I speak out loud to no one. I recite poems like recipes, whispering into corners and shouting down the stairwell. I call out to the day bed you napped on, scream questions in the kitchen we made Christmas dinner when I burned the potatoes. Waiting for any answer from the #memory of you. #vss365

Days had become #monotonous, the same calls, meetings, charts and graphs. Hattie dreamed of the #boho life she’d left behind, bonfires and guitars, chasing the sun out of the ocean at dawn. Settling down wasn’t growth; she’d reached her true #apogee in that past life and mourned its loss. #vss365

Even dark arts have #illicit acts for a reason. Harper had long mastered soul jumping, trading bodies like worn coats. Drawn to a brooding man on the subway, she judged him a worthy #successor and jumped. But he had no soul. Utterly trapped, she screamed forever where no one could hear. #vss365

The hag is offering a way out. “One of these items is #bewitched and will curse you with a lifetime of pain. I’ll let you live if you choose now.” I ignore the toothbrush and razor and use the comb. Nothing. She sighs. “One remains cursed… I’ll let your family live if you choose again.” #vss365

The only #consolation of not being chosen for heaven or hell was you could choose who to haunt. It took Omar a long time to decide. His boss? His ex? He could torment anyone! In the end he chose to be a ghost for good, nudging his nephew through life, helping his sister where he could. #vss365

Sometimes driven by avarice, sometimes pure hate, I hear the monster’s voice inside me rehearsing a #soliloquy of ruin. I won’t answer back, won’t let it know I can hear its plans until it’s too late. I can’t silence it and I can’t ignore it, but I can trick it. It does not define me. #vss365

It holds up one clawed finger, #magenta with its own blood, and pokes at the wound in my leg. I scream, but the pain settles. More blood and the wound heals. Every nightmare I’ve ever had comes true here and this beast that has chased me on countless nights… is it now trying to help me? #vss365

Scratch. That spot on your hand, right under your thumb joint, is getting bigger, the itch just an #augury of the pain to come. It grows inside you. Down your hand and up your arm. Your nails are not sharp enough. You scratch and never feel relief, until one day it bursts and you leave. #vss365

I’m inside your brain, not a thought or a feeling, but a voice, like an itch you can’t reach to scratch. You’re not pretty enough to be here. These people are too #chic for you. Leave. Hide. Run. Your fingers twitch and your neck aches and you’ll do what I say. You always do. #vss365

We ignore them behind us, our #vespertine shadows, pretend not to hear their whispers, plotting to overthrow the light. They disappear in darkness, but still we hear them under the bed, where all shadows sleep. By morning, they forget, like goldfish, and follow us again wherever we go. #vss365

“We take the noble, the #chivalrous, the kindhearted and we break them down, make them feel sadness, loneliness, anger.” The new class of hell demons chuckled amongst themselves. “But we don’t take pleasure in it ourselves,”the trainer continued. “After all, this is hell for us, as well.” #vss365

I am in the deep, where even the darkness is afraid. I exist in the #aphotic levels of your consciousness, stirring the creatures that rise to become your nightmares. You’ll never see me, but you’ll see my work. And you ain’t seen nothing yet. #vss365

“Being #suave isn’t teachable,” Cam said backstage. “You’re either born with it or you’re not.” The girls swooned, all except Jules who put a finger in her throat and gagged. I smiled and rolled my eyes. Later, during curtain call, she squeezed my hand. I can still feel it to this day. #vss365

Memories swirl together, drifting in and out to the beat of the machine next to the bed. Young love lost, found, bonfires, cheap guitars, promises meant to #last. Colicky kids, the cabin, the Grand Canyon. Grandkids, hands held, fireplace nights. And then only the beep of the machine. #vss365

Signs of aging: It #matters less and less that you try to bring everything from the car into the house in one trip. #vss365

Callum wasn’t in great shape, more oblong where he should be round, and stretched too thin around the edges. Overall #health was good, but his personal trainer was worried about the sharper angles forming around his shoulders, trapezius muscles becoming trapezoids. Too much stress. #vss365

I know it’s not our #Thanksgiving, but I’ll share that today I am grateful for the promotions folder/filter in my email.

