We’re excited to announce the Bookshelfie Awards — a new book award celebrating the best in independent publishing! We’re looking for books that take risks, break moulds, and showcase brilliant writing. Submissions open now! Winners to be announced late December.

This is a couple of days late. My firstborn graduated this weekend and there's been a lot going on for that! 🌟🎉 I'm catching up today. Here's my poem "Wrap" #PoemsAbout #NeverForget @brokenspinearts.bsky.social @alanparry83.bsky.social

I dream in the old language The one my father would sing in when he didn’t want us to know he had been crying from a world that liked to break him like cheap porcelain Swept up in sunshine mended at night only to be broken again the next day

my coat pocket contains a smaller version of Tuesday #poetry #haiku #micropoetry

In a town no bigger than a sigh, the #wraith of Margaret Gill rang the church bell at noon on Saturdays. No one asked why; they nodded while whittling their wood, accepting that some secrets belonged to the town, watching the shadows stretch into the afternoon like truths too long untold. #vss365

#vss365 In The Mist Of Life We Are A wraith stitched from fog and fret slips through the floorboards toothless, tongueless, it feeds on wallpaper stains, drinks light from the kettle’s hiss, wears my name like a borrowed book, then folds into the mirror, exhaling a moth-bitten sigh. #wraith

Yesterday, when I was thinking of you, I caught myself holding hands with your #wraith. #vss365

My mother would see them. A #wraith. A forewarning. Thinking of those soon to be left behind, she would whisper her news, and give a chance to say last words and speak of love. They took her from me for it. Now when I see the not yet dead, I turn my back and pretend they are simply shadows. #vss365

Wraith As I sit lonely on the shore A silk wyrmed veil descends A gentleness of turning mist And as it bends I see The faces of forgotten friends Smiling down Lovingly Untill the wind Across the sea Softly Stirs The ghost Of me #vss365

and the trees spoke their quiet into the boneyard beneath while the crows gathered dire and daring upon the heath and the wind threw its tenacious tail through the dour heart of the woeful wood certain its magnificent mischief would lead to some good #poetry ⬇️

Like a boat without a sail I sigh to no avail Lost in time & space I search for his face With teetering faith I fall a miserable #wraith In agony I know I’m a curse No kindness left to disperse My Romeos body forever asleep I have no time to weep #vss365 #pic MCNY org

Sunday is a gothic novel on the dry riverbed a haunted castle, for a water #wraith to roam among the sticks and storms of trespass that carved a scar of dust, pale as milk where the sun casts her runes in the space between leaves and my shadow is a nightdress made of silk #vss365

Doubt is so at home with uncertainty, it has its own duvet. But doubt isn’t the same as uncertainty, it’s a response to uncertainty. Read why it matters, and why doubt can help us as writers. #WritingCommunity #Writers #WritersLife

#vss365 #prompt #clarity Greetings wordsmiths! For the next two weeks I hope you find clarity in the words I offer. #Clarity – Clear understanding or sharpness in thought, vision, or truth I look forward to reading all of your lovely writing!

#vss365 #prompt #immunity (Origin, Latin – "exemption, protection") On #WorldFamilyDay, a shield—built by love, or from it. What no longer reaches you? What do you choose to keep out? Last prompt for this fortnight. Over to @katrevier.bsky.social#vss365#prompt#immunity#WorldFamilyDayom tomorrow Stay well, Adios.

#HIRAETH The Moon is too close for most to feel the effect; home hangs in the sky, its mass tugging on lunar soil and human hearts. But Mars gets queasy; the pale blue dot brings tears even to adventurous eyes. At Jupiter, cosmic hiraeth unbearable, from outer limits, we return. #vss365 134/365

Rory couldn’t remember the last time he had spent so long away from the game, but he had agreed to accompany Katie to this wedding. Still, the sense of #hiraeth for a place that didn’t, strictly, exist, burned within him. He longed to return to the game world, but he smiled and bore it. #vss365

Inbetween these city walls When it rains, petrichor Floods my senses Sky whispers In my mother tongue You be a mountain girl You be a gypsy Up in mountain top clouds Around pine you did play And my heart pangs beats Of memories— #hiraeth #vss365 #mytruestory 📸 mine

You returned from America a mermaid, with a tale made of mountains and a strange fascination with your feet the cold cut of liberty, tied and bound to the sirens that call on the streets and a #hiraeth that you swore could be found on the shore of a canyon selling hotdogs and sweets #vss365

#vss365 #prompt #hiraeth (Origin, Welsh – "a deep, unplaceable longing") A home you never had, but always missed. Where does your yearning live? 🌀 Theme 4: Release Also please join in me welcoming @katrevier.bsky.social#vss365#prompt#hiraeth our incoming host from May 16. Do follow her and enjoy her prompts.

#vss365 #prompt #eclipse (Origin, Greek – "abandonment, obscuring") Darkness doesn't always mean ending. What did the light leave behind? I hope we heal with good memories and not only sad ones of pain and loss. I dont see people healing, lets call this part of : Theme Remembering 🎗️

Societal acceptance Scars I bear Marks of disfigurement Deformity and flaws Judged by societal standards Never the beauty Never perfection Always trying to fit in Assimilation to norms Assimilation to society The wrong path The genuine path Is a lonely path #vss365 #poetry #poem #scar

We The People Will no longer Be fodder For your wars We refuse To till your fields And to bear Your branding scars Dear dictators And oligarchs We see you All the same While we reject Your dark rule We demand A future, sane And since there’re Many more of us Pay heed When we complain #vss365

This is Havisham. She has a deep, unsettling #scar that stretches back through all nine lives and ten thousand generations, back through tiger and sabre and primordial slime to the dawn of time, when creation was a desolate and empty bowl, that was still half full. #vss365

#vss365 #prompt #scar (Origin, Old Norse – "cut") Not all healing hides its evidence. What stories are written on your skin? Every healing is non linear, and some take longer, some never do.. We will start to💊 Heal from today.

