The list of people that I notice who do amazing work here is long. But I do as I’m told so a quick shoutout to some of my favorites.

@brandi333 writes poetry but also longer articles. Very wide range of emotions. I think this is a good place for her. Very moving.

@undermeyou maybe the first person I followed here. Amazing stuff. She knows how to be strong, but also have an emotional side.

@mnezz her short stories and poems amaze me. She definitely found a way to face her dark side in writings.

@msh very smart and versatile. I love how she plays these games about meaning. Amazing. Just out of the blue..

@anarosewood is younger than most of us, i think. She writes amazing posts. Very good descriptions. Very realistic. Keep it up.

There as so many more: @thelonely, @evat, @che4255 , @creativechaos, @wetpetals , @sandflea68 , @miraleigh, @sharondabriggs , @el_tenneze, @estherflowrs1, @sown-laughter, @amberlight, @k_s, @amandapheonix ,@tooldtocare (no you don’t..)... I’m getting excited..there are so many people here who I still haven’t mentioned. Just go to my “following” . I don’t follow people for nothing.

Finally, I want to comnend the great @danceinsilence who is just the best teacher in the world. Poems, short stories , he does amazing stuff. Don’t miss his tutorial posts. Very helpful. Thank you.

You all rule and if I haven’t commented much on your work lately,

just know that it’s because I’m back to full time work and just barly have time to write my own.

I love our community. It’s amazing: we’ve never met each other but we can share things so freely here.

Long live and be strong!!

The world won't remember

The sound of a quiet girl's footsteps

It won't recall the musings of a single girl, out of millions overall

The population won't remember a girl who lived in a small town, who accomplished little of note

The world won't remember

But they will

The family who raised me,

The friends who stood beside me,

When it's time, they will know

They'll remember the shy, anxiety-riddled girl who loved to write

The girl that brightened their day in some way

The girl there to wipe tears away before they could fall

The girl who wanted nothing more than a simple, peaceful life

They will remember it all

All I ask

Is when I'm gone

You'll remember me in the wildflowers that grow by the highway

See me in the stars that look brighter on snowy nights,

Smell the salt of the ocean and remember that I was alive

Walk in the forest I haunted in life and remember that I grew wild

Like the yellow weeds that I called spring flowers,

The ones that faded into wishing flowers,

And blew on the wind in the summer time

Like the embers that floated above bonfires

That kept us up all those midnights past

Like those fireflies

The floating lights that taught us to dance,

Like my ashes, carried away on the breeze.

All I ask

Is when I'm gone

You'll remember me a wildflower

She stands alone.

Drowning in a sea of superficial acceptance,

With a deafening undertone of regret.

How far can she bend?

Until she fractures her domain.

She defined her own sense of failure,

Success is a word burned from her skull.

She stands alone.

Loved,

By everything she is,

Yet in love,

With everything she’s not.

She doesn’t see her reflection,

As the realm sees her blessing.

She stands alone.

A creation of her own,

Suffocated by a world,

Of isolated standards.

Happiness,

An impossible feat.

She stands alone.

Grasping on the arms of others,

Praying to save falter.

Flicked wrists keep her down.

She stands alone.

If you cry out for help,

And the world decides not to listen,

Do you make a sound?

She is gone.

I'll taste bitter at first. Dry, making you thirstier than you were before you took a sip of my favorite drink. It will come in waves, for everyone but you. I'm not sure anyone else would know though.

You'll turn the thermostat up, sleeping better when it's warmer. I always made you too hot, sweating through the shirt of yours I'd taken out of the hamper. I liked them better when they smell like you. Soon it'll get uncomfortbale though and you'll turn it down. The sheets will be cold when you stretch out, but the bed won't be. You fell asleep hand in hand with an amber scented memory of the first time we slept together in our bed in our house. No matter the temperature, you sleep in the warmth of every night we fell asleep in our bed in our room - no matter where we physically were. We didn't stay in that house forever.

Marrying you was a promise to give you everything. There aren't many people who have as much to give as I have, as I do, as I did. Marrying you was a promise to give you everything, always, forever.

And so when you cook my favorite recipe alone, it won't taste bitter. You'll remember to use smoked salt instead, always more - not enough - and it will taste familiar enough the sense of home we made together, the sense of taking a pause in life, the sense of devotion will overwhelm you for just a moment.

Your eyes will glass over, but you'll smile and the bed won't be cold that night.

