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Mary Petralia
The Grove
Characters:
Someone in there: age irrelevant
A childlike painting: thirty-seven
Setting:
An orange grove near the Indian River, filled with sandy anthills, a large, worn down, wooden outbuilding that appears to resemble a potting shed or storage barn, random green hoses strewn down the orange tree aisles.
Time:
Yellow
As the lights come up, we see Someone in there upstage left, standing next to an obviously artificial orange tree. Someone's feet are carelessly tangled in a green garden hose meant to water the gnarled tree that struggles to shit out a good fruit or two. A childlike painting done in a guster of geometric pink, green, and orange pointelles with dark blue veins leans against the trunk of the tree. Someone in there looks to the west, allows the ants that have come to find sweet orange nectar to climb up their legs. Someone in there strokes the painting. A wide-brimmed hat brings no relief from the yellow. Time burns.
Mary Petralia holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Central Florida. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Bridge Eight, Shooter Literary Magazine, London Journal of Fiction, Kentucky Review, Tincture Journal, Eyedrum Periodically, Anamesa: An Interdisciplinary Journal and other publications. She lives on the east coast of Florida with her family where she teaches high school Language Arts.
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