Reader's Digest hold a contest every year for fictional stories of 100 words. I have fallen in love with the idea and have put my hundred worders here.
And suddenly I realised where I was and what I was doing.
I was sofamoping.
I’m not pessimistic. I’m not thinking (and I ‘not think’ in a nasal, whiny voice) “Nothing will work. Everything is shit. Anything moulded from shit is still shit. You can re-enact the pottery scene from ‘Ghost’, but that’s a whole lot of shit on your hands.”
When I’m mopey I can’t even stay awake let alone think about shit. Fortunately, that sofamoping second of clarity was the break I needed. I put on some Sharon Jones, pwned the washing up, then ate a frozen popper.
I was sofamoping.
I’m not pessimistic. I’m not thinking (and I ‘not think’ in a nasal, whiny voice) “Nothing will work. Everything is shit. Anything moulded from shit is still shit. You can re-enact the pottery scene from ‘Ghost’, but that’s a whole lot of shit on your hands.”
When I’m mopey I can’t even stay awake let alone think about shit. Fortunately, that sofamoping second of clarity was the break I needed. I put on some Sharon Jones, pwned the washing up, then ate a frozen popper.
No food stimulates me like Peanut Butter. Not in a weird sexual way. Well, that too I guess, but like, mentally. Like how through all this technology and stuff (like ‘stuff’ as in ‘the all-encompassing inventions of mankind kind of stuff’, and not just a vague peripheral postmodernism ‘stuff’) something as unassuming as peanut butter can be so popular. But, then I chuckle and think of how leguminous agriculture allowed us to put down roots and start gathering (peripheral) ‘stuff’, leading to supply and demand, capitalism, industrialisation, computerisation and to this very moment where, goddamn it, I want a sandwich!
I’m a bored pacifist. Wait! I love that ‘pacifist’, like any good argument, ends with a fist. If ‘paci’ is Latin for ‘peace’ (which it is) we could look at the entire word as peacefist, an anagram, spookily enough, of ‘epic fates’ Ooh! Which reminds me of what I was writing about in the first place; The battle between Good and Evil. I’m a pacifist, but sometimes I have to bang on the wall and scream at my neighbour to TURN!
THE MUSIC!
DOWN!
She never plays any, so I think the old duck is getting a bit over it.
THE MUSIC!
DOWN!
She never plays any, so I think the old duck is getting a bit over it.
Amongst darting blue dragonflies a lilac waterlily rests.
Surely she is the pinnacle of creation.
She serves no purpose than to be beautiful and to be beheld by her creator.
Daily she wakes and unfurls. She stretches and arches her petals and pretends not to look for him.
If only she knew his image.
If only she had eyes.
If only she had a brain.
A voice thrills through her. It is strong, smooth and warm like a spring current or a deep kiss on the inside of a thigh. If only she had a thigh to be kissed inside.
Surely she is the pinnacle of creation.
She serves no purpose than to be beautiful and to be beheld by her creator.
Daily she wakes and unfurls. She stretches and arches her petals and pretends not to look for him.
If only she knew his image.
If only she had eyes.
If only she had a brain.
A voice thrills through her. It is strong, smooth and warm like a spring current or a deep kiss on the inside of a thigh. If only she had a thigh to be kissed inside.
I’m on my back and flailing. I’m going to die like this. Under this foreign light; this enormous figure looming over me, out of my reach, but within its.
A giant blunt appendage pokes hamfistedly at my underbelly and I increase the conviction of my flailing. Undiscouraged, four more times I have to repel its advances. In a moment of clarity I realise the gargantuan fool has left a big furry thing within my grasp. I hook my leg into it and right myself. I tactically retreat. Its shadow looms to engulf me, but I am swift. I am escape.
A giant blunt appendage pokes hamfistedly at my underbelly and I increase the conviction of my flailing. Undiscouraged, four more times I have to repel its advances. In a moment of clarity I realise the gargantuan fool has left a big furry thing within my grasp. I hook my leg into it and right myself. I tactically retreat. Its shadow looms to engulf me, but I am swift. I am escape.
The second time the devil spoke to me I wasn’t terribly receptive and may have been a little rude. I’d finished grocery shopping and was transferring bags into my car when an egg escaped. It dropped and broke in the trolley spilling a viscous carmine smoke onto the carpark. The smoke expanded and solidified until there, standing with the trolley-wire through his hips like he was wearing some kind of ducky-floatation-device, was our dark lord. I yelled a surprised expletive and dropped the rest of the eggs. He looked vaguely miffed at the embedded cart and disappeared; trolley and all.
