got knocked off my feet by a wave, going completely underwater and coming up terrified. It wasn’t long before I shook off that fear, but I kept a healthy respect for water and how dangerous it can be.

Growing up, most of our family vacations were planned around the beach. When my children were still living at home, our vacations were also mostly about going to the ocean. When you live in land-locked Indiana, you go to the mountains or the ocean on vacation, the two things we do not have.

But water is much more than the ocean. It is in lakes, in rivers and creeks and in swimming pools. It is in bathtubs and pots and cups. Water is necessary for life.

When my daughter was a young woman, she participated in a trip with an organization called Wine to Water. She went to the Amazon, and they worked to repair a well in a village in Columbia. The trip changed her views about many things, and she was amazed at the primitive way the people they were helping still lived. She became very sick and feverish while she was there, possibly from wading in the water in the Amazon River, or from something she ate or drank, but she was too sick to even think to have someone contact her family. Thankfully, she recovered, continued working and came home safely.

We have lived on a lake since my youngest child was born. He is now 33. So, the lake and water sports have been a big part of what our family enjoys, as well as boats and fishing. Our lives revolved around the water of our lake as soon as the weather warmed up. We watched sunsets turn orange on the horizon or saw the sun sparkling on the blue water. The beauty of the water always delighted us.

When I think of water, I also think of water used for washing. Washing usually has a certain connotation, either work or relaxation. But it meant something else to me when my husband passed away and the nurse from hospice asked if I wanted to wash his body. I had been touching him and holding his hand after he died, and his body still had warmth. I felt the warmth leaving his skin, and that is when the nurse arrived. I said that I would, I didn’t know what to do. We began washing him, but his body was as cold as porcelain, it felt like nothing I had experienced before. It broke my heart. I felt like it forced me to accept that no living force resided in his body anymore, which I knew, but it was something else. I’m not sure what it was. Perhaps I felt death’s cold touch, the one who took my husband. I took no pleasure in it, felt no wonderful closure from it. The memory of that experience sticks with me, and I think of it when I think of water.

Water is such a big part of my life, and I know I am blessed beyond what I could ever imagine that I have constant access to clean water. Water is a wonderful and beautiful thing. I am drinking it right now.

Violet Lentz:

Our Lady

our lady she appeared to me
and in of all the dad gum places
she caught me in the shower stall
makin’ shavin’ faces

“gol dang!” i screamed, right out loud
as i couldn’t believe my eyes
but there she stood outlined in hair
and much to my surprise

my woman came a runnin’ in
and behind her my daughter
and there i stood butt nekkid
wearin’ nothin’ but some water!

“jeez ow!” i screamed and drew up quick
the curtain round my waist
“go get the gol dern camera, ma
we ain’t got no time to waste!”

and as i turned to look upon
our sweet savior’s ma a-gain
water sprayed off the top o my head
and she went down the dad burn drain!

Roberta Writes:

Mist

tiny water droplets

suspended in clouds

above the golden veld

gently embrace

the wild hibiscus

shimmer in rows

along strands of web

the bush is quiet

animals all hiding

deep within thickets

the only sound

splashing of wheels

as the vehicle

squelches through mud

***