"Bonfire" Prompt Stories

Each month, as part of the “Find Your Voice in Writing” class, the writers are asked to compose a 100-word paragraph based on a prompt. This month, the chosen prompt is BONFIRE. Each of these delightful paragraphs is very different and creative; they are tiny stories all on their own. It is always surprising, the many ways a prompt can be interpreted. We hope you enjoy them!

The BONFIRE Stories

The people gather in the middle of the field to watch the girls dance in front of the haphazard pile of blazing logs. Chanting and shouting in a methodical manner, they attempt to pump up the eleven young warriors before they have to enter the battlefield tomorrow. To help them in the upcoming battle, and bewitch their opponents, the girls throw homemade effigies of the warriors’ adversaries into the raging flames. The crowd erupts in cheers and ear-splitting battle-cries, demanding a conquest at any cost. This is just another ritual to ensure a victory at Friday night’s football game.

Katie Yusuf

Light flickers across the faces of six campers. Some sit on rocks, others crouch by the stone fire pit. Each girl holds a long marshmallow-tipped stick.

“I want mine golden brown.”

“Blackened on the edges, crispy, a gooey center.”

Many comments rise into the night.

Only Briana silently stares as the blaze dances, her marshmallow-ready stick across her knees. Soon tears seep down her cheeks.

Sadie moves close, drapes her arm snuggly around her friend, and whispers, “ I’m here for you.”

Briana sighs, her head resting on Sadie’s shoulder. “It’s just at the last bonfire, Mom was still alive.”

Wendy Lamson Collier

"Screw you, chunk!" We scream and kick at a thick log in the campfire pit.

We've done everything, but this damn log will not go out. "Okay Todd. I got this," I mumble, pissing all over the log. That doesn't work, because when we kick it, the troublesome timber still glows red.

We empty our beer bottles, then our precious water, until finally thick white smoke dissipates from the stubborn wood knot. We had to make sure we didn't start a forest fire, so of course I lost Rochambeau and got stuck touching the soggy log.

John Mistur

Putting on my shoes, I walk to the high tide line for driftwood. I structure the fire and light it with a single match, as Grandad taught me. The tiny yellow flame licks the salty wood and the updraft breathes life into it, fanning it red to blue. Brilliant sparks of light break free, flickering and glittering as they form constellations in the sky. My night vision is ruined, and I am enclosed in a half dome of light. This isn't a cozy little fire to gather around for warmth. This is a bonfire, bright and boisterous, for pure joy.

Laura Nicol

I thought, given the name Bonfire, the horse would be majestic, flashy, and spirited. Our first meeting was a shock. The trim paint mare quietly walked out of her stall on a loose lead rope and gently ate oats from her owner's hand before entering. This is Bonfire? I thought.

A gorgeous Morgan entered the ring next, with a trainer, and immediately, Bonfire began charging the Morgan, rearing and baring her teeth. “Bonnie’s a people horse,” the owner explained. “If you take the job, you’ll be safe if you keep her from other horses.”

I declined the position, not assuaged by the sweet barn name Bonnie.

Diane Baumgart

Bonfires of the Banned

Ashes

of paper

floating, twist

fiery in the breeze.

Embers

spark blazes,

threatening trees

vital to forge new pages.

Lost

are life stories

deemed “different”, “unconventional,”

extinguished by the few.

Debate

discussion,

muted and unheard,

lessons never learned.

Prose

which so emblazoned

our collective imagination …

fuel bonfires of the banned.

Kathy McKnight

It’s magic. A luau bonfire on the beach in Hawaii. Drums beat rhythmically. Dancers’ hands and hips tell stories with expression and beauty. The pig in the pit is lifted out and offered up as a delicious sacrifice to the crowd. Hawaiian pineapple satisfies the sweet tooth. Taro root Poi, a traditional staple.

Sparks fly and color changes as the fire burns hotter and more intensely for a while longer. With the passage of a few more hours this will diminish, the early morning high tide slowly creeping back over the beach to extinguish whatever lingering embers remain.

Evelyn Panfili

Bonfire of the Vanities

A knock at the beam-bolted door turns into an insistent fist pounding, shaking the wooden frame. “Thud, Thud, Thud.”

Sandro races around his studio. Tossing canvases behind dusty bookshelves and others under his four-poster bed. His shaking hands briefly hesitate on his “The Birth of Venus.”

The goddess stands on a shell modestly covering her naked frame. He knows the Dominican priests, followers of Giroloama Savonarola, will place the painting atop their bonfire. Savonarola desires nothing less than all vanities be burned today, February 7, 1498 in Florence.

Sandro Botticelli carefully wraps the masterpiece in a blanket and places it gently under the wooden bed.

Michelle Pahl