Unheard Words, Radical Thoughts - Part 5

I had been really busy for last few days, so couldn't post on the blog. But I was finding sometime daily, mostly while traveling from office to home, to write the story for the day on the words received on our Readers' Club's WhatsApp group.

For the three words covered in this post, I tried to use an alternative literary device in one of the stories. I am not sure what impact it creates, but I felt it right to do so.

Mavourneen

noun [muh-voo r-neen, -vawr-, -vohr-]

darling; dear

Tale: Hero/Villain

"My beloved! My mavourneen! I hope this letter still carries my fragrance when you hold it in your hands. It has been months since I went away. I had no choice. And I know my dear, I promised you that I will write to you every Sunday. But I never did. Never could. There was nothing bright to say. Things were gloomy and there was so much desperation around. After months, today the sun shines bright and there is no sound of bullets. Today it looks like the war is ending. When I left Dublin, I had never hurt anyone. But now I am being hailed as a warrior. I murdered thirty soldiers with my bayonet and killed many more with my rifle. They are going to reward me on my return. But to tell you the truth, my dear, I am not proud of this. I can smell the rotting corpses in my dreams. I hear children wailing too. As much as I try, muffling my ears, the wails don't stop. I love you and it is your thoughts that have kept me sane. Hope to see you soon."

She read this letter hundredth time. She could feel his warmth and smell his manliness in it. Her tears had dried up, but the letter was damp with sweat from her palms and tears of all the past occasions when she read it. He never came back. His decorated coffin returned though. The second world war had not only taken his life, but also hers.

Deleterious

adjective [del-i-teer-ee-uh s]

harmful; injurious

Tale: Vacuum

Their marriage was on the rocks. They hadn't talked to each other for days. Smiles had vanished from their home and both their kids were growing grumpy. It was difficult to understand what went wrong. They both loved each other deeply and had well paying jobs. They were a successful couple in every conceivable way. One day he came home, shot his wife, strangulated his kids and then jumped off his 50th floor apartment. The deleterious effects of living a purpose less life had taken its toll on his mental health. For months, now he was always bothered about the vacuousness of his life, his friend informed the police.

Potboiler

noun [pot-boi-ler]

a mediocre work of literature or art produced merely for financial gain

Tale: Life of Crime

He was considered as the most intellectual filmmaker in the noir genre. His crime thrillers were dark and morbid. Lapped up by the audiences, he was the toast of the town. Some of his critics mentioned that his films are so perverse that if he wasn't a director, he would have made a perfect criminal. They didn't know how close they were to truth. He was a pickpocket in childhood. After spending some years in a juvenile home, he came out a hardened criminal. He started drug trafficking and pimping. But then he came across a melancholic, beautiful small time actress. They both fell in love. That transformed him as a person. He studied film-making and nothing stopped him after that. His life reads like a potboiler. Isn't it?