A fine wish

Saying farewell to Visual Verse

A Fine Wish
By Sarah Farley

She waits for her son to collect her. Late as always, but what is lateness but just another moment in life.

Earlier, at the house, she’d overheard him whispering with his wife. Cloistered and clipped, it was a conversation she was not meant to catch.

But she’d caught it anyway, despite the safety of the kitchen door. And now their infectious words were spreading. Spreading from her ears. Taking seed in her mind. Trickling through her body. And she knew that not a single corner of her would be spared.

The day will soon be as dark as her reflection, and she wishes that her son would hurry. Would return to pick her up before the rain dips down to refill the cracks in the pavement.

And yet. Maybe this time he won’t come back for her. And that could be a fine wish, too.

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This is a piece I wrote for Visual Verse: An Anthology of Art and Words, in response to an image by Omid Armin. It appeared in Volume 07, Chapter 4 – please follow this link to see the published piece alongside the image.¹

Starting in 2013, Visual Verse fostered collaboration by publishing one image on the first of every month and inviting writers to respond by writing 50–500 words in just one hour. Other than some simple guidelines, there were no restrictions on the form or subject of the writing.

Over 10 years, this has resulted in thousands of incredible pieces of writing, covering poetry, prose, short fiction and non-fiction, and spanning topics that range from the personal to the political.

I’m incredibly honoured to have had 5 pieces published since I started submitting to Visual Verse in 2017. So I write this post with sadness, as I’ve just written a response to the image prompt for their final edition of the journal and submitted it in the hope I might be honoured one last time. Although I have no expectations!

Please do take a look at the Visual Verse site, read about the people who began it and explore the archive. Then if you have one hour spare, write a response to the final image and submit it. The deadline to submit is 15 October 2023. Not only is it a wonderful challenge to have the constraints of both time and word count, you might have a chance to be part of a collaborative anthology that’s truly wonderful and will continue to live on in their archive.

1. I haven’t posted the image on this note as I don’t want to inadvertently breach copyright. You can see the image, together with my published piece, on the Visual Verse site at the link I’ve included above.