Black Rabbit Hall

by Eve Chase

When Momma leaves, our family huddle disperses, like when you take the magnet away from iron filings.

you realize life is not linear at all but circular, that dying is as hard as being born, that it all returns to the point you think you’d left long, long ago. Like the hands of a clock.”

too often it’s only children and old people who speak the truth. You just have to slow down and listen.

Momma’s pleasure in spring was one of the pleasures of spring. I wonder then if all children just love the things that make their mothers happy. If that’s what it comes down to, really.

because it’s depressing to linger on rabbits and the way each of us is no longer who we were in the process of becoming when Momma was alive.

It’s actually quite useful to have an enemy to laugh at, I realize. Everything will be okay as long as the enemy is someone else.

“Amber, remember that strength of character is forged through hardship, not fun. If we aspire to duty and hard work, then if we are lucky, and only if we are lucky, happiness may come.”

“Pleasure is a by-product, not a bloody right,

you do miss places that make you rewrite your own map, if only slightly, places that take a bit of you away, give you something of their spirit in return.