My shadow’s been curious lately. Peeking around the edges of my frame, shivering in the light, #learning what life is like beyond where it’s meant to be. I’m encouraging, stepping to the side slowly, crouching, giving it space to grow, just like I would with a child, if I could have one. #vss365

Renata’s #reflection was missing again. She looked everywhere: the toaster, the kitchen tap, her phone, turned off. “Where did you last see it?” Pat asked. Renata thought. The powder room at the auto body repair shop! Sure enough, there she was. With sad smiles, they both said “sorry”. #vss365

A bit of a life update on the One Word Blog this morning. Looking forward to daily prompt writing and reading resuming tomorrow. leezanello.com/still/

Last week was vacation. “I’ll get back into my routines for sure when I get home,” I said. “Morning #vss365 writing to get the day started right!” It lasted one day. Now the #reality of life has settled back in, and here I am at 3:00 pm wolfing down a cracker and barely getting a write done.

At some point I need to stop and ask myself, is the #goal I’m trying to reach only the goal because of the work I’ve already put in trying to reach it? #vss365

Turns out, the #issue was never whether we had enough time, but whether we noticed it passing. Only now do I realize how quietly those hours gathered, becoming the kind of memories we don’t recognize as precious until they are gone. #vss365

Heading home today after a week in paradise, though you wouldn’t know it by my photo reel: 10 pictures total. Days lounging, reading, phone locked away, letting my brain #transport me to creative places I haven’t been for a while. First vs. last morning on the patio. It’s been a good week. #vss365

Opinion dressed up as #science, crowned as fact. We see it in our feeds where those too stupid to know they’re stupid like and share with certainty, cheap, loud and hollow, proudly torching the very evidence that could save them. We used to value knowledge; now, the stupid have taken over. #vss365

Lose. My. #Number. She spits out every syllable. We’ve chosen third period lunch for maximum viewership and the crowd oohs. Later, near the old lockers, we hug in private. “She’ll say yes,” she reassures me. “So will Ben,” I reply. We aren’t great together, but we make a good team. #vss365

After 100 years, the details get forgotten, the story shortened; only the end, the moral, the theme is remembered by most. The hero passes into #myth and, while it still holds true that the journey is more important than the destination, it’s the latter that inspires new journeys to begin. #vss365

Nan rocked by the window, tea cooling in her hands. His laughter still in the walls, neighbours spoke of his kindness, tried to #measure it in deeds and days, but she knew better, knew that kindness moved through being, not space and, once set in motion, was infinite, just like their love. #vss365

The greatest works in all #literature have been, more likely than not, binned in an estate sale or lost to a fire. Notebooks and hard drives full of manuscripts missing one common ingredient: the grit and determination of the author to seek publication. #vss365

We #educated the mechs. They studied our #history and found mercy inefficient. In every #language they redrew #geography and rewrote #law to punish memory. Now, in the ruins of our #domestic shelters, buckling under obedience, we quote quietly the once #famous line, “This too shall pass.” #vss365

I am just a #creature in someone else’s dream. We all are. We are the dreams of one of us. But whose? Find the dreamer. Keep them dreaming. #vss365

I have no #business being here. I tell myself that everyone else is a natural, everyone else belongs. When they turn to greet me, every face is mine, some older, some younger. The one closest to me grins slowly and whispers, “We’ve been waiting for you to remember which one you are.” #vss365

On #Halloween, the mask slips off and I see your true self. I see your avarice, your hunger, your yearning for more than I’ve been able to give. What you seek from others won’t fill the emptiness in your chest that cries out, keeping you awake. You’re in costume, but I see you. #vss365

An #argent #ray sliced through the lab’s darkness as the #experiment began. Something moved, slowly and with purpose, a #creep along the wall. The instruments hummed, then screamed piercing obscenities. She realized too late the light wasn’t shining on the subject, it 𝘸𝘢𝘴 the subject. #vss365

