This week, for your reading pleasure, I present two pieces from students in The Loft Literary Center’s class, We Like Short-Shorts!
The first short is the moving 99-word “English Class” by Jennifer Howe Salzwedel and the second is the clever 280-word “Scrabble en français” by Suzan Grovender.
English Class
Fistfuls of words spray the ground. Like coins thrown, the sounds spin clumsily trying to evade her eager ear.
Comprehensible? Not yet.
Of all her eyes have taken in, this class is the most foreign. Computers, schedules, tests … no allotted prayer time …
She will wait. Waiting she can do. Has seen more than exacting Americans will know.
Settling … her grayed eyes unfocus, her tall brown fingertips and solid wrists rest.
She will sit erect, motionless — outlasting the gunshot report, the spattering blood of her first sons.
With time she can return to spinning words, to Americans who know no gravity.
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Scrabble en français
C’est ma première fois. Donc j’ai mal à la tête.
Wow, what a lot of work playing Scrabble in another language. I asked my husband to play with me. He’s been speaking French a lot longer than I have, although at this point I have studied it more.
Blow by blow:
I draw an “a,” so I play first.
My first word is alor (misspelled) for 12 points. He takes advantage of my bad spelling by playing sa and gets the points for my word and his for eight points.
I slam him back with so (12 points) and he volleys a return of ange for 10 points.
I sneak up with extending his word out making it rangé for six points. He extends that word to make it orange + nô for nine points more.
I’m on top of that right away by adding an “s” to his word and spelling out six for a total of 20 points. He immediately takes advantage of the “x” and plays xi for 12 points.
I come back with aube. He jumps at playing his “j” for je.
I play zen. He plays tête.
I play bête, He plays tome.
I construct sic. He returns with bacs.
Feu for me. Paté for him.
Il for me. Vite for him.
We take a break, reeling from our efforts. I have my Larousse 2010 “Poche de Dictionnaire.” He has the “Larousse French-English.”
If these were guns they would be smoking and reloaded. After leading for a while, I now have 117 points and he has 130. We are about half-way through the game.
Will our marriage survive the stress if we finish the game?
Try your hand at writing a compelling story of 100 words or less and send us your entry. (Story titles are not included in the word count.)
Submission deadline: April 4, 2012.
First, second and third place winners will be announced April 11, 2012. Once again, the prize will be a surprise short-short something.
Contest guidelines: Only Minnesota writers can submit. Only one short-short by an individual will be accepted. Your short-short must be under 100 words. Please put your last name and short-short contest in the subject line of the email. Include your name, address, telephone number, email address, word count and a brief biography (up to 150 words). Send your entry — in the body of the email, or as an attachment — to mbarrett [at] minnpost [dot] com. The file must be saved in Word.
Marge Barrett has published prose and poetry in numerous print and online journals and in The Best of the Web 2009 and The State We’re In. Her chapbook of poetry, My Memoir Dress, was published in 2011. She received an MFA from the University of Minnesota, creative work awards from St. Catherine University and grants to writing programs in Prague and St. Petersburg. Currently she teaches various writing workshops and at The Loft Literary Center.
