Sail On, Oh Paperboat!

JOSE GERVIC LABE, JR.

The salty breeze whipped at Lloyd's face as he stood on the edge of the windswept pier, his gaze was fixed on the endless horizon. Ten years had passed since he'd last seen the sun-drenched shores of his homeland, ten years since the laughter of his family had filled his ears. Now, he was a solitary figure in a bustling foreign city, his heart heavy with a loneliness that mirrored the vastness of the ocean before him.

Tonight, the ache in his chest was particularly sharp. The city lights twinkled like distant fireflies, offering no solace to his yearning soul. He felt adrift, a paper boat tossed upon the waves of uncertainty.

As the moon, a silver coin tossed into the inky sky, cast its ethereal glow, Lloyd felt an urge to bridge the distance. He rummaged through his meager belongings, finding a crumpled sheet of paper and a stub of a pencil. Words tumbled out, inky tears of longing staining the page. He wrote of the city's cold embrace, the metallic tang of loneliness, the ache in his chest that mirrored the ocean's unending roar.

But he also wrote of his dreams, his aspirations, the secrets he had long held close to his heart. He poured his soul onto the paper, a message in a bottle cast not into the waves, but onto the winds of hope.

Folding the letter into a tiny square, he fashioned a boat from a discarded newspaper. It was a fragile vessel, its fate as uncertain as his own. With a whispered prayer, he placed the letter inside, its weight was a tangible representation of his yearning.

He knelt at the edge of the pier, the wind whipping his hair, and sent his paper boat sailing into the vast unknown. He watched, his breath ragged, as the tiny vessel danced on the waves, a speck of defiance against the immensity of the ocean.

Would it reach his village, nestled amidst the emerald embrace of the rice paddies? Would his words, carried by the wind and the current, find their way into his family's waiting hands?

Doubt gnawed at him, but hope, like a stubborn weed, refused to be uprooted. He closed his eyes, picturing his family gathered around the fire, the flickering flames illuminating the worn pages of his letter. He imagined their smiles, their tears, their hearts swelling with the knowledge that he, though far away, was never truly gone.

As dawn painted the sky in hues of rose and gold, the paper boat had vanished, swallowed by the horizon. But in Lloyd's heart, a flicker of warmth remained, a proof to the enduring power of hope, a promise that even the vastness of the ocean couldn't sever the ties of love and longing.

He turned away from the sea, his steps lighter, his heart a vessel carrying the echo of a whispered prayer, a silent plea for his message to reach its distant shore. The city might have been his home now, but the emerald fields of his village would always be his compass, guiding him through the storms and leading him, one day, back to where his heart truly belonged.

ORIGINAL PIECE: Poetry

Sail on, Oh paperboat!

[E]
This is how I missed my family out there.
by In the manGer(vic), He sleeps

WORD COUNT: 529 Words
WRITTEN FOR: "The Writer's Cramp"

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Winner and New Prompt, due Jan 25-2024"

PROMPT:

Go to your port - to the Trophy Room (you'll find that under the tab community), and find the oldest award (ribbon or plaque), that was awarded for your poem or story. The date under the ribbon or plaque is what counts - for example: my first ribbon is from March 2005.

Find the poem or story. Read it.

Now rewrite it - if your awarded item was a poem - you now write a story, and if your awarded item was a story you now write a poem.

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