Fall Writing Frenzy 2022

The 4th year of the Fall Writing Frenzy is up and running! From today through October 3rd, kidlit writers can submit their 200-words-or-fewer pieces inspired by one of fourteen photo prompts given by the contest creators, agent Kaitlyn Sanchez and author Lydia Lukidis. 

(To see the rules and all the gorgeous prompt images, check them out here.)  ​

About this poem: I grew up in southern USA, where twilight is sometimes called "dark thirty." It's a magical time of day, with the sun glowing below the  horizon, bats squeaking overhead, and fireflies dancing all around. When I saw this photo, I immediately thought of dark thirty and all the magic that exists for a kid during the twilight of their childhood.  I hope it comes through at least a little bit in this piece.
​
​Thank you for reading! Let me know what you think in the comments.

​DARK THIRTY
​by
​Carrie Karnes-Fannin
​

When the light
becomes a trick of your imagination,
and time
 
      stops
 
on the knife edge
separating day
and night,
it is

dark thirty.
 
And as the frost moon rises,
this moment of possibility and magic
is your doorway.
 
Your jumbled thoughts make you pause…
 
Alice with her time-challenged rabbit, Lucy climbing into a dusty wardrobe, or Dorothy
in her ill-gotten heels--
 
they could tell you about doors.
​About portals.
 
How the one who goes through
 
        is not
 
the one who returns.
 
As you shiver
in your hand-me-down jacket
and smooth your ordinary hair,
 
you think
becoming someone else
wouldn’t be
bad.
 
So…
 
you
stretch,
grasp, search
for the way through.
 
But the knife edge dulls,
and clouds swallow the moon.
The light is lost,
 
and dark thirty
is merely
 
dark.
 
But now,
old stories blaze for you
in a new way.
 
Little Red loves the damp
mystery of the ancient black woods.
 
Rapunzel knows
her way down from the tower.
 
Wendy doesn’t mind growing up.
She just wants adventure.
 
And you…
 
you don’t need moonlight,
magic, or even
a door.
 
You only need
to reach.

(186 words)

Image credit: Daniele Colucci for Unsplash // Image description: A narrow street or alley, paved with stone and lined with attached houses. It appears to be twilight with a few clouds in the sky. There is a single red-orange light attached to the outside of one of houses in the mid-ground, on the right hand side of the street.