Author Photo by Sally Anne Sample Ward
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Call me Magdalene. Not Maggie. Not Meg. And certainly not Dolly, for God’s sake. Call me Magdalene. Let the syllables roll off your tongue. Slowly…slowly…
Let the connotation seep into your stomach, your very skeleton, your middle there. Take a breath. Narrow your eyes. What do you want?
Think: do you really love your life? Your job…your grown children…your spouse? Is what you have now really enough for you? Take another breath.
Touch my cheek… my silver-sheathed breast…me. Keep breathing now.
Hear the raging air blowing all around us. Feel the wind’s unpredictability. Sense the precipice beneath our toes. Smell the gift. See how our bodies sway just before they’re beyond choice? How our chests cease to heave?
We fly for an instant, holding each other for an infinite moment of understanding. See the puffs of dust rise in frilly clouds that our bones make as they crack on the sun-scorched earth./
—Cynthia Sample
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Cynthia Sample holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts in fiction as well as advanced degrees from University of Texas at Dallas and at Austin in mathematics and business. Her writing credits include stories published in Numéro Cinq, SLAB, Summerset Literary Review, Between the Lines, Wichita Falls Literary & Arts Journal, and others. She lives in Dallas.
I love the brevity and Cynthia’s lyrical expressions that reflect the lives of women, and men, and all creatures. This will follow me all day, I know. Tak (thanks).
Makes one think of identity, meaning and our ephemeral nature. Bob bullock