This is a piece I wrote at my writers' group. The exercise was to take a member of your family and place them in a room of the house you grew up in, and then simply describe them. This is what I came up with:
Her legs are folded double beneath her, perched on the stool, the six inch bench. Her hands lie on her thighs, her palms upturned. There is a dull breeze that rattles through the window and disturbs her silence. Her lips move, but she is silent.
"Mum?" I ask from the door. "Mum?" No response. No reaction. She is still. Brown, squirrel, goldfinch, a lamb, etched on wood. She stares; ikonostatic, iconoclastic, Ikon of Assissi. Frozen and alone - but not alone. There are words on her lips, foreign words, alien words. Are they even words? Sounds and assonance and clattering consonants that she shares with only Him- a tongue that is barely heard; muttered or spoken. She will not look and I shouldn't break the silence. I turn, leave and know that I must not question this, as I haven't my whole life.
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