This is a free flow exercise I did recently during a writing retreat. The facilitator led us through a relaxation exercise followed by visualization.  The concept was to keep writing, keep the pen moving until time was up. This is the piece that resulted:

“Come sit on the bed, love,” she says.

I move closer, my bare feet on the carpet not making a sound. My pyjamas, a soft cotton, keeping the summer night’s cool air from making me shiver. The window open to the sound of crickets, a train whistles in the dark distance, the full moon brilliant in the ink sky. I sit on the bed.

She lifts my hair in her hands and begins to brush, the white bristles smoothing out my long blonde hair. She finds a tangle; her strokes slow, her attention gentle and light until the knot gives way, the strokes rhythmic once more.

I missed my grandma. She was closer to me than my mother, their home more comforting than my own. I would count the days until the weekend, until I could once again climb my trees, play in my garage, eat warm apple pie and get tucked into bed, the pink lava lamp globing and sinking, breaking and floating, its motion a lullaby, my grandmother’s words, ‘I love you,’ embracing me each night as I drifted off to sleep.

In gratitude,

Marissa xo