Haiku: Bleary keystrokes

They call to me; early, impatient,--and creaking. Looking down at the keysand squinting through a cracked mirror of blur,raising hands which are balloons of lead,to push into life words that wait in the queue of the addled Tilt-A-Whirl in my smeary mind. I find that the "T" key and the Space Bar will have nothing...

Haiku: We are all in The Village

Freedom is but an open door to illusion.When we are "entertained" we are numbed,numbered...and herded. For we all live in The Village,all bright and colored and quaint,yet impossible to leave and driven to stay yet we dream of freedom that laughs at us...and raises it's skirt to promise easy love.We are flowers in a terrarium;growing...

My life as a Bagel

It's 4:00 in the morning and I have risen from the all too brief, coffined sleep; driven by both insomnia and thoughts that race as shards of glass from a mirror cracked. There in the dark of one small lamp, I see the keys and they call again to feed from me, from my soul's...

Haiku: Thorn in my Eye

A sudden look from afar this smoky room,A fleeting dream of hearth and home...only a glimmer;A dream caught and trapped forever in gleaming glassWhile the thorn of her gaze both punctures my mind and brings my heart of rusty gears to full stop.

Haiku: Storm in the Night

Light and fury,shrieks of a sinner's windawaken the numbed souland sweeps away the dried heart.

Tight

He woke with "Danny Boy" stuck inside his headand forced himself to get up while his body screamedfrom it's every part, "stop moving!". The chemo had done it's part,he was suitably exhausted and looked the part of Karloff's stand in. He was as tight from head to toeas an old war-drum.The heart inside him beatas...

4:00 Diner- The Blackness

The man had come to the Diner and wreaked havoc once again with a power that the customer had not seen. He had come over and sat in the booth, number 6, across from the customer and had told him "Now, for my story..." The customer found that his heartbeat had increased and he felt...

4:00 Diner: Smoke and Mirrors

He came to the Diner early that day. After yesterday's literal attack by that entity of black, he needed to see if it was still standing and, more importantly, (an oddly to him), he needed to see if DeIDre was OK. He got up from his resting place, got dressed as best he could manage...

4:00 Diner: Velvet

He was late to get up but he had to. His head was so tired from working late already and it swam and begged for caffeine. So, bitter or not, he headed for the Diner in his mind. He left his upstairs quarters and nearly fell down the stairs leading to the Diner. Something, again,...

4:00am- Back to the Diner

He was up earlier than most times I was actually just after 3:30 but he couldn't sleep anymore. Hungry again and needing some bad coffee from "Joe's", he started the long walk down again, past the toll booth that still took dimes; and the guy who waited by the side of the road and always...

Eustace’s Garden: VSS

Eustace's garden was full of the brightest, most vivid collection of flora the county had seen. Of course, it's origin was the blood that seeped from the calyx of each bloom, as he fed only the finest cuts from his victims to each bud. vss365 18 October 2020 #prompt:#calyx

Reading to my Special Needs students Part 2

https://videopress.com/v/xlePzzqL?preloadContent=metadata Here is the second video I made to read another story, "The Lorax", to my severe and profound Special Needs students during the pandemic. This one was a bit longer and it was harder for them to hold attention, but they could see me and hear my voice and I was hoping it would...

Reading to my Special Needs students during the Pandemic

https://videopress.com/v/8jukxTlN?preloadContent=metadata As I have probably said. I teach students with serious and profound Special Needs. During the shutdown here in the States, they could not do anything "virtual" so I thought the best thing to do was to try and reach them so they could see me and hear my voice and maybe at least...

The Wrong Way Home

It had been a long, long shift; And the way that creep in Booth 4 kept smiling and staring at her all night, gave her knots in her stomach. He looked so unkempt and pale-- although he was good enough to leave her a $50.00 tip, which made her uneasy. Tips like that usually mean...

The Ballad of the Grey Man

Ne'er a girl has yet been born, could boast that she befel the curse the maiden born to me endured and lived to tell. She was born upon a twilight dark, when I at first laid eyes upon this beauty God had made with His own hands, my prize. She cried the cry of a...

The Mourners: A Tale of Horror

The phone rang at 3:24am. "Well..that's always pleasant news", thought Manny, as he scrambled to his senses from a dead sleep. "Mmmm...H-Hello...", he said; rubbing his eyes and the back of his neck while he struggled to hang onto the phone itself. "Mr. Barnes?", said a sharp, high-pitched voice on the other end, "Manfred Barnes?"...

The Pack

The car had stalled in the worst place imaginable. She was in the middle of absolute nowhere in Farmington which meant nothing but dense forest and no gas stations for at least 35 miles each way on the interstate. She had done her best to fill up the car, her beat up, yet reliable old...

Flash Horror: Number 2

It was the night all children look forward to all year long--the one night they never stop longing for all year and plan all year long around it. And no..not the Jolly Fat Guy in the suit day where everything seems to be green and red and the adults are all boozed up in bad...

Flash Horror #1: The Family Dinner

This will be the first of a series of very short flash Horror stories I intend to to experiment in writing in under 500 words..(no rotten tomatoes please.) He was clearing the table of the remnants of dinner without a care in the world for the firs time in MONTHS. "Wow, this was great" he...

The Girl on the Swing: A Tale of Terror

Leonard had gone down to the playground as he usually did on Fridays. It was as crisp, and sweet an Autumn day that could be found and was going to waster no time in enjoying it while he could. The doctors had told him not to push himself too much; to “take it easy” as...