Hazy Shade of Winter, Less Than Zero, pills, sheet walls, redaction, and deciding to live.
From a hit by The Bangles, to the bloody and '80s adulating reach of American Psycho, episode number 38 starts and ends with more bangs than a West Texas brothel in the 1800s. Seven writers from the site complete the landscape here, with a lead by area_man, and wrapped nicely with thePearl and Mariah, so you know the new blood between them holds its mud.
Here's the link to the show.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLsEjqj8g6s
And here are the pieces featured on Prose. Radio.
https://www.theprose.com/post/816235/when-the-zoloft-hits https://www.theprose.com/post/816024/searching https://www.theprose.com/post/816017/they-call-her-fickle
https://www.theprose.com/post/816230/the-day-i-decided-to-live https://www.theprose.com/post/816225/if https://www.theprose.com/post/816122/i-redact-my-forgiveness
https://www.theprose.com/post/816108/perceived
And.
As always.
Thank you for being here.
-The Prose. team
Reclaiming Me
I don't write fiction. Life too thick to break out from. Made up characters flat compared to those who have punched me in the gut in life. Punched so hard, so deep it knocked the creative wind out of me. So I can only spew, vent, rage. I hate this version of me.
There was another once. Joyful, loving. In love with you actually. Expansive, generous, giving. All for you. I loved even me then.
I know I say you took that soul away but is it true? Was it me instead of you?
Was it me instead of you who had the capacity to profoundly adore beauty, suck the spirit out of pleasure, enjoy just breathing? Was it me who gave you to power to deflate, ravage, slaughter my soul? If so, I renege on our broken contract of forever and ever; and now vow to try to reclaim the I who is me without you.
I'll admit I don't recall the melody but I still have the words always swirling never stopping in my head. Perhaps if I listen to the earth, the beat of my still thumping heart, the never disappointing spring, I can twist my words to a different tune and regain myself in the process. Perhaps if I just chose to realign my focus I can reclaim me.
Jane’s Addiction, being a dog, feathery tops in the valley, and everything that follows.
Premiering now: In number seventeen from Prose. Radio, Jane's Addiction sees the ocean break on the shore, while in the city a group of writers from the site bring it back to soil with each of their own literary footprints.
Here's the link to the show:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U33WX-dLTZ4
And here are all the pieces in the feature:
https://www.theprose.com/post/808204
https://www.theprose.com/post/807185/...
https://www.theprose.com/post/785150/...
https://www.theprose.com/post/783763/...
https://www.theprose.com/post/806394/...
https://www.theprose.com/post/808549/...
https://www.theprose.com/post/808564/...
https://www.theprose.com/post/808547
https://www.theprose.com/post/808080/...
https://www.theprose.com/post/808371/...
And.
As always.
Thank you for being here.
-The Prose. team
Toxic Soup
In the murky depths of our modern existence lies a cauldron of toxicity, simmering with the noxious vapors of deceit, greed, and disillusionment. The air is thick with the acrid stench of political discord, where truth is a casualty and integrity a relic of a bygone era. Society churns in the turbulent waters of technological advancement, drowning in a deluge of information, yet starving for genuine connection. In this suffocating atmosphere, human empathy wanes, replaced by a callous indifference, leaving souls adrift in a sea of isolation. This is the toxic soup we’ve brewed, a bitter concoction of our own making, where the once-clear waters of morality have become clouded by the sediment of our collective discomfort and relentless pursuit of greed for survival.
In the face of such a tempest, one can only hold fast to the fragile hope that amidst the chaos, a glimmer of redemption may yet emerge. And as the pendulum of power swings with reckless abandon, one cannot help but wonder: who will emerge victorious in the political arena, Only time will tell, as the electorate braces itself for another round of the age-old dance between hope and disillusionment.
I do not wish for seconds.
The Thief
Luke 23:1-56
The men who hung beside Christ were thieves in this world and were caught. There was no escape for them. They had earned what they now faced: punishment, shame, and suffering.
How they chose to spend what little time they had left on earth was curious to me. The first thief outwardly mocked Christ. The other questioned His identity and claims of deity. The latter ultimately decided to believe and was assured a place in paradise that very day.
The “how” did not bother me as much as the “why”.
The thief gets to go to heaven, but why? Why is this even acceptable? He didn't “earn” it. So he is a screw up his whole life but he gets a free pass right at the end?
The story stuck with me; it was unsettling for reasons I could not place. It irked me to be missing some key understanding. However, the answer would arise repeatedly, in subtle and at times, astounding ways throughout my life: grace.
This thief was not a member of a religious organization, nor had he the opportunity to make a public statement of faith with a water baptism, nor had he paid any tithes to his church. It had been impossible for him to “earn” his salvation with these human-approved rituals. What he did do was believe.
He simply believed and was saved by grace through faith.
Because of grace, we do not get what we deserve. No other realization has ever humbled me more than when I could finally piece together the spiritual implications of the thief on the cross. The magnitude of grace is unfathomable to my human comprehension, yet I am filled with gratitude.
This story gives me hope because I know that I too am nothing more than a thief in this world. Yet, I believe.
Brushing Sand
Answer number one: it was beautiful, and then it was dust, and then it was both.
I remember seeing the rover for the first time. I almost didn’t want to touch it, like it was holy, a bone from a saint. Then I stepped back and saw my bootprint next to it, and I knew, fully, where we were.
The four of us had studied Mars exhaustively for years and viewed every image, still or moving, dozens or hundreds of times. We had felt the sand that first sample-return drone recovered: a box of precious nothingness, 10 centimeters square, every grain analyzed and formulated by celebrated scientists. They learned so little from it. But what we felt, we chosen four who immersed tentative fingers within it, let it rest in the grooves of our fingerprints...
Full story newly published by NewMyths here: https://sites.google.com/newmyths.com/newmyths-com-issue-66/issue-66-stories/brushing-sand
Years ago, the early draft of this story appeared for a brief time on Prose. The response was favorable, and also included some criticism that helped me realize the story could be better. After a great deal of reworking, I am very proud to share the final, published version with my Prose friends. Thanks to all who commented on that early draft, but especially to TheWolfeDen, whose challenge inspired the story, and JD4, whose criticism was sharpest and therefore the most helpful.