Tag Archives: Edward Hopper

Scattered Steps: Prosery

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Edward Hopper, “Automat,” 1927

“Tell me! What people?” I’m frantic, barely giving Marie a chance to reply.

Again, she warns, “it’s not safe here. Meet me at the old mill tomorrow at noon. You remember? Make sure you’re not followed now—or tomorrow.”

She practically pushes me out the door, murmuring nonsense about visiting Auntie soon, in case anyone is listening. She really is scared.

I don’t see anyone, but it’s getting dark. I gaze up at the stars, wishing I could walk in the street of the sky. Night walks scattering poems, I think. Here on earth, less pleasant things are scattered, like—oh no–as I feel the squish under my shoes and smell dog poop. It’s going to be one of those nights. I remind myself, I’ve had worse. I head to a café, order a bottle of wine, and pour the first glass.

A continuation of my spy series for Prosery on dVerse. Linda asked us to use this line by E.E. Cummings: “In the street of the sky night walks scattering poems.” I’ve continued this from where I left off in September.

Haunted

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Edward Hopper, New York Movie, 1939

Haunted

During the war we talked about “after,” but we didn’t realize that for some of us, there will never be an after. I remember one survivor who said the past was like a festering wound, but “she’d had it sliced away–leaving a scar, it’s true, but barely noticeable.” She said, “You cover it up and go about your life.”

But at night, I’d hear her tossing and turning, and sometimes crying. I recognized it for what it was—the past haunting her. It doesn’t go away. It’s a movie playing on an endless, repeating loop. It’s a ghost that visits each night, or an illness. Paul is that ghostly contagion. He haunts me at night, visits me in my dreams, and he’s infected me with dangerous thoughts. Sometimes I’m no longer sure if what I did was right.

It’s Prosery time at dVerse, flash fiction of no more than 144 words using the given poetic prompt line. This is another episode of my ongoing (and going, where is it going?) spy series. Sarah has asked us to use the line:

“she’d had it sliced away leaving a scar”.

From a poem by Michael Donaghy. You can read the original poem here: https://rihlajourney.wordpress.com/2010/12/27/liverpool-michael-donaghy/

No Answers: Prosery

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Edward Hopper, “Automat,” 1927

We heard about D-Day, of course, we heard. It was the beginning of the end, though we didn’t know it then—not for certain. We didn’t know if it was permanent. I was cut-off from information like everyone else. In the ensuring months of battle, I faced uncertainty—and fear. And then, finally, I was safe in body, if not in mind. I still didn’t know if I’d been betrayed. What was I supposed to do with that? Finally an end to war, yet amidst the cheering for liberation, there was still devastation and loss. What were we to do with our ghosts? What were we to do with starvation, the many who traded sex with strapping American soldiers for a meal? These are the things they don’t tell us. I went home, but the past is a hunter, stalking us, taking us unaware.

For dVerse Prosery, Lisa has asked us to this line:

“These are the things they don’t tell us.”
– Girl Du Jour, from Notes on Uvalde

She has posted the poem on the prompt page. I’ve used the line to continue my Prosery spy series. Today, June 6, 2022, is the 78th anniversary of D-Day, when Allied forces landed in Normandy, in the invasion that led to the end of the Nazi occupation of France. This year, 98-year-old American veteran Charles Shay said:

“Ukraine is a very sad situation. I feel sorry for the people there and I don’t know why this war had to come, but I think the human beings like to, I think they like to fight. I don’t know,” he said. “In 1944, I landed on these beaches and we thought we’d bring peace to the world. But it’s not possible.”

I see them

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Edward Hopper, “Automat,” 1927

I see them at night.

You may say they’re not real, but in the dark hours when you’re not sure if dawn will truly come, they’re as real as anything else. Wraiths, spirits, ghosts? Or the manifestation of a troubled mind? Survivor’s guilt the psychiatrist called it. I have witnessed true evil, and now I carry it with me, always ticking, like a pocket watch that never needs winding. It counts the minutes and hours till I see those tortured souls. Yet, they’re with me always. I dress in their stories patterned and purple as night. I wear them like a second skin.

I’ll never know if I might have saved more people–only that I was betrayed, and that I was fortunate enough to escape. Finding my betrayer has become my purpose for living. In the meantime, I see the dead. Every night.

(144 words)

A continuation of my disjointed, non-linear spy series for Prosery where Lisa is hosting. The line she selected is:

“I dress in their stories patterned and purple as night.”
–Kimberly Blaeser, “When We Sing of Might”

Do We Ever? Prosery

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Do we ever truly get over such events? War, death, destruction—the thousands of ways humans hurt each other and the Earth? As Nighthawk I had to be cool and calm. It wasn’t only my life at risk, but the lives of many others, too. I had to be calm when the man with shiny black boots and a cruel face entered the restaurant. I had to keep my face blank when the officious manager met with him, and then declared, “So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.”
Calmly, I smiled at our oppressors, poured drinks, and served food while residents starved. Calmly, I plotted to destroy them–until the night you didn’t show up.

I still have nightmares.

Prosery for Ingrid’s prompt at dVerse, using the line “So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm” from William Blake’s The Chimney Sweeper. This is a continuation of my non-linear spy tale.

