‘So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.’
‘Yah de yah’ Esther shook her head as she turned the radio off.
‘Excuse me, young lady, I was listening to that’ her father shook his newspaper in her direction and scowled.
‘Really Dad? Since when did you listen to Poetry Corner?’
‘Now then Esther, Dad, let’s be having no arguments. Not today.’ Her mother’s voice, always the voice of reason.
A log shifted in the fireplace, sending a shower of red flakes onto the marble hearth. Spurts of flamelight glanced onto a photograph propped on a small table. It was a portrait of a young man in military uniform.
Her mother’s voice caught in a sob as she looked at the photograph and said softly:
‘He did his duty though didn’t he?’
Very late response to Ingrid’s prompt at d’Verse Poets to write 144 (or less) words of prose incorporating a line from William Blake’s poem ‘The Chimney Sweeper:’ : ‘So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm’
Writing Whatnots 
Oh, this is poignant! And I just love the imaginative way you presented the line. I think your conclusion echoes Blake’s sentiments in the poem.
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Thank you Ingrid – and thank you for the prompt 😊
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Oh my heart this is poignant. Especially moved by; “Spurts of flamelight glanced onto a photograph propped on a small table.”
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Thank you 😊
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