A stolen prompt from Cheri

I just found out what all the PromptTuesday blogs were about. And found the prompt.

Yay for me.

Here's this week's prompt from Deb and Cheri:

Today’s PROMPTuesday keeps it simple.

Read this poem (one of [San Diego Momma's] favorites):

Disillusionment of Ten O’Clock
by Wallace Stevens

The houses are haunted
By white night-gowns.
None are green,
Or purple with green rings,
Or green with yellow rings,
Or yellow with blue rings.
None of them are strange,
With socks of lace
And beaded ceintures.
People are not going
To dream of baboons and periwinkles.
Only, here and there, an old sailor,
Drunk and asleep in his boots,
Catches Tigers
In red weather.

Meditate on it for a minute. Then write whatever comes to mind.

Here are PROMPTuesday’s rules:

* You must write your entry in 10 minutes. This encourages top-of-mind, primal thinking before the ego and judgmental brain kicks in. Just set a timer, make your kid count to 600 slowly, whatever. It’s an honor system. And I trust you.
* Keep to 250 words or less.
* Please have fun. Don’t put pressure on yourself. Together, let’s rediscover the simple joy in the writing process.
* Post your submission in the comments OR post in your blog and leave a link to your blog in the comments.

She closed her eyes and tried to imagine something pretty. Something happy. Anything. All she wanted was sleep. She wanted to spend an hour, maybe two, thinking about nothing. Clear her mind of all the bullshit. The fucking bullshit that had engulfed her, her entire life. She imagined herself lying in bed at home when she was six years old. Trying to please him. Keep him off of her. Anything to keep his mind off of what he always so desperately wanted. Touching her, gratifying himself. She always wished the tigers that were on her little red footsy pajamas would jump off the fabric and bite him. Rip his face to shreds, or even worse, rip apart the thing that he thought made him man. She would quietly slip away to her room, praying that he would not hear her and follow her in. But he always did. He would stomp down the hall, and the hair on her neck would stand straight. The shakes would start and she would begin the prayers for morning.

“No!” She screamed. She sat straight up in bed, the goosebumps taking over her body. She glanced at the clock. One in the morning. It had been two hours of sleep. Sleep that was always haunted by his eyes.