Tag: grief

Heart Play with a Pause

Suzanne Biro

A Note: The story in this post is accepted for publication in SmokeLong Quarterly and will appear in March 2026. As part of the publication agreement, I’ve granted SmokeLong Quarterly First World Electronic Rights to How to Mourn Your Mother, (hereafter referred to as The Story) for the period of six months starting with the publication of The Story in SmokeLong Quarterly, during which time The Story may not appear elsewhere.

I explained in my cover letter to SmokeLong that I had posted earlier drafts and a recording of me reading this story and I offered to remove it for the time when SmokeLong will publish it. They accepted the story with these conditions which is very generous and progressive of them. And, as I have had accepted stories declined for posting them in draft form on this blog before, I’m removing much of this post’s content earlier, (the draft writing and thinking exercise, and the video of me reading it at a public reading) for the next year or so. I’ll repost again in September 2026.

Once published, I’ll link the published story and accompanying audio in this post and here.

The following is a portion of the original blog post from July 2025.

Performed another public reading, this one at Blizzmax Gallery, heart leaping in my mouth.

I sifted through older works to find a piece suitable for the occasion. The event showcases short stories that may be read in under 5 minutes, equating to around 600 to 750 words. And, because the last time I read I selected a work that was dark, I wanted to read something lighter and funnier this time round.

Laughing.

Turns out, I haven’t written “funny” in some time1. Choosing is not so easy…many of my flash stories are sorrow containers…they await my attention to weave light into them. What do I mean by this? I mean humour or beautiful imagery or sensory details…components that gift a reader better pay off for their time and energy sharing my dark.

Also, I seem to have a lot of pieces that are very …how do I say this….poetically artsy…less story, less fun(ny), syntactically gymnastical…intellectual babies whining to be picked up after a failed roly-poly2. And for stories read out loud, some of my writings tax the listener’s ear and mind3.

So, I chose this 747-word creative nonfiction flash, written in 2023, and wanted to report here, for the sake of interest and transparency, how many publication rejections it has collected so far. I discovered I never sent it out! It was entered in a small contest and made it to a shortlist where it garnered positive feedback from two editors I hold in high regard4. The version below incorporates their feedback.

I practiced reading this story to friends the other day and could feel the tug of certain sections that don’t quite “fit”. So, it’s a good piece to practice my heart work. What is heart work? It’s focusing to feel and know the deeper emotions in the piece, then render them with words. Somehow.

I’m hopeful winding my wayward musings in this post might be soothing in the same way Bob Ross’s leisurely guides through painting technique can be. Or, perhaps this doesn’t transfer to the written medium, I’m not sure…I’m resisting the (very strong) urge to hit the delete button here. This exercise (practice) of writing around a story draft helps me see and understand it best. Even when I print out a hard copy and make notations in the margins, cross out lines and rewrite sentences, the revision doesn’t attain the necessary level of attention required for me to write through reflections and become aware of the deeper workings in the story. So…if you’re interested to read through this writing/thinking (writhing? ha ha) process keep going…otherwise quittez ici5.

  1. Well…I did write a very short piece (for friends, for a laugh) about the door in the my kitchen separating my apartment from the bedroom of the young guy who rents the apartment adjacent. The door is dubbed the Sex Door. It’s pretty active; I quell jealousies. The piece I wrote is called Door Play and I think it actually wins the world record for Fastest Literary Magazine Rejection Ever at under 2 hours!!! Wait, I’m wrong. I considered reading this at the public reading…but I really don’t think I can read the word coming (and emulate the necessary vocals), at least in that context (smirk). Is it spelled come or cum (?): a funny read I didn’t write. ↩︎
  2. Just so we’re clear: this is me, not you. And the long project is a counterpoint, it’s all story and basically puts the ass in class, chokes on the word literary and throws up a right mess, but with a few poetic lines ha ha ha. But, I like it. ↩︎
  3. I know, I know (!)…I’ll curb these tendencies. I’m trying to improve sound toward song. And I’m getting better at knowing I’m enough without the window dressing. Sort of. ↩︎
  4. I completely forgot this. ↩︎
  5. Wait, are you leaving? ↩︎
My mum, Camilla–my nickname for her, and the name my kids call her, is Nuddy (a little riff on Nutty I think…I’ve called her this since elementary school). All four of us (siblings) adopted different nicknames for mum: Mills, Cam, and Pong. This pic cracks us all up. Even Nuddy.

Like Miss Stress

Suzanne Biro

Up and down. Up and down.

I think the best sound in the whole wide world is laughter. I was going to narrow down to toddler laughter which bubbles up and out of little people bodies as the best of champagnes, but really, it’s any laughter expressing unreserved joy.   