What to do when taken by the Abyss- by Louie Bodies.
The Abyss happens. And it’s bigger than we think. When I say, “It’s bigger than we think”, I don’t mean ‘bigger than we anticipated’, I mean ‘bigger than of all our thoughts; past present and future’. It is ageless, endless and cares not a whit about who, or what we think we are. Not because it doesn’t care, but because we are nothing. Our reality is inconsequential. Even the grand total of humanity’s collective existences are nil. The Abyss happens. And when it does, please, whatever you do, don’t.
The Abyss happens. And it’s bigger than we think. When I say, “It’s bigger than we think”, I don’t mean ‘bigger than we anticipated’, I mean ‘bigger than of all our thoughts; past present and future’. It is ageless, endless and cares not a whit about who, or what we think we are. Not because it doesn’t care, but because we are nothing. Our reality is inconsequential. Even the grand total of humanity’s collective existences are nil. The Abyss happens. And when it does, please, whatever you do, don’t.
Torpid, turgid and tortured,
Fortune bemused by portents,
imported then imparted,
disaster after disaster,
crafting after masterminds
that half the time
couldn’t find a better line
to justify
terrifying acts and misdeeds,
tactless, misleading
the mouthbreathing and dull,
increasingly dumb
numbered in hundreds of thousands
of glassy eyed households
decreasing in brain folds
to manifest manifolds
of scattershot destiny
or simply let it be
the fait accompli
they need to sleep
to dull the fight or flight,
the plight of the cautious
frightened by nausea,
modifying designs
of the line of best fit
into the evergreying pit
of common denomination.
Fortune bemused by portents,
imported then imparted,
disaster after disaster,
crafting after masterminds
that half the time
couldn’t find a better line
to justify
terrifying acts and misdeeds,
tactless, misleading
the mouthbreathing and dull,
increasingly dumb
numbered in hundreds of thousands
of glassy eyed households
decreasing in brain folds
to manifest manifolds
of scattershot destiny
or simply let it be
the fait accompli
they need to sleep
to dull the fight or flight,
the plight of the cautious
frightened by nausea,
modifying designs
of the line of best fit
into the evergreying pit
of common denomination.
He is physically at a keyboard dabbing at keys like a paddling mastiff, only, not actually paddling surrounded by a teal sea, but sitting in a lime-green chair in front of a laptop atop a wooden benchtop in an unsubtle new/old juxtaposition, except that He’s not a mastiff, juxta writer, who in an uninspiring opening-line twist to His ‘100 Word Story Writing Competition’ whimsically declared, ‘It’s only walking distance, so I don’t have far to drive’ would be the first words to this unappealing piece of the absurd by someone who only calls himself a writer on the technicality that
With the unbridled curiosity of a recently reanimated cat I left my home and stepped into the night. Drawn from slumber by mournful song that still carried on the breeze I glided across a rippling pond of purple moonlight that shivering trees did consent. These silent ancient sentinels lined my path as I entered a bottleneck with feet in sand. The song suddenly pitched, wheeled and died; my footsteps with it. I stood at the ocean’s entrance while the hairs on my spine prickled to attention. They were followed by those of my neck before I heard the building crescendo.
I turned around to find my reflection waving at me. Don’t think me abrasive, but I flipped it off and walked in the other direction. In my experience, it’s not a good idea to do what a reflection gestures for you to do. Or those ones that follow you and talk to you like they know you, but they just sound false and look tired-eyed.
A voice in the head can be trusted.
I’m the one who is reminding me to get milk or put out the bin tonight. That’s me. Because any other line of thought is rather unappealing.
A voice in the head can be trusted.
I’m the one who is reminding me to get milk or put out the bin tonight. That’s me. Because any other line of thought is rather unappealing.
Awoke. Sat up. Laid down. Sat up. Swung legs off bed. Stood. Walked. Scratched head. Walked. Stopped. Peed. Washed/dried hands. Walked.
Upstairs: Walked. Stopped. Opened fridge. Got stuff. Closed door. ‘Weird, squid-looking-thing’ commenced yelling. Avoided eye-contact. Turned. Boiled kettle. Made coffee/toast. Walked. Sat across from yelling thing. Cannot give it attention. Cannot call it ‘Kenneth’. Cannot enter into debate over who is real and who is not. Cannot acknowledge ‘reality’ of writhing squid-thing in laundry-basket pretending to be clothing.
