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Greetings and salutations

Welcome to the house of the Nyne Willows

By Willow PhoenixPublished 3 years ago 4 min read
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Brushing a stray strand of hair back from her eyes, she pauses a moment to look behind her.

The road has been long, the look of it a shadow behind her eyes. There isn’t time to think of that now. There’s too much to be done.

A laugh, hoarse from misuse, crackles into the air. Yesterday isn’t the goal, gone, immutable, it is what it is. Tomorrow, that can still be changed, in fact, there’s really nothing that can’t be done, possibilities, infinite.

A memory out of place, one that doesn’t fit and can’t be reconciled with linear time.

Recently, Sean and I sat and had a talk, we discussed how neither of us have ever really liked our names, given at birth. How to resolve these generic names that have never really “fit”?

Together, we recalled an evening in the woods last summer. A hesitant group, too harnessed down by the circumstances of the world to truly let loose and enjoy an opportunity at fun and revelry.

A little self conscious, feeling I did not fit, I turned where I always turn when I need to take myself “elsewhere”, to music and light. I brought out my pixel whips and heedless of any opinion, spun and twirled and both apart and very much a part of, lost myself. As the evening progressed, I would hear people walking past mentioning seeing the beckoning lights even from the road. It seemed there were more people now, but I was only peripherally aware, still lost in the lights.

Sean remarked that, I had, that night, served the role of a will’o’wisp. I’m not sure which one of us seized on it, him I think, “Willow”.

It immediately suited and felt “right”.

Over the next few days, I pondered. More, something more. A memory of a beloved movie that yet I could not have seen but somehow did, the tree outside my grandmother’s house, the only place on rare occasion I felt safe, the softness of a sprig of pussy willow brushing my cheek as I made my way to the stream’s bank.

Memories flood and trickle back and I find my name that has always fit.

Nice to meet all of you. My name is Willow

I have been a writer my whole life. I write poetry, stories, many vignettes, tantalizing looks into worlds that might be, may have been, or perhaps, even will be. I have struggled with finding an avenue to share my literary art. Publishers are reluctant with new authors at best, short stories become even more challenging, publication of poetry, unless you are a “known name” already, pay next to nothing and fall to the back of a shelf, gathering dust and cobwebs.

I am hopeful about sharing my art here. My main goal is, and has been, to share my vision with others. Of course, money is nice in the world we are currently cursed in which to reside, that being as it is, I am driven to share, I want to see my ideas go further.

Main genres I have written recently, include odd cross genre medleys of suspense, alternate universe, a bit of sci-fi, magic, of course!

With love, with hope, with ambition to see better than what has come before,

Willow Rose Phoenix

Letting go of something

That never was

Only fond imagination

Let go

Walk on

It was never there to begin with

Letting go of something

Real, and tangible

Something that has gone away

The heart clings to what was

The pain lingers

Let go

Let it free

Free yourself

Hold a little place for what was

Hold it with love and compassion

Without regret or malice

Show that love and compassion to yourself as well

That it’s okay to be sad

About what you’ve lost

But it’s also okay

To let it free

It’s not there anymore

And holding on causes pain

It’s time to get up

Brush yourself off

And face the beautiful future

new love, new joy, new despair, new hope, ever so many times! new stories to be told, new lessons to be learned, but never the same ones, we’ve already learned those, time to move forward

happiness
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About the Creator

Willow Phoenix

If my path has been conventional, then I think convention must be redefined, but perhaps that wouldn’t be so bad after all.

Self identifying as agender and an artist and the rest not withstanding, now based out of Seattle, hi, I’m Willow.

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