(From the Katya Chronicles)
Pulled from the drowning pool
with poetic style and prose.
They waited for me
until I was ready
Until I found the courage to leave
Not look back.
They were my writers’ group.
Alice paid cash for one of my art photos; she loved cats, too.
‘Ilima, found the lawyer
I will never forget their gentle guidance, support
I am here today because they loved me.
Family was one thing.
Our son, my Brother-in-law, the list was long
My writing retreat friends are another.
Alice was a gentle soul
She was best at finding the misfit in a room. She found me.
We almost lost her when she was hit by a careless driver on the way to the Kailua Post Office. Months later, we finally met again to write. I remember we all wore masks that day. Her immune system was still suppressed. We loved her. It was December 2011.
The opening line, “pulled from the drowning pool,” didn’t fit. Pulled was too gentle a word. It was more like yanked, dragged, and pushed, as in finally, out the front door. It required group effort.
…
Anthony had once claimed she could pull poems out of the air, out of her ass even,
Sometimes she could, but that didn’t happen that often anymore.
Gina worked on those lines all day. They sounded more like a prayer than a poem. Her writers’ group met once a week. She needed to have something ready. It wasn’t supposed to work like that. They were supposed to work from a prompt. Have ten minutes for the initial free write and then an hour to revise it. Gina wasn’t that confident; she needed the week to come up with something legible. Something worth sharing in a group. Photography came easily. Writing came and went. Writing lately appeared like a bald eagle; it only showed up when it was time to feed the young. Novice writers had it made. Gina wished she could go back to those early days, but it was too late for that.
Friends were everything to Gina.
They were her rock to cling to when Anthony and Gina butted heads. Anthony always won. Gina had an ugly souvenir from their latest trip to Europe.
She hid upstairs when Dennis came to visit.
It would be another week before anyone would see her. The black eye had turned green; it was healing. She didn’t see too many people anyway. She’d push it back into the dark recesses of her memory. She’d work on forgetting the ugly, focus on the good. So, she could share that in her writing. Boring, cheerful poems that masked the revolting truth. The horror show that was her daily life. Sometimes, Gina wished she could go back in time to 1974. Start over, flip Anthony the bird, send him packing right from the start.
…
Katya watched through the scope in the Time machine and sat back; Gina clearly needed help. Tiki, a carved wooden Polynesian Fishing Master, could drive, but mentally he was a misfit. Katya needed a sharp legal mind to figure out her next move. Gina was regressing, and there was nothing she could do but sit back and watch.
Katya was so mad; she could carve a fish into Tiki’s heart. And Katya was good. Tiki wouldn’t feel a thing.
Cornelia DeDona 11/27/25
Corney Press 