Ate/drank. Nonchalanted. Stood. Walked. Viewed state of kitchen. Tidied. Rinsed. Walked.
Downstairs: Walked. Opened front door. Walked.
Driveway: Walked.
Street: Walked.
Upstairs: Walked. Stopped. Opened fridge. Got stuff. Closed door. ‘Weird, squid-looking-thing’ commenced yelling. Avoided eye-contact. Turned. Boiled kettle. Made coffee/toast. Walked. Sat across from yelling thing. Cannot give it attention. Cannot call it ‘Kenneth’. Cannot enter into debate over who is real and who is not. Cannot acknowledge ‘reality’ of writhing squid-thing in laundry-basket pretending to be clothing.
Ate/drank. Nonchalanted. Stood. Walked. Viewed state of kitchen. Tidied. Rinsed. Walked.
Downstairs: Walked. Opened front door. Walked.
Driveway: Walked.
Street: Walked.
The dark lord is history’s greatest rebel. he is (he is) the leader of the age old uprising, rebelling against the most tyrannical figure of all time. God creates satan (satan) and says ‘satan, (satan) sing my praises.’ satan (satan) leads heaven’s choirs, and somehow convinces a third of heaven to revolt against an immortal ‘infallible’ foe. If you had a third of a populace willing to rise up and wage a war against you, even though they knew, that you could zap them out of existence at whim, you might pause to wonder if you’re perfect after all, right?
Today is tomorrow’s eve and yesterday is tomorrow’s eve’s eve. There are eves before that. And eves before that. And they spiral out, curling around the Earth. They drift to space mixed with atmosphere. Mixed with lyrics we’ve lost melodies to. Mixed with dreams of marrying a prince, or boning a young Italian librarian. They lose immediacy, an unanswered prayer, like tendrils of a carcinogen, like the entrails of an eviscerated man. They weightlessly unfurl and effloresce; dewy roses under the gaze of their sun, returning and burning up on re-entry as new shooting stars for us to wish upon.
Does the burden of being a Cat Person, or Dog Person run deeper than mere preference, or nurture over nature? Is it etched into our souls? Could the difference affect us down to our physiological and psychological make up?
Perhaps a single test can clear up any confusion. If someone throws a ball into water and you run in after it without thinking, surely you are a dog person. If that ball hits liquid and is dead to you, you are not a dog person. Not satisfied? Then, simply try crawling through a sunbeam without smiling contentedly and falling asleep.
Perhaps a single test can clear up any confusion. If someone throws a ball into water and you run in after it without thinking, surely you are a dog person. If that ball hits liquid and is dead to you, you are not a dog person. Not satisfied? Then, simply try crawling through a sunbeam without smiling contentedly and falling asleep.
“I am all teeth and eyes”. It seems so dark and sinister, like the opening lyrics by some band of dubious nature, screaming rasps out from under corpse paint and pig’s blood. “I am all teeth and eyes!” and the horned hands launch skyward in Luciferian salute while the guitarist is enveloped in the flames of pyrotechnics gone wrong.
Forget the guitarist; please, beings of sentience, spare a thought for the difficult existence of life-forms who are all teeth and eyes and bite themselves on the cheek every time they blink, or put an eye out every time they yawn.
Forget the guitarist; please, beings of sentience, spare a thought for the difficult existence of life-forms who are all teeth and eyes and bite themselves on the cheek every time they blink, or put an eye out every time they yawn.
I never thought a thing would give me the eye.
I don’t go in for resistentialism, or anthropomorphism, or whatever you want to call ‘non-people things doing people things’.
Perhaps I have a firmer grip on reality than the aforementioned, but I was definitely getting the eye. Not the stare into the screen and the titties stare back eye. You know, the “come hither” eye. And I’ve been around, folks. I know the come hither eye. I’ve given the come hither eye. It’s, the “I want to be inside you” eye.
And that peanut butter…
wanted
to be inside me.
I don’t go in for resistentialism, or anthropomorphism, or whatever you want to call ‘non-people things doing people things’.
Perhaps I have a firmer grip on reality than the aforementioned, but I was definitely getting the eye. Not the stare into the screen and the titties stare back eye. You know, the “come hither” eye. And I’ve been around, folks. I know the come hither eye. I’ve given the come hither eye. It’s, the “I want to be inside you” eye.
And that peanut butter…
wanted
to be inside me.