My first short story collection is based upon Australian aboriginal mythology.  Therefore, my blogs are a smattering of aboriginal culture and short story craft elements.

Today Aboriginal people and scientists work together to record knowledge passed down for thousands and thousands of years.  One aspect of this work involves the medicinal qualities of plants. Paintings by aboriginal artists (Mick Namerari Tjapaltjarri) record such medicine tales and the search for cures.  One painting by Louisa Napaljarri Lawson, an acrylic on bark, honors the “Medicine Vine Dreaming.”

The medicine vine, Tinospora smilacina, consists of a woody stem that curls around tree branches.  It has cream colored flowers and a  green fruit that turns red upon ripening. The heated leaves draw out infection from lesions, are used to cure headaches (poultices) and sore throats when chewed. If pounded into pulp and shaped, the vine offers a sticky bandage for open sores.

Prompt for today:

Write a flash fiction or a prose poem about an imaginary plant that can cure an imaginary disease.

Send the piece to me on this blog site as a comment and I will post the best one in the next blog.