The pallor of defeat Drains the weak To ghostlike presence Hail the iron stubborn The scarlet furious Vibrant under attack Bleed but never fade Under constant siege Painted in crimson Fall if you must But do so screaming Unceasing defiance #vss365 #pallor

& all i want, all i yearn for, is to get lost in my dreams somewhere in the echo of you, where i'm encompassed in all of your beautiful poetic tenderness, as my heart finds harmony, along with love, butterflies, & starlight. . #moonmystic ~ 'Somewhere In The Echo Of You' #poem

#writing #haiku #vss365 #micropoetry #俳句 #nexa Closed sign guards the door Where hope is measured out in drops Crawls towards the exit

From the #pallor of the man’s skin, his aversion to light and the angry hissing he made whenever anyone tried to get him to go out for a healthy walk, Rory deduced that he was, in fact, a vampire, and probably needed killing. His family probably wouldn’t like it, but there were few options. #vss365

Some old #poetry

The moon is sick and pale with grief her #pallor waxing and waning as the days go by, life lengthening as the world grows cold. Jealousy becomes her; she glows a pale green when thinking of the sun though she has swarms of attendant stars and the great glowing ball itself, none. #vss365

i walk empty streets.. under stars.. that rip-the-night.. out of a pallor-blackened sky.. and the moon greets me.. like an old friend.. who knows me.. and by name.. © 📸dww #vss365 #blueskyrelay #blueskyartshow #writesky #zen #writingcommunity #amwriting #landscapephotography #landscape #fullmoon

The #pallor of slugs at midnight a tiny crescent of life to echo the moon, raw and white as bone she crawls in waves, one foot to the rhythm of celestial tides in runes of silver light where time is caught, and only tears or oceans are made for salt. #vss365

#vss365 #prompt #pallor (Origin, Latin – "paleness") Life drains from moments too. What did your colorless truth reveal? Second Word from 🌀 Theme 3: Wounds For this sub theme, it is the last word; and we will start with 💊 Healing tomorrow

#vss365 #Prompt #Echolalia (Origin: Greek – "echoing speech") Not all repetition is chosen. What memory loops inside your language? The last word of the theme 🌀Emotion, after which we will dwell in 🌀 Memories from tomorrow.

∴ karma coils sunwise latchkin teases sedge-braid picks hares cough out cunning · fern-fletched, a crow shrugs leaflust clues sense moss-stitch clefts sly briars unlock ∴ #vss365 #haikufeels #PoemsAbout #Green @alanparry83.bsky.social @brokenspinearts.bsky.social #writingcommunity

A dragon became a fly or a fly became a dragon in the constitutional rites of #karma an eagle feather brushes the tip of a mountain once in a hundred years and we meet by the river, a plot twist of evolution and surface tension under the same sun we are one you and I little dragonfly #vss365

#vss365 #Prompt #karma (Origin, Sanskrit – "action, consequence") Every cause remembers its effect. What ripple started with your hand? This is the 2nd & only other Sanskrit word and second day of looking within 🌀Emotions Anish For Day 1 do leave feedbacks and brickbats @uropoet.bsky.social

In my eyes, bird wings stutter She perches low, eyes filled with tears Her feathers gleam with tiny fibers painstakingly placed Preening for what she lost She stretches her neck out to #nirvana As she flies with the weight, in her eyes, is me I get this crazy idea I can fly too #vss365

"I hope the rain stops soon," says a woman at the window as dozens of lives that won't touch mine rivulet down the ramp. Silverblacksilverwhite. I automatically like people that choose blue, that are offered neutral & say no, give me sky. "Mhm," I agree, tho water on glass is my #nirvana. #vss365

Querying teaches you something every great writer needs: how to believe in your story, even when no one else has said yes yet.

Fine hat, nice suit I’ve gotten fat— I really Oughta diet I thought #Nirvana Would afford Me times Of peace & quiet But helping Other slaves break free Calls and I can’t deny it And now I see My comfort Was the chains Made me compliant #vss365

#tired stars folded in #nirvana bloomed through her wings she became a rush not of air but of recall rising where all things begin #tankaThursday #vss365 #NaTankaMo #MayTanka #poetry

The hangar bay of this particular station was packed with ships of all kinds and variations. From little planetary skiffs, to large haulers. The place was that big. Dylan needed to find one, particular ship. One not recorded on the manifests. A ship called ‘The #Nirvana’. Somewhere here. #vss365

May burns in a flame that broke free still the fire but not the fire exquisite in its rambling reaches, like hands that want and need to grow the burning hunger of a bold #nirvana still the fire but not the fire as summer waits and watches taking her time, and cautious with the matches. #vss365

#Nirvana (Origin: Sanskrit – "liberation, extinguishing") On International Workers' Day, we begin with rest. A silence that holds more than sound. What does your version of peace feel like? 🌀 Theme: Emotion begins. #vss365 #Prompt #Nirvana

I love when writers remind me that “rules” can be broken. Two main character names starting with the same letter, one chapter told through 1st person POV after the entire book was in 3rd, ending a goddamn sentence with a preposition… If done well, anything is possible. #writingcommunity #booksky

#vss365 I've been Trying to pare down, Live life in a nutshell But each day brings Additional stuff. More doctors to see More mail to sort; It all feels like Superfluous fluff. Think I'll move to the mountains Walk in clear streams, Tell the world that I've had quite enough Additional stuff