If a single person dies from the Corona virus in the US, the stock market drops over 2000 points. If millions of babies are vacuumed out of wombs, dismembered, and sold as spare parts, the masses don't blink an eye.

If a candidate for President brags on video that he refused to release money to the Ukraine unless, within 6 hours before leaving, unless he got his way by ordering the firing of a prosecutor, so his son would not be investigated, and the crowd laughs, then why impeach another candidate for President whose son did not sit on a Ukrainian energy board, who did not need investigating?

If anyone lived through the 60's and 70's when the two dominant US political parties apparently "switched" every plank of their political platforms so the Republicans bear the responsibility for slavery that the Democrats advocated, then why doesn't anyone remember the "switch", have never been taught about the "switch" in school, or can find a single source that explains how, when, and why this "switch " of political platforms occurred?

How can four years of free college costs less than 50 years of taxable earnings to pay for that free college? Did the words "free" and "forever" suddenly switch definitions without fanfare or footnoting?

Do criminals obey laws? Do dictators care about costs? How can killing an infant be healthcare? Will a flimsy surgical mask prevent the spread of infection better than a wall that prevents the entry of someone who can spread infection?

Did anyone see the collective media stammer and stutter when quoting the US Constitution about the details of impeachment similar to small children who have to read their term paper aloud to the class when they know they did not write it (Mueller?)? Both politician and school child have an audience watching them read the unfamiliar for the very first time.

Mindy woke this morning and decided to verify all she had ever taken for granted. She sought credible sources. She asked uncomfortable questions. She avoided jargon. Mindy wanted truth and would accept nothing less.

To this day, Mindy is on her quest. She asked if having sex with Harvey Weinstein was the only way to becoming a successful movie actress. She wanted to know just how people could support Islam and homosexuality, two diametrically opposite positions. Mindy asked why a baker (a private business owner) must bake a cake or be charged with a crime, but Facebook (a private business owner) can ban whoever and whatever they say and be heralded as pillar of free-speech?

Mindy suddenly lost popularity among her peers. They wanted her silenced for making them uneasy. They charged her with hate crimes. Mindy asked if there were any crimes that did not involve hate. They eventually called her a racist.

Mindy asked them to define racist.

Mindy is still waiting for their answer.

Mindy will have to wait a very long time for their reply.

Maybe forever, if she wants a correct one.

~ I

L P

C S

E \ E

S / C

P L

I

am

that

which

shadows

thee.

I

am

body

planetary.

Covering

your

light

you bleed,

upon the sky

but must

I leave?

Until we

pass again,

like minute

and second

hand,

upon the face

her clock,

when

hour, eclipse

is

struck

The boxes were stacked to the ceiling and left only a narrow path for Lucinda to navigate. Her childhood home now unrecognizable. The formal living room on the left side was completely blocked off and Lucinda was sure her mother had filled every available space with her possibilities boxes.

That was what her mother called them as she filled each one with pieces of her life, Lucinda's, Amy's, their fathers and her mothers. There was every test and essay each of the girls had ever written all neatly marked on the outside in childish block lettering. A box devoted to every year of their lives. Every Christmas, Thanksgiving, party that happened and those that only happened in her mothers head. Boxes from the old house on Olive Street that had never been unpacked.

Each box a real or imagined moment that her mother compulsively captured and sealed shut. Lucinda wondered how many boxes had her name written on them.

"Luci, are you in here?" Amy asked.

"In the back," Lucinda said as she tried to pull a box down without bringing all of them crashing on top of her.

"Jesus Christ, Amy said, "It smells like formaldehyde in here."

"It's the boxes," Lucinda said. "Help me move this over," she motioned to the box on the floor.

"Where?" Amy asked. "There's nowhere to put it."

"Just push it out of the way so I can try and see if we can get into the kitchen." Amy grabbed the box and dragged it away from the pile. The tape gave way and the contents spilled onto the floor.

"Look at all this," Amy said, as she combed through dozens of dried out paint brushes, pencils, ribbons and crumpled up scraps of paper.

