Writing.
Short Stories for the Inner Child - 25th May 2025
At six o'clock on a bitter Sunday morning in April, a man cast his mind back to when he had been thirty and had penned countless poems and stories, for he had believed he possessed a great deal to say. Then he reflected that now, at fifty-eight, he could no longer see his stories through to their end, having come to believe he had nothing left to say.
In days gone by, after bringing out a story or a collection of verse, well-turned-out strangers who spoke without putting a foot wrong would invite him to give readings before audiences thick with women and thin on men, to frequent exclusive literary circles and rub shoulders with the most discerning minds of his generation.
With the dawn of technology, one by one, the literary circles fell by the wayside, as people took to staying put in their own homes, setting down their daily vicissitudes in the belief that they too carried great importance.
So, the man relinquished his writing—everyone had turned author—his tales of destitute families starved of affection, his verses about brazen women with far too much rouge upon their lips, seemed to him to ring true only in a world that had long since faded away.
At a quarter past eight on that raw April morning, the man broke his fast as he did every day: Assam tea with toasted bread, butter and berry preserve, and it struck him that being able to partake of such a breakfast each morning made him a wealthy man. He then watered the pink African violet on the windowsill that looked out upon the hills, and dressed in layers because spring was unpredictable. Then, he packed only the bare essentials into his rucksack, leaving behind all manner of superfluities, including his medicines and laptop computer, and left on foot. He set off towards the south of the country, where stretches of fine white sand met waters of emerald green that ran crystal clear. For many years, he had made up his mind that heading south put him more at ease, for he held out hope of chancing upon folk with gentle ways and hearty handshakes.
© Martin Heiland-Sperling 2025. All Rights Reserved.
There’s such quiet beauty in this — the way you capture that moment of reckoning between what once mattered and what still does. It reads like a meditation on aging, humility, and rediscovering meaning in simplicity.