On purple scrub brush & blue mist dreams

by Kayce Stevens Hughlett

Gathering with other writers is balm for my soul. Even though we're currently doing it virtually via Zoom (as so many things are being done during this time of isolation and Covid-19), the time together is always rich. Recently we were offered an exquisite poem by Natalie Diaz called "If I Should Come Upon Your House Lonely in the West Texas Desert" and asked to write from whatever words or images beckoned us. The first 1/2 line is from her poem and the rest is what emerged after for yours truly. Enjoy!  

If I try running off into the deep purpling scrub brush, I may finally return to myself … to the self who craves adventure and dances in the blue mist of dreams … the self who’s been gone awhile, the one who pops her head out in brief bouts of delight when the sun shines unabashedly at daybreak or the moon rises to meet the setting sun.

What if I were to try wrapping myself in that purpling scrub brush of which the poet speaks? Would it pull away the layers of longing that have gathered over these long lonely months? Those stratums that shift like marine layers in morning sky, the ones that hang heavy with moisture, like tears waiting to be wrung out of damp laundry … the laundry layer of lists and what ifs and could we, can we, and I wonder whens. Moist and sinewy, the questions leave stains upon my heart the shade of faded pink watercolors, their rims glistening like petrified dragonfly wings in sandy dirt.

The balm of humid air beckons me, a sensation that is silkier than purpling scrub brush but lays so distant I cannot reach it. And so I pause and breathe and rise. I follow the thread of cacti photographs and mountain goat hoof prints and wait to see where the blue mist will lead. 

I turn away from fall, because even though some would say it was the time of my birth, I know that I come from lingering summer days and ships that set sail at night’s falling edge. I do not transition well into the shorter days of autumn, and so I reach for what I do not know. I stretch my hand and heart toward the place my bare feet long to run … into the deep purpling scrub brush of my soul.

~~~

Happy 5th Birthday, BLUE!!! My dreamy novel turns 5 on September 10, 2020. Available in paperback, Kindle, and Audible. 

Blue: a novel is available at Amazon.com, BQBPublishing.com, or your favorite independent bookseller. Released September 10, 2015!! Or... contact me for a signed copy :) 

 "Transcends genres with its complexity of story and psychological suspense." Chanticleer Reviews