Two Pieces
Windy Lynn Harris THIGHS THAT STRETCH DENIM TO ITS LIMIT They erected the tall iron wall around my city as I ate rationed rice. We were separated then. Men over there, away from us. A war or not a war. A disease maybe. Inside, we have turned on each other. No slumber parties or games of canasta. Women are animals of instinct. Predators. In my dream, I scale an Evergreen and I can see the ocean. I am sick of rice in my teeth. I hunger for the men who hefted those rationed bags up my steps. Sweat and muscle. Delicious and dangerous. Thighs that stretch denim to its limit. WELCOME BACK I stood at the trail's narrow opening, eager to prove I was healthy enough to revisit the place where it had all gone wrong. I scanned the rough incline ahead. Tall saguaros beckoned me with their outstretched arms. Sunshine warmed my shoulders. My left side had healed for good, but I felt a twinge down my leg anyway. “I’m unbreakable,” I told mountain. “You’ll see.” A giant hawk circled above me in the Arizona sky. I stepped slowly at first, kicking up dust, and with it, the scent of dried sage. |
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About the Author: Windy Lynn Harris’s short stories and essays have been published in The Literary Review, Crack The Spine, and The Sunlight Press, and many other journals. She has received fellowships from The Maribar Colony and The Dorland Mountain Arts Colony. She has also received two Professional Development Grants from the Arizona Commission on the Arts which are funded by the state of Arizona and The National Endowment on the Arts. She is working on her first novel, a much longer version of “Thighs That Stretch Denim To Its Limit.” Find her here.