24/7, Divination 2

I am participating in Folded Word's writing month event, called "24/7," during August. Participants spend the first 24 days of the month writing short works, then spend the final week in revisions. The second part of this entry gives more details.

I'm not required to give a central theme to the entries, but I chose the theme "Divinations" and am using a pair of dice to generate prompts (values shown below). My prompt for August 2 is to write a divination-themed prose poem that uses earth.

In Scarabaeidae Sancti (99 words)

Back and forth the scarab roams, displacing dirt, recycling crops fallen to loam. Up from Egypt, down through time, rolling the soul toward rebirth, ashes to ashes, dust to stars. I tell you I have watched it climb through cool dark earth, kingdoms and wars, Osiris to Isis, recreating the starch of life. Nothing dies forever, it says, foretelling my fate. I need only wait, molting old skins, shedding my antiquity. At last I have seen what lies ahead, cushioned in a carapace of certainty. Tunneling through the urge to resist I rise, my own decomposition fading into mist.


Grapevine Beetle, Pelidnota punctata, Family Scarabaeidae (Scarab Beetles). Photo taken in April 2006.

Dice values:

Blue Die
1 (CE logo). Twitter poetry (140 characters or fewer)
2. Twitter fiction (140 characters or fewer)
3. short poetry (8 lines or fewer)
4. prose poems (under 100 words)
5. micro fiction (40-100 words)
6. flash fiction (101-500 words)

Purple Die
1 (CE logo). Birth
2. Water
3. Air
4. Earth
5. Fire
6. Death

My Random House College Dictionary, Revised Edition, defines "divination" as 1. the attempt to foretell future events or discover hidden knowledge by occult or supernatural means; 2. augury; prophecy; 3. perception by intuition; instinctive foresight. One meaning of "occult" is "hidden." That gives me a broad range of interpretation.

Elissa Malcohn's Deviations and Other Journeys

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Vol. 1, Deviations: Covenant (2nd Ed.)
Vol. 2, Deviations: Appetite
Vol. 3, Deviations: Destiny
Vol. 4, Deviations: Bloodlines
Free downloads at the Deviations website and on Smashwords.

Go to Manybooks.net to access Covenant, Appetite, Destiny, and Bloodlines in even more formats!

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