The Power of Imagery

A couple of writing exercises.

The tree sat with its branches tenderly reaching for the breeze. Rob saw its branches, illuminated in the sunlight, speckled with flowery-smelling blossoms. A bud would drop every once in awhile, and the white petals would circle slowly and gently till they lighted like butterflies on the grass. Rob could hear the hum of bees in the meadow, and twittering birds perching in the leafy branches shading his head. It was here that he had first kissed Hannah. He had pressed his lips against hers, for the first time finding out that kisses are wet. He had felt her black hair slide silkily through his fingers, heard her breathing, felt the tree’s smooth bark behind him and her heart beat through her denim jacket. That was years ago.

Rob looked the ring on his left hand gleaming in the afternoon sunlight. He rubbed its polished metal surface and sighed, his eyes closing slowly. She would be coming home when the sun went down.

*          *          *

The tree, like a gray stone pillar, sat holding its bony branches slack, creaking like a coffin lid as the bitter wind made it sway like a hangman. What little bark that was left on the stony trunk was brittle and encrusted with lichen. Rob leaned against it, clutching his coat tightly to his body as the cold swirled around him. He could smell the rotting wood, hear the crows in the tree’s hollow cawing mournfully. He grasped the trunk as dead leaves swarmed past the tree in a gust. It was as smooth as bone, and tiny parasites had burrowed through the wood in jagged patterns. It was here that Rob had received the fateful phone call. The call that had changed the honeymoon plans to funeral arrangements.

            Rob’s eyes watered, whether from the wind or his aching heart he did not know or care. He let them stream as he pulled out the photograph. There was Hannah, beautiful and gone; her black hair entwining her head like a veil. In a moment of madness the wind snatched the photo from his fingers, and an updraft carried the photo away into the swirling gray sky.