A sound. Is that wind? Is that a whisper?
It’s an hour after midnight and Cal heard a distant whistle. It was an ominous and yet a comforting news of retrieval operations for tonight. And it will be his first night as the lead of the pack.
There is a news of a lone fisherman who went missing five hours ago, after deciding that he wanted to take the chance of grabbing a big catch in the middle of the moonless night filled with stars. Another hour came and the high-pitched sound echoed.
“The golden retrievers of the seas are whistling!” They have found him!” Cal exclaimed.
He called his pack of Aspins, commanded them to carry the lights, as he carry his newest torch light, a bit bigger from his cadet years, fitting his mouth perfectly. As the lone lighthouse beams, Cal and the Aspins made their way to the shore. #
(story stayed on shelf as of this point, I do need to enhance more cohesive writing for children’s books).
Poetics:
28 June 2026
It’s still humid on this side of the concrete jungle and my mind wanders with the memories of Mama’s hometown, brought about by an instagram reel of a golden retriever holding a night light. Away from the talks of creative writing and doing some artsy, my mind wanders on crafting Cal’s adventure in a parallel universe: this golden retriever is a foreigner deployed as a light keeper in the heart of “The Heart of the Seas”.
This was a result such activity from BeachReads book club, an intermission from the serious book discussion of Glenn Diaz’s Yñiga. In his novel, one of the central characters aside from Y and the general antagonist is her cat named Jestoni. Well, the activity is supposed to be a craft or a work of art that best describes your safe haven. Since I am never good in arts and crafts, I turned to writing. After grabbing the hard paper from the stack and pasting the bookmark at the front, I wrote a children’s story at the back.
Together with the recent inspiration of a golden retriever having his adventure, I wrote one of my day deliriums of retirement, being a self-sustaining spinster in my mother’s hometown, Verde Island.