"Remember this?" Amy asked, holding up a shadow box filled with the decayed remnants of flowers. Lucinda took the box and a felt a familiar tightness building in her chest.

Suddenly she was six years old. Her mother had taken them to the park and told her and Amy to go pick wild flowers. She had collected a few and gone back to show her mother when she saw her sitting on a bench a strange man next to her. They were holding hands and then... She remembered and that was exactly the problem.

"Well?" Amy asked, waving it at her. "Do you don't want it?"

"We're going to need a dumpster or three," Lucinda said, taking the box out of her hand and tossing it on the floor. The glass shattering cathartic. All the memories. Being here. Everything was coming back. Everything she tried to forget was coming back all at once.

She felt her sisters arm around her.

"Breathe," Amy said. "Damn it. I'm sorry. I didn't realize how hard this would be."

"I just want to burn it all," Lucinda said. "Every box, every scrap of paper. Everything."

"It's not going to change things."

"Maybe not. But this. Leaving everything like this. All these boxes. She had to have known how hard it would be."

"I don’t think she had a choice.”

“But we do,” Lucinda said, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a lighter.

That afternoon Lucinda filled a small 10 x 10 box with the few pictures she had of her mother, taped it up and wrote Possibilities Jeanne 1956 on the outside. Rest in peace mom, she whispered.

As a fallen angel,

wings stripped of their feathers

by the demons from my mind’s hell

my strength slowly withers.

But I will rebuild my wings

with every new feather

adds a new page to the rings

that bind my book of leather.

This book of mine

tells the story of redemption

over the course of time

as I battle my depression.

The demons take my pen

and tell me to just stop trying,

to just give in

and get busy dying.

However I steal the pen back

before I can doubt

and numb myself black

to block them out.

This book of feathers is my mission

my scarred skin makes its bind

my blood of crimson iron inks its inscription

my bone makes its spine.

By finishing this book before I die

I hope these pages put together

will rebuild my wings and let me fly

so I can show all my book of feathers.

#poetry

#writing

#challenge

I lean down and pick up the crumpled note.I look around if somebody might have just dropped it but there is no one here. I throw a quick glance again, filling a bit guilty and

I unfold the little piece of paper.

I promise I will come back

for you Mark

S.

I freeze for a moment, a bit dazed. I look around again as If there were hidden cameras somewhere and this was some kind of a joke. I look at the note, shaking my head and taking a deep breath. This was my name...and the love of my life...Samantha...I close my eyes and try to calm myself. Just a coincidence, nothing more. I lift my hand and without thinking I put it to my nose, inhaling deeply... daisies and roses.She smelled like that.Exactly like that.I open my eyes again. This couldn't be true.I look at the gentle handwriting and the small letters.Not possible.

I haven't seen her for years...because she disappeared, just like that.Without any warning, no signs. She was gone.All of her family, friends and the police looking and searching for her, for months.Without any result. It's been 5 years and no one has seen or heard anything about her. Her loved ones still believing that she would come back.There was no body...so there was no death.That's how they saw it. That's what I hoped for but pretended that I didn't. It was easier. Denial was easier.It made the breathing thing more bearable. It made it possible to survive without her in my world.

I stand there in the middle of the sidewalk,not moving, or blinking. Standing there like a statue. Lifeless...and then my hand loosens up, my fingers losing tension.

The little note falling to the ground. I stare at it without thinking, the wind gently moving it and lifting it in the air. The note making little circles, as if it was dancing, toying with me. Mocking...and disappearing behind the corner of the building.

A shiver runs down my spine and I shake out of my dead state.I start to walk, catching speed with every second, breaking into a run. My legs caring me faster than ever before. I almost lose my breath running, but I don't care. I have to catch it.Now.I reach the side of the building and notice the little piece of paper, swirling on the sidewalk, like it was already tired and needed to take a rest. I run to it in just a couple of swift strides and quickly pick it up before it can fall into the drain.I grab it and unfold it.

"...I will come back for you..."

I swallow hard and my eyes start to sting. My heartbeat starting to rise