I’ve been crying a lot.  I used to worry that if I ever started crying, I wouldn’t be able to stop. If I opened the sluice gate, an ocean of tears might wash me away. So, I didn’t cry. At least, not often and never deeply. But now I do. Grief feels soggy. Heavy. The way a body feels waterlogged after a full day of lake swimming, skin sponging the tang of seaweed, fish scales. I’ve felt, at times, as I move through these days, that I’m sunk beneath a wobbly surface. Laughter pulls me up splashing. Up and down; the way life moves.

Grief, like creativity, is a process. Six months post leaving my marriage I’m …still processing. But the grief—which doesn’t erupt a monstrous geyser in the way I feared, instead[1], it’s discreet weepings I indulge then pack up and away, get on with the day—has illuminated my writings.  Allowing myself to cry has also allowed myself to see and understand some of the reasons I’ve resisted revising my own pieces…I wasn’t ready to see the pain I (unknowingly) layered there. By pain I guess I mean sorrow…regret…shame. Seeing it now feels…embarrassing. It’s so obvious. Like, decades of obvious.

Crying improved my (re)vision; laughter, goddammit, is gonna help me process embarrassment. Kind of feels like answering the front door in the nude. Would I do this? Maybe. It’s important to push my creative practice from its pillowed comfort towards the perilous shadows. The only way I’ll learn and grow.

A recent Saturday afternoon found me staring down the barrel of a good cry. I was going to write too…I seem to be able to do both these things at the same time, a curious dexterity that won’t earn me any trophies.  A friend texted she was running a creativity workshop, something to do with comedy. Few people showed up, would I join her?  I read the text through watery shimmers and worked to compose a polite decline. But my hands refused to send the message. My fingers deleted my crafted decline three times before I twigged I wasn’t entering the right response. So, I typed I’d put a game face on and be there.

The workshop included drama and improv games, the kind of theatrical exercises that involve the whole body and breath work and screaming out your chosen name[2]. The kind of exercises that, had the bartender offered to give me a public enema instead, I would have enthusiastically accepted[3]. I will say that I traded an afternoon of crying for laughter (and embarrassment) and I had a lot of fun. Unfortunately, some of this was caught on camera, which I leave here for your enjoyment with the caveat that I look much better when I let my hair down and sport moonbeams. I even ended the afternoon singing a karaoke song[4]. Invitations: can’t fault an old broad for sounding boundaries[5][6].

It started as a low laugh, skipped stones tingling my throat, expanding rings with every exhalation, a laughter that brought the rain clouds down, had me surfing the troughs to the crests[7].

Keen eyes will note I am the ONLY one laughing in this most bizarre of situations. For context: the woman with the tambourine is performing interpretive dance while the woman on stage sings a parody of Snow White’s (in Snow White’s voice) feelings of oppression from society just because she leads a polyamorous life living with seven very short men. The workshop was in the Royal Tavern, one of Ontario’s oldest bars, dating back to before Confederation, once owned, for a short time, by Canada’s first Prime Minister, John A. Macdonald, a man purported to drink from a water glass filled with spirits when he stood to speak in Parliament. Having stood on the stage, I kinda get his methods.

[1] Ok. Not entirely true. I did experience some epic wailing sessions. Interestingly, the worst of them brought on by reading a most beautiful passage in the novel Foster, written by Claire Keegan, where the little girl protagonist gazes across a field topped with dozens of flitting white butterflies. The scene hauled up an image of my own (no longer) vegetable garden, the golden light of late August lighting up the cabbage moths like confetti, hovering the flower blossoms, circling the globes of fire red tomatoes. The grief took me then, a clenched fist to the stomach that had me gasping for breath and buckled my body. I mourn losing the garden.

[2] Aloura. I have no idea why that one popped from my mouth. Desperation I assume.

[3] Probably exactly what you need Biro, such a tight ass.

[4] Yes, of course this was after two IPAs, the only way to really get the pickle out of Miss Stress’s bum. I sang Journey’s song, Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin’, which I must assure you retains only surface significance with its glancing reference to crying. This was the first time I sang karaoke…I hit a few flat notes in the first phrases (dreadful, but the show must go on) and managed to warm up and belt out the sense of revenge the song requires to really hit it home.  I dislike the too many na-na-na-na-nas at the end and left the stage long before those were completed.  People had more patience in the 70s.

[5] Come on Super Man, put those old phone booths to use; Kérd a számomat.

[6] This is a sure-to-make-you-laugh piece, Who The Hell Was Mr. Saxobeat Anyway?, written by Josh Baines.

[7] I’ve returned to working on my longer form project, pulling out old sections of writings, collaging them together, stitching in some humour and even exploring my dark. Feels good to be moving again. Recent epiphany: I’m actually living the life I’ve always dreamed of …like, right now. So, resolve to stop crying and get on with shit. Embrace joy.