I sat staring deep into the flames, listening to voices stirring the wind around me. Soft footfalls pressed through the grass stalks, rustling gently. Though I couldn't see them, I knew they were ... [+]
Susan writes essays, poetry and works for children, including her latest picture book, "Piper and Purpa Forever!" She still rarely wears raspberry. "The Alchemy of Time and Presents Past" is in Short Circuit #10, Short Édition's quarterly review.
Everyone receives gifts they neither need nor want—bath salts for people who only shower, a frilly nightgown wrapped up for someone who sleeps in sweatpants, that 27th tie . . . Sometimes we return them; sometimes we pass them on (a practice so common the word regifting was invented); and sometimes we toss them in the back of a closet. That's what I did years ago when my mother gave me a screamingly bright fuchsia shirt for Christmas. The hanging tag dubbed the eye-popping shade raspberry, but no bush ever grew a fruit that color. My mother wrapped the present in a gold box that had once cont