StarlightShadowdust

Oh, shit, they're staring.  I flashed an apologetic smile and awkwardly hefted my giant suitcase into the seat by the window.  My smaller, hunter-green suitcase I tucked underneath the table, resting my legs against it.  My laptop bag sat in my lap, squished between my stomach and the edge of the plastic table – I have to get a new one of these.  The three young adults – around my age, maybe younger, if I had to hazard a guess – turned back and continued talking amongst themselves. I thought people here were supposed to be really nice.  But they'd just watched me clamber onto the train, tripping over myself and self-consciousl

Am Devi Am descending. Am the impossible, indispensible Instrument at forefront, At brink of stability.  Am the champion of the Forgotten, am the avenger to the Lost.  Am fragmenting.  Am writhing in death.  Am Upright, withstanding Typhoon of ichor & crystal & silent wheezes or proud Smiles or roaring rustles of regret.  Am Plummeting.  Was bone & sinew, winding taut.  Am Filament & flesh, Stretching smile to greet the end, pleading absolution to the Ones left across the expanse, sprawled & Struggling, wondering who will safeguard them now, in the face of Entropy.  Was no one.  Was the one. Am battling a motionless corpse, s

The streets are paved glass and blood.  On the slick surface I tread – there a skyscraper, and there, a ship, and there, a soul. They reach with outstretched hands – save us.   But the cry is muted, ghosts across my slick shell.  I can do nothing, because the stars are raining, and I am pouring up, dodging bullets of blood and bone and cloudburst. Cloaked in whispers, my body continues its roam.   Blessed fire and burning flesh, and the stars are raining,                     spiraling,                                spinning, swaying.   They pepper the glass and gore, but they cannot cover the gazes.

Outnumbered, You Don't Dare Make A Stand Everyone has a musical ancestry.  Some have The Beatles, others The Rolling Stones.  Queen, Michael Jackson, KISS, Simon and Garfunkel, The Who, Elton John, Billy Joel, Duran Duran, Bruce Springsteen.  Something our parents listened to, the lifeblood of our music today.  Maybe it's an artist or a band we love, but squirrel it away as a guilty pleasure, or display it for everyone to see.  While I was raised on many of those classic names, one in particular sticks with me: Bob Seger.  "Well," said one of my high school teachers, decked out in a checkered bowtie and slacks peppered with sailboats, "of c

I've Told You Nine Times, The Ring is Nice, but I'm Not Ready for a Commitment You blew it.  The hours I spent on the couch with you, shifting as my sides cramped.  Sprawled out on the floor, trying over and over again to make it work.  Dragging my eyes across each word, contemplating those verdant green hills you're so fond of. Two hours later the book lies abandoned on the floor. A confident statement: I'm not a fan.  Ensuing stares and accusations.  Well why not?  I just don't care for the prose, is – Are you blind?  No, I just don't want to read about a mountain for five pages.  It's called worldbuilding.  No, there's anoth

Larger Than Life, But Still Human Beowulf, the assignment sheet said.  I nearly threw down my anthology and did a dance on the spot.  When a friend of mine asked why I was so excited about reading Beowulf, I nearly choked on my soda.  I even (in typical modern modes of alerting everyone to how I feel) had a Facebook status about the assignment: "Danni I forgot how much I enjoyed reading Beowulf. I realize this makes me a nerd of nerds (I also read Shakespeare for fun), but I really don't care. Beowulf was a badass." I have always been a nerd.  I grew up with Star Trek: The Next Generation, I taught myself how to read, I devour books at an

First a pack of C4, then a golden ring sake from a jug that could make a monk sing. Then the fur of a cheagle and some omnigel. Don't forget pineapple or your it'll give your stomach hell! That flux capacitor and materia need a dash of FK otherwise the sonic screwdriver will begin to decay. Boiled in water and fire from an Adept, spoken only in the Speech will this spell accept. Written only by a stele can these words be read, mixed only in a lightning storm when most are abed. And from final frontiers to decades past, any character of your choice – real at last.

           I stood among the rain and lights, unwilling and unable to look away from the scene in front of me.   I drew my coat around me, trying in vain to shield myself from the downpour; the numbness had already crept into my bones, and it wasn't from the water.  The gurney rattled along the sidewalk, and I tried desperately to look away from the body in it.  My eyes roved wildly over everything and anything before I finally focused on the figure 5 in gold on a red firetruck that had arrived with the ambulance.  Of course, that did nothing b

"I am indeed amazed when I consider how weak my mind is how prone to error." ~ Descartes As Hektor rode the subway on his way to work, he found himself sitting on an airplane going somewhere unknown.  A pretty stewardess was making her way down the aisle, and Hektor flagged her down.            "How can I help you?"            "Where am I?"  Hektor was still reeling, trying to figure out how exactly he'd gotten from a subway to a plane.  Did he black out?  Oh god, was he crazy?            The stewardess tilted her head to one side and blinked.  Hektor noticed the dark circles under her eyes.  "You're on flight N-287, Mister Peterson.