Alliteration Challenge

I do like the dictionary. Considering this, my vocabulary is not very extensive and I seem to have lost words since I've had kids. When my kids and I are sitting at the table at mealtime, and one of them asks me what a word means, I can usually use it in a sentence and I understand it's meaning but can't give them a definition. I reach for the dictionary, conveniently situated on a bookshelf beside the table, and announce, "it's dictionary time!" My daughter now asks, "what time is it mommy?" to which I usually respond with the actual time. She laughs and tells me that it's dictionary time!


Over the years, I have had fun with words by making up poems/stories of alliteration for cards, usually for my husband. A couple of great kids books we've read that use alliteration are "Bashful Bob and Doleful Dorinda" and "Rude Ramsay and the Roaring Radishes" by Margaret Atwood.

Here is my first story using alliteration, inspired by the pages that opened in the dictionary for me this morning (p.708 & 709, The Oxford Paperback Dictionary)

The Search and Salvage

Sarah, from the Salvation Army, wearing her Sam Browne belt, set off on a quest to secure a supply of samphire to savour in salads. She avoided the salvia, with its spikes of red flowers, which made her feel faint. She had run out of sal volatile, which she kept as a salve, for saving her from these spells.

The sandstone cliffs were daunting but Sarah, with her usual sang-froid, approached them in sandals. She had marvelled at the sandpipers scampering amongst the waves as she steered her sampan onto the sandy surface of the beach. Satisfied after a lunch of sandwiches and sangria, she proceeded to scale the sandstone wall that spread before her.

As she scrambled up the hill, sanguine about her quest, she stumbled upon a saluki. After raising a paw in salutation, the saluki supervised Sarah in sussing out the samphire she so desired. With samson-like strength, Sarah and the saluki, whose name was Sam, scrambled up the scarp and scree. In the last rays of sunlight, they saw it. A staggeringly salubrious sampling of samphire. Stupefied by its scent, Sarah opened an empty sandbag, and started securing a stockpile of the coveted plant.

She smiled at Sam and signaled her departure with a song of solidarity. The saluki joined in and their symmetry of sound stretched across the sea.

by Sonya ; )
©2011 Sonya Wilson, all rights reserved