Light of the Pyres – a Prosery Tale

A piece of Prosery for Kim at dVerse Poets. Kim asks us “to write a very short piece of prose that tells a story, with a beginning, a middle and an end, in any genre of your choice.

As it’s flash fiction, we have a limit of 144 words; an additional challenge is to hit 144 exactly. The special thing about Prosery is that we give you a complete line from a poem, which must be included somewhere in your story, within the 144-word limit.”

For the third Prosery, I’d like you to write a story that includes the following line from ‘Love After Love’, a poem by Derek Walcott:

‘You will love again the stranger who was your self’.

Light of the Pyres – a Prosery Tale

All that happened was in the past. So long ago, there was no way to change anything. Naught to do but watch the rain fall on the tiny grave. The landscape was dim, lit only by the flames from the pyres for the dead. The sky roiled sullen scarlet orange, it was medieval. A shiver ran up her spine.

They had won the battle, but they had lost so much. Star had lost her way, lost herself. She scarcely recognized her reflection anymore. She had been forged in the furnace of battle, hammered on the anvil of loss and honed into a fine weapon by tactics and strategy. Her self remained no more, replaced by the soldier who was a stranger in her own body. And suddenly she understood the prophet’s words, “you will love again the stranger who was your self.” But how?

Til next time ~Peace ~JPP