CCC 1-21-26

***

Susan walked down this street many times, looked into the shop windows, talked with familiar shoppers, and today just got a weird feeling. The always bustling alley was empty. The shop window showed no one inside. She looked around, turned and looked again. She was alone. A chill took over her chest, her hands started to shake. Suddenly she couldn’t breathe well. Susan needed help, but there’s no one…

Susan collapsed onto the stone walk. A shop owner rushes to her but it’s seeming too late, she’s gasping for breath. Why did this happen he wonders. She looks perfectly healthy as always. He gets out his cell and dials 911. Susan was brought back to the real world by the paramedics. She sat on the gurney ready for the ambulance and wondered where she was. The crowd that surrounded her looked unfamiliar, as did her rescuer. What had happened? The street looked crowded now. She started to say something but lost her breath again. The paramedics revived her again, and once more before the hospital. What is happening to me, she wondered, now afraid to even think of it.

***

Crimson’s Creative Challenge #070

MLMM Wordle

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I said please surprise me, but you know how much I love that outfit with the blue front. The flower pattern of rosebud twins is quite appropriate for the day, don’t you think? Of course the choice is yours, that’s fine, but I prefer our announcement to be subtle. Do you think only the twin rose buds intertwined would work, since they already know we are pregnant? She just smiled and said okay.

***

MLMM Monday Wordle #460

Tanka Tuesday

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Offering an ode to red vines

A candy I find that’s sublime

Chewy strings are mostly red

A sweet treat that may have been said

To be a soothing temperance

Frustration gone chewing dance.

Now others may see this sweet treat

Too much a threat for children’s teeth

But they may be temper prone

The chewability is known

For solace in that circumstance

Performing a tantrum stance

***

**The form, 8,8,7,8,8,7, follows “To an Intra-mural Rat” poem pattern.

#TankaTuesday Poetry Challenge No. 48, Marianne Moore, 12/30/2025

Fandango’s Story Starter

***

When he didn’t reply, I immediately thought, “They’ve got him and now they’re coming for me.” His cell rang about ten times and I gave up. Our sister, Maria and grandmother Rosita, were staying home, sheltered and safe, I hoped. Jose, my brother in law, had to go to work, and did so, every day. I knew it was only a matter of time before he was yanked out of his car, or workplace, because it was happening to all of our Hispanic relatives and friends. Even children were grabbed out of school. This must be a bad dream, a nightmare. It can’t be real. Please let me wake up to the freedom I had a year ago.

***

Fandango’s Story Starter #231

Simply Six Minutes

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“So, Joe, I heard you and Harry went over to the “Hot Tub Club”.”

“Yeah, so what?”

“Well, what was it like? See any girls over there?”

Harry laughed. “Nope, just a bunch of us old fat guys.”

“I heard it’s a good place for cruisin’.”

“Joe, how many years since you cruised anywhere!”

“We’ll just a thought Harry. I miss my wife. It’s been five years since she jumped off that cliff with all of her friends. She’s the only one that the leopard seals got.” Joe turned away from Harry as an unbid tear fell.

***

Jim’s Simply 6 Minutes

dVerse Poets


Whether you live in a place where there is lots of snow or where there is never snow, whether you love it or hate it, I would like you to write about snow as you see, feel or imagine it, in any form you wish, using clear imagery as crisp as fresh-fallen snow.

***

loving snow

soft wet flakes landing

scooping flakes

—-

no rude gesture here

sticking out the small hot tongue

savoring soft ice

welcoming wintery gift

wrapping in a snow angel

***

Poetics: New Year Snow

SYW 1-19-26

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Here are this week’s questions:

1. Would you like to have your own private jet? Who wouldn’t? I would visit my son in Albania!


2. Would you like a chauffeur to drive you everywhere? Oh yes!


3. Would you like to live on your own desert island? Nope. Give me a cabin in the woods in the mountains.


4. Have you ever had anything made to measure (suit, dress, shoes etc) Yes. My mother made a lot of clothes even as a teen.

Gratitude: I am extremely thankful that after many hours even days on the phone trying to get some thing corrected, that my daughter came over today and to fix it for me. She has a magic touch.


https://pensitivity101.wordpress.com/2026/01/19/share-your-world-19th-january/

JuJoJan 20 – Unspoken

***

I blushed as he finished reading

I had no idea his words were leading

My heart to admire him

Unspoken thoughts on the brim

Of my lips but not revealed

Thinking his words could heal

My broken heart, empty now

Shown in his wrinkled brow

Concern for me, maybe a start

A try to fill my empty heart.

***

Daily Prompt – JusJoJan the 20th, 2026