Love potions. Such a waste of time. Mr. Heartsick sitting in front of me is starting to ramble. I can’t concentrate. I let him drone on about her freckles and hair and how her giggle makes his chest constrict. When he’s done I’ll give him my speech about how love potions cause a temporary infatuation that slowly fades out, and he won’t listen to a word. He’ll give me almost as much of his attention as I’m giving him my own now. The truth is his only thoughts will be of basking in her infatuation and not a thing about what he needs to do to maintain it. And the truth is that right now. The only thing I’m thinking about is getting a hold of Ty and how quickly he can get me a fix.

As he wraps up his pain-stakingly detailed description of his fair maiden I grab a rose quartz bowl. In goes some cinnamon, vanilla, and cloves. I add some powders that I keep premixed. Dragon’s milk. Rose petals. And just as he becomes too caught up in my ritual to remember every single eyelash he’s ever pulled from her cheek and told her to wish upon, I get to the histrionic part of the show. A single drop of fae blood. Translucent and slightly iridescent. His breath catches as it hits the milky surface. It’s instantaneous. The contents of the bowl turns pale gold and shimmering. It’s liquid light. I fill a vial, and his hand reaches before I’ve even got the cork in.

“I need you to know that this will not cause love. This will keep her infatuated for about a week. The infatuation will slowly fade. You need to have a plan to gain her interest during the time of this infatuation. Help her fall for you. Do you understand?”

He shakes his head and grabs too quickly. I let him leave, though I doubt he has any plan. She won’t fall in love. He’ll sneak her some liquid love into her tea or her wine and become so caught up in her sudden unyielding interest that he’ll never do anything to keep her around.

I’m spent, and I need a hit. I convince Ty to stop by and then knock out while I’m waiting. I wake to his cool hand on my forehead. He looks concerned but also tired. His soft, bright eyes are concentrated frustration with the slightest trace of relief. I miss when those eyes shone with love for me, and I can’t help but feel disappointment in everything I’ve become.

“Mia...Damnit. I thought you said you needed to replenish potion supplies...I thought you were off the coal...”

I think about lying. He won’t believe me, but he might give me enough to make it through the night without the shakes and the sweats. I’m weighing my options when he pushes me off his lap and makes for the door.

“Ty, wait! I have enough for work, so I just need enough for the night. If I could just get like a coin then it’ll make the dreams easier on me...”

“I didn’t bring any. I’m no fool, Mia. You aren’t using five coins a week of fae blood making love potions, which seems to be all you’re selling anymore...”

I can’t believe him. He’s pacing the kitchen clearly unsure of what to do with me. I knew that he probably suspected that I was still using fae blood, but I figured that he was playing along to avoid putting me through having to say it.

“If you want me to stay I can. I can talk you through the dreams. Give you dragon’s milk so you sleep. I can help you relax through them. Help with the shaking. I miss you. I hate to see you stuck on this...”

“Can you go now? I have other plans tonight anyway. I don’t need you to make me feel guilty or judge me.”

I know he’s not trying to do either, but I need him to leave. He looks defeated. He gives me a quick, hurt nod. I walk him to the door. Our hands meet accidentally at the knob, and I see his face tighten. A quick kiss on my forehead and he’s gone.

If Ty won’t help me I have only one other option. I have to go to Callie. The lowest of the low. She’s a disgusting creature. A pixie that feeds off her own kind. It’s bad enough for us witches that are addicted to fae blood, but at least we aren’t spilling our own magic for fun. Maybe for profit or for spells sometimes. But I’d never dream of using another witch’s blood. Not to mention that the mere fact that she is an addict suggests she was doing something unsavory to cause her to get a taste for the drug.

I toss my cigarette out as I hit the buzzer for her apartment. The smell of rotting fruit drifts up to her front door from the alley, and I am torn between wishing she’d buzz me in and hoping I never have to see her again. I hit the button again three times in quick succession and almost immediately receive the sharp click of the door unlocking. The speaker must be out on the intercom. No surprise in this hovel.

“Mia. What’s up, babe? I like your hair dark like that.”

“You gonna let me in then?”

I push past her into the dark apartment. Her power must be out. This small studio is a fire hazard at the best of times, but right now it’s filled with smoke and what looks to be every candle the south side of the city holds. She’s close behind me, so I steal myself for whatever she might ask for in return. She’s horrid, but she’s also smart. My eyes are dilated, and I’m sweaty despite the cold. Not to mention that with her being a pixie she can probably smell me detoxing.

