The prompt this time was the five word free write. (To learn more about this prompt, see the link here.) One of the words, hurricanes, reminded me of the memoir, Wave, by Sonali Deraniyagala. If you haven’t read this incredible, frightening, beautiful book about loss and survival, I recommend it.
That night, I had just learned that a dear friend and mentor, Pat Schneider was dying. I would wake the next morning to find out that she was gone. I still don’t have words for how this makes me feel, although I am forever grateful to have known Pat, and I am indebted to her for showing me that being a survivor of loss was part of my gift as a teacher. 
Anyway, the five words that night were:
Pigeons Figs Grey Hurricanes Waiting
What I wrote is below.
___________________
He wants to pitch a story to a queer magazine, something about begin gay and going grey. Or maybe he wants to write a villanelle, or a sexy, saucy, sonnet. He could even return to that old manuscript, to the scene in GG Park where the pigeons rise all at once, then circle and circle.
Instead, he finds himself writing (again) about being a survivor. That old, tired narrative he’s written 1000 times before. His inner critic sighs and his inner adolescent leaves the room: nobody wants to hear it.
And yet, the irony of it. He was supposed to be a statistic: dead from HIV, suicide, or something brutal, like a bashing. He certainly had a death wish as a teenager. He wanted to die with his sick mother, because that way he wouldn’t have to endure life without her. Like that scene in Sybil, when they are lowering her grandmother’s casket into the ground, and the little girl—beside herself with the loss of that one tender love—wants to jump in after it. That’s how he felt too. I can’t possibly live without you, he thought, so better to die with you.
But it turns out, he wasn’t really morbid. He chose life. He grew older. He kissed dogs, marveled at yellow swallowtails, spoke to house finches, coaxed flowers to bloom. And now he finds he’s in good company.
The survivors just keep coming. Those who have endured pain and humiliation, fear, great, great loss. What a beautiful, unusual family they are: all ages and genders and backgrounds. He’s still surprised by their stories, by all that they’ve survived: the surgeries, the sexual predators, the bullies and the batterers. They’ve become good parents, or published writers, they’ve rescued abused dogs or sat with people who are dying. The irony doesn’t escape him, though: he never thought he’d live to see this surprisingly wonderful group of people he now belongs to.
The Catalyst 