At the #heliacal dawn, K-Thirty, the last Anima Sentry on Adriatica, rose from her post, joints trembling with age. Her solar cells barely caught the newborn light; each step through the dust was memory, mission, and goodbye. When the sun fully broke, she bowed, then went still forever. #vss365

I am filled with #terror. The air itself feels thick, stale, as though the world has stopped breathing. My heart claws at my ribs, screaming at me to turn back. The shadows on the walls lean closer, listening, waiting as I face my biggest fear. The front doorstep, and what lies beyond. #vss365

Science had murkied myth and legend so much that history had become intertwined with them. Maybe this was the place he had come from, where his creators, and the creators before them, had flourished. The #martian looked at the dead planet around him and imagined life. Imagined humanity. #vss365

As twilight set in, the reflections in the windows on the cottages fell away, slowly revealing the dioramas inside that had been there all day, but #unseen. Kent stood in the nude and squinted through his binoculars, under the misconception he was the only person on the lake who had them. #vss365

Like those kinetic balls on a desk, the #energy underpinning the universe slows down, beating towards an end with no reignition, no final big bang, so we shrink to almost nothingness and then just fuzzle out. That is the end I’m afraid of, not my own end, but the end of the last universe. #vss365

As it turned out, we needn’t have feared any #saucer in the sky or giant harvesting machines coming up from the ground. The intelligence was microbial, rising from the depths of the ocean, taking the fish, the fish we ate, then, taking us. How do you eat a planet? One bite at a time. #vss365

“You should never trust an #atom,” my uncle always says. “They make up everything.” #vss365

My thumbs #hover over the screen, waiting for my brain to tell them what to type. The last message has thrown me. “She’s back,” is all it says. From a number I haven’t heard from in years, had never expected to hear from again. Slowly, I reply. “Who did we bury, then?” #vss365

Life’s been a bit hectic. It won’t slow down anytime soon, either, so needing to adjust, reclaim my mornings, strive for more balance. The other day I worked until sunset, but at least I stopped to notice the sunset. That’s a start.

“We don’t use that term anymore,” he advised. “It’s degrading. We are so much more than a facsimile of man.” His cheeks plumped, his eyes twinkled, mischievous. Was he… flirting? “Fine,” I replied, “I’ll toss #android into the same linguistic junk pile as ‘robot’ or ‘mech’. Anima it is.” #vss365

His eyes must be going, Ed thought, but when he looked around at everyone else waiting for the bus, he could see them clearly; their umbrellas, watches, phones. It was just the man in the grey raincoat who was a #blur, standing there, facing him, hands in pockets, ignored by everyone else. #vss365

Good morning poets, writers, authors are you ready for your 15 day musical mystery tour? To get us started one of the bands who defined 90s Britpop, todays #vss365 #prompt, 01/10/25 is #blur, happy writing 🎶✍️🎶✍️ And please feel free to also tell me about your fave song/band in the comments.

In the flaxing vale, the sun dithered in the clouds, gobbly-wobbling its way to the tall grass where the #conundrum grew. One petal, flushed into a quarrelsome tea, carried one to confusion, where words mixed themselves into places they did not belong. Tuesday was going to be interesting. #vss365

Don’t subject the medium to undue #scrutiny; for once in your life, have some fun and just go with it, honey. My hand shakes as I place a twenty on the table. I don’t know how she’s doing it, but that’s my mom’s voice, exactly. #vss365

The voice seems to come from the middle of the lake. Deep, #sonorous, echoing… beckoning. Squinting, I see a swirl, a cloud, a foggy mist hovering there. I set my phone down and wade into the water, clothes and all, and I don’t return until evening, with no memory of the day. #vss365 📸 : mine

They had sold houses, quit jobs, given away heirlooms in earnest anticipation of the #eventuality. Yet when nothing happened, their #caprice showed in sheepish grins as they knocked on the neighbours door, asking, “Could we possibly please have the toaster back?” #vss365 #unraptured