“You’re gonna let me do what I want with you, right, love?” My hand is on the nape of her neck, fingers wrapping through her lilac hair. I whisper into her pale clavicle, and I feel a small shock course through her skin. She leans into me, and I can tell this is going to be easy. I grab her hair hard and push her to the mattress on the floor. An hour or so of my hands and mouth violating her until she’s breathless and disoriented. I let my fingers slowly trace the small, crescent moon birth mark on her hip. She’s calm as she breathes out a light, approving sigh letting me know that we’re even.

“There’s needles and bowls on the mantle, but this time can you take enough so that I can drop too?”

I nod to her, but inside I’m nauseous. She’s going to drop her own blood? I’m no longer sure she’s a safe resource. She’s always disgusted me, but this is low even for her. I’ve never met a junkie using their own blood. Blood releases magic. The more you spill the less the being contains. The more you spill the more you have to use next time. At some point…you only have so much magical blood.

I pull a syringe full from her spidery, glowing veins and empty it into a crystal bowl. I drop the bowl into one of the larger candle’s flames. The smell is intoxicating. Sharp, biting citrus with sweet, sticky sugars clinging to the edges. The blood coagulates, no longer beautiful and iridescent but a matte black mess. I grab a dropper and it takes every bit of restraint I have to feed Callie first. I kiss her mouth open and then let a single drop slide onto her tongue. She smiles and lets her eyes flick upwards as she crashes into easy sleep. I pull the rest out and fill a vial from my bag I left near the front door. Then I take my drop. And suddenly everything is easy. Suddenly Callie isn’t such a disgrace. With her translucent skin and her pastel hair she’s actually quite lovely. I drift into sleep. And I don’t remember a thing.

"Doctor," Winston exhaled, assuming the position on the psychiatrist's couch, "I feel sheepish admitting this, but I've been baaad baaad."

Dr. Churchill glanced at him over her glasses. "What did you do this time?"

Winston blushed, turning his ivory wool pink. He whispered. "I...I used up all of the pills ewe gave me. The insomnia's worse!"

The doctor stared at her patient. "I cannot possibly prescribe you a higher dose or allow you a refill yet-"

"But-"

"Shhh!...Shhh!...Have you ever considered counting people?"

"Counting? People? I...I-"

"You've never done it. Perhaps I should have suggested it sooner, but your blood levels alarmed me such that I thought the pills would be the best place to start. Now, I fear that you are getting severly dependent on them, so we much search for alternatives. I think that counting people will work nicely."

"Oh...oh...kay."

"It's very simple. You just picture the bipeds doing something mundane, like maybe going through the line at their grocers... Try it for one week and let me know how it goes."

ONE WEEK LATER:

"So", Dr. Churchill addressed her patient, "How did the people-counting go?"

"Fine...until the guy with the lamb chops went through the line!"

There is no symmetry,

We do not mean to them

As they are to us.

They have no guilty

Conscience at all

Despite all the terrible,

Terrible things they’ve done,

So they lose little sleep

Over their bloody hands.

What sheep do

When sleep evades,

Is think of ways

To make that

Doomsday machine

Work just a bit better.

Sheep are ruthless perfectionists.

And they waste no time

On mere numerics.

The white whale that hides in the depths of the ocean,

the bell jar I see through,

the beetle I transform into,

the sharks that haunt my marlin with such devotion.

The pearl I carry with me everywhere I go,

the fast paced creek that I am going up, without a paddle to row.

These are my adversaries, although they are great in size,

they can be hard for you to see,

much like the mockingbird I shot,

or- perhaps that mockingbird was me.

The clock reads 10:01 pm. My muscles ache and my eyes are so exhausted that they feel sensitive to the air around me. I turn on the faucet and the warm water wraps itself around me. I close my stinging eyes and shampoo my hair, a frizzy, tangled mess from the wind of a Monday in the gap between summer and fall. I hear the water thrash against the porcelain floor of the shower, first... and then a brash torrent of scolds echo around.

“You disappoint me! Why should you think you’re good enough?!”

I try to concentrate on the water calling out to me.

“Don’t listen. You’re okay. You’re doing the best you can,” it says.

I turn off the faucet and let my dripping feet copy myself onto the shower mat and suddenly, there is a new person amongst me. Then, I wipe the mirror clean and finally, I see my tormentor face to face.