Time can be measured, it can be erased

It is often a thief, a mistress who waits

A whispering shadow so often chased

Those who forego or those who embrace

The new aches, the new pains

The wrinkled lines etched on their face

There are those who rely on the passing of time

Each year a ring, each hour of shade

So often their reward is how tall they can climb

They are the trees, sturdy and stout

Ma...

It starts slow, as these things do.

Quick, hurried glances in the same occupied spaces. Small, unsure smiles. The subtle obvious brushing of hands.

Tiny moments begin to add up, shuffling their feet towards each other. Laughing through the lunches. Finding each other in crowded rooms. Cups of coffee left at each other's desks.

The pace quickens, as lunches turn to dinners. As dinners turn to la...

A man lives deep in the forests of Monai.

What shape or soul he takes differs in tale, often leaving many to believe what they had seen was not real. He was a myth, a story told around hearths to warn children to never stray into the forest after the sun fades. He is a phantom, a ghost, within the night.

But every myth starts in truth, and the truth is there is a road within Monai, where footpri...

Four isles lay, carved out from the planet’s core. One covered in water, the salt air echoes from its shore. One erected up high, foliage weaving in and out from its base. One made of clouds, suspended above the others. And one isle banished, scorched from the inside out.

Four isles lay, encircling a barren land, where no growth, nor wind, nor water breaches it. Only strips of sand sprawl from ea...

A crew who just met are setting sail for a year to this destination on a body that is not water....

The bench was unoccupied, just like the day before. Except for a book. The same book, with the cartoon boy and girl looking over an edge of a cliff, their dog behind them clinging for dear life. There were no words and yet she opened it everyday as if she could read it.

She started towards the bench, as a voice calls, “Good morning, Aggie! Care to join us today?” 

The voice is either Dave. Or Be...

Plumes of smoke dance around the head priest as he stands on the dais, stoic and smug. He has lit a sage wand, as other priests walk the aisles with their heavy perfumes and oils. Anything to hide the smell of the several packed sweaty bodies within the temple. And the decaying flesh and maggots.

“Azure, most high, we thank you.” They chant as they walk by. 

A wooden cart accompanied by four unl...

The voices came, as I knew they would. One low and gravely. The other, pitchy and sharp. They had arrived to see the shattered glass. The torn up rugs. The splatter on the floor.

I lay still, listening.

“No sign of forced entry. Who’s the resident?” The gravel voice said. Their feet dragged on the floor, a pause, and then the faint sound of bones popping. “Looks like she was stabbed, Eve, more tha...