Nighthawk Again

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Edward Hopper, Nighthawks, 1942

Now what?

As Julia shook herself from those bleak memories of occupied Paris, she considered what she knew. Not much. Maybe it had been a crazy idea to return to France, but there was no paper trail—only memories to guide her.

Think. What is crucial to finding the way? Is this? “There is no beginning or end to the story—time circles,” an old woman with jade green eyes in a war-weathered face had told her. She was one of thousands of refugees streaming back into post-war Paris.

Julia sighs. What is she missing? She needs the one puzzle piece that will let her see the entire picture. And somehow Paul, and her relationship with him is the key.

If there is no beginning or end, she needs to work from the middle. She needs to become Night Hawk again.

Perhaps this one doesn’t work as flash fiction, but. . .more on my non-linear make-it-up-as-I-go spy story. This is for Prosery on dVerse, where I’m hosting today using the line: “Crucial to finding the way is this: there is no beginning or end.”
From Jo Harjo’s “A Map to the Next World.”

The Heaviness of Secrets

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Edward Hopper, Monhegan House, Maine

I’m weary, and sometimes the great bones of my life feel so heavy. The secrets that fill them are an extra weight I carry with me always. In the terror of those times, they were a fuel I swallowed eagerly, and they kept me alive then. How could I know that they would stay within, bricks cemented to my core?

We all had secrets. We were chameleons. Pierre/Paul/Hans—he had so many names. Were any of them real? Where are you? I’ve wondered for over a decade now. Oh, there have been rumors—he was sighted in Moscow, in Buenos Aires, in Singapore—but none of them have checked-out.

Yet, I can’t rest. I’m comfortable here in Maine, living on the pension from the job I’m not allowed to talk about. But I’m going back to France. I have one final lead to follow.

I’ve returned to my spies and Hopper for Linda’s prosery prompt at dVerse. She asks us to use the line:
“Sometimes the great bones of my life feel so heavy,” from Mary Oliver’s “Spring Azures.”

Living in the Aftermath

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Edward Hopper, “Automat,” 1927

The war has been over for five years, but still she watches for him. She can see him as he was–in threadbare clothes like everyone–but somehow elegant. As her cigarette burns untouched, along with the food on her plate, she thinks about their last meeting and his promise to meet her at the safehouse.

She sat inside it for hours, as the day darkened to dusk, then thinking she heard a sound—she remembers it so well–walking outside to find there is nothing behind the wall except a space where the wind whistles. And then the soldiers came. Had Pierre betrayed her? Is he living a life with another name now? How many names has he had?

She has survived, but she’s only half alive. She sits at the table in the dreary café till closing. Then goes home alone.

This is for dVerse, where I’m hosting Prosery today, using

“there is nothing behind the wall
except a space where the wind whistles”
from “Drawings By Children” by Lisel Mueller

I thought I’d go back to the spies—a different couple, I think–and Hopper.

Loneliness of the Night Hawk

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512px-Nighthawks_by_Edward_Hopper_1942

Edward Hopper, Nighthawks, 1942

 

Tomorrow, after parachuting into France, we may never see each other again. My nights will carry a new loneliness, of being someone else, Night Hawk. Already, I look different. My mouth is unfamiliar with my American dental work removed. I own only carefully mended French-made clothing and shoes. We risk our lives to save others–and we carry suicide pills to take if we’re caught. I must learn to dream in French.

Last night, we finally gave in to desire. Swooping in like raptors, we grabbed and held each other. Last night our kisses and caresses expressed what there are no words for—that when it is over, said and done, it was a time. And there was never enough of it. Someday, perhaps. For now, our memories, like this letter, must be tucked away in a locked drawer, and kept for the future.

 

I’m continuing with my spy and Edward Hopper collaboration for the dVerse Prosery Prompt that I’m hosting.We’re using the line I have italicized from Allison Adelle Hedge Coke’s, “A Time.”  Come join us, if you’re so inclined, for a bit of flash fiction, no longer than 144 words.

 

 

The Sequel: Summer Stock

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New_york_restaurant_by_edward_hopper

Edward Hopper, New York Restaurant

 

Perhaps the story did not end with the slam of a door and a parting of ways. Certainly–as with that other famous play–the audience thought that was that. They discussed the denouement. Then, they exited the theater and quickly forgot about it.

But stories always go on, even if we can’t see behind the curtain; even if what passes for drama is mundane or boring and closer to farce. Three kids in six years for him and a move to the suburbs (but not too far away); a steady corporate rise for her.

They connected again on social media. She saw photos of his children playing in their grandfather’s dentist office. There were not many shots of him and his wife together. He saw her photographed at business functions and vacationing in exotic locales. No steady partner in sight.

“I’m in New York for a conference. Do you want to get a drink and catch up?” He messaged her.

The audience thought, this time they will marry. And they did, moving back to their hometown, where he could be close to his children.

But they couldn’t go back to their old roles. Their characters had moved on from ingenue and young hero. Within three months, there were more slammed doors. And when she was offered a new job in another city, she took it and left.

 

A bit of flash fiction. Claudia McGill challenged me to write a sequel to her story-poem. Yeah, so the sequel is longer than the first part. 😏 Read hers first here.