One of the things I love about Friday Fictioneers is the wonderful photos provided by Madison Woods that just jar the creativity. I can be in an editing/revising slump, see one of the pictures, and the story unfolds in my head. Love when that happens.
And, apparently, I’m a glutton for punishment. Starting this past Wednesday, writer Jennie Coughlin started a Rory’s Story Cube Challenge–a story a week for 108 weeks! You can read about it here. Then, read the story I wrote for the first challenge.
Be creative twice in the same week? Oy!
Here’s today’s Friday Fictioneers’ inspiration photo:
And here’s the 100-word story:
The Last Druid
We expected the trees to bow in grief when the bier passed. That the plants and flowers slumped was no shock, for on our shoulders we bore The Last Druid, and the growing things mourned.
We placed the bier in the clearing at the center of the ancient stone circle, and we said the old words in that unfamiliar tongue, the words she had taught us and gave us the charge to remember.
The time for words over, we put the bier on the boat, lit the fires, and shoved it into the lake.
And even the rocks wept.
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For more 100-word flash fiction from the Friday Fictioneers, go to Madison Woods’ blog. Have a read; leave a comment; join us.
unexpectedpaths.com 
A sweet story.
Thanks much.
Dear maggie,
Your story joins the flood of creativity that Madison’s picture has called from thin air. Another impressive rendering of a world vanished (only because we refuse to see). Love it.
Aloha,
Doug
Thanks, Doug! I blush with humility. 😉 That’s what’s been great about Madison’s Friday Fictioneers–it’s a safe place to stretch your fiction a little and try something you might not normally write.
Interesting take on the prompt. Mourning and grief manifested in the environs that surround the sufferers. Have experienced it before, under different circumstances of course. Very well written as well!
Thanks for sharing.
Parul
http://faitaccompli.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/layla/
Thanks for reading!
Lovely take on the prompt. Very evocative.
Here’s mine:
http://tollykitsjourney.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/flash-fiction-story-2-for-fridayfictioneers-flashfiction/
I really liked this piece – it struck just the right notes for the period of time it was reflecting, and after reading the line ‘And even the rocks wept’ I looked back at the picture again, and wow! You caught it.
Mine’s at:http://castelsarrasin.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/spellbound-friday-fictioneers-april-2012/
Thanks for the kind words.
How very sad, can just imagine the heaving shoulders of trees as bow in grief. That last line is so powerful, nice work.
You know., this story is really beautiful and beautifully told. The ancient ritual, all perfect – except for one little thing. “and shoved it into the lake.” The word “shoved” is wrong, it jars against the beauty of the bier. “Pushed” would be better, “guided” might be even better, but not shoved. You shove your classmates, not your beloved last druid…
Yours helpfully,
Laura
here is mine: http://fictionvictimtoo@blogspot.com
I see your point, but would you be “pushing” or “guiding” something that was on fire? Just sayin’.
In my Funeral by flame TV watching and film viewing, I would have to say, that the boat is guided into the water – that usually several folk wade in with it – then light it – and also, it takes awhile for it to become the raging inferno necessary to reduce the being to atoms and ash.
OH my god! I put in the stupid @ sign by mistake – and I did it everywhere! Yikes – so it was
I am really here!!
Please find me: http://fictionvictimtoo.blogspot.com
That’s what I get for doing this early in my English morning!
Laura Lindaura
I loved this story, and it was a great opening to my reading of today’s fictioneers. You kept the pace and style beautifully, but I have to agree with the previous comment – shoved leapt out at me as a careless and unnatural act in such a loving ritual. There are so many alternatives – “edged” or even just “sent” work for me (although you’d need to change into to onto for these options) but you may prefer others.
oops, link!
I’m over here: http://elmowrites.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/friday-fiction-maturity/
If I am not mistaken I’ve commented on this same story on a different blog, though I can’t for the life of me recollect the name of the blog. Have you posted the same story on another blog of yours?
In any case, nature is in tune and at grief with the passing of the last Druid. Strong use of powerful metaphors to bring out the grief. A fine post.
Here is mine: http://readinpleasure.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/fridayfictioneers-diamond-tear-drops/
two things –
1. i don’t really know entirely what was happening in your story. i don’t know what a bier is, but i also don’t need to know what it is.
2. it doesn’t matter because i could “feel” everything that the plants and rocks were feeling. there are several places where you could have saved at least 10 or more words, but the most important thing is that i know something devastating has happened, so much that even rocks are sad. nice going.
Loved your last line most of all, that even the rocks wept. That swept me with a powerful emotion. Always a sucker for druid stories!
Your story really conveys the grief of the land at the passing of the last druid. Happily, such traditions live on, as things stand today. If your story were to come to pass, it would be a sad day in any culture. Well done on a very effective story. 🙂 And thank you for reading mine:
http://andyfloodwritersblog.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/lowtown-hanami-haikyo/
I loved the line, “and the growing things mourned.” Very emotion. We feel that loss like we’re there. Nice job.
My attempt: http://unduecreativity.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/water-the-earth/
Really fantastic work, I absolutely loved the whole idea and the way the story was told. So sad, yet the druid will go into the earth and join his natural family.
http://garybaileywriting.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/fridayfictioneers-death-and-life/
Great.
The last line ‘even the rocks wept’ is very powerful: rocks are inert aren’t they? but they too are part of nature. A tree is living, a rock, it’s a rock. But they wept. Very nice. Also, in the dog days of summer on the east coast, when each breath is like drinking steeped tea, the rocks around here do indeed weep.
http://thebradleychronicles.wordpress.com/
The rocks do indeed weep when the humidity is killer–I live in Virginia.
Love the absolutely beautiful imagery of this.
Here’s my story: http://wp.me/p24aJS-3Z
I liked it : )
You made it extra awesome by having one of the bier-bearers as the central character of the story. It made it not only a poetic story, but an emotional one.
I wonder–will there be another to carry the torch of the druid? Or will the rocks weep unto eternity?
Here’s my much more humorous approach:
http://the-drabbler.com/splat/
Aw, a sad burial of the last druid! I didn’t understand that till the end, but I liked the personification of the plants around her mourning for her (probably well in character for the narrator).
http://littlewonder2.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/friday-fictioneers-bats/