Complicated Stories

Prose from SHS.

Photo by S O C I A L . C U T on Unsplash, edited by Slaidey Valheim.

I used to think the complications it took
to explain a person
made them special;
made them a better story
than everything everyone else was reading.

I was a storyteller.
I thought I knew best.

When it was easier
not to explain anything about him
barely tell them who he was;
tell them only that we were together

I should have known
it wasn’t a love story —
no matter the prose or stretches of imagination.

I guess
I’m not a very good writer after all.
I didn’t fool anyone but myself.

Thanks for reading! If you like my style of prose, please make sure you follow the Bits & Bones publication, where I’ll be dropping short speculative non-fiction Mondays and Wednesdays!

This excerpt is one of many that I’ll be posting to Medium from the collection Strangling Heartstrings (a memoir in prose).

If you’d like to get your hands on a copy (featuring more stories exclusive to the ebook) you can get it on Amazon or download it from my Patreon (Skull+ tier, along with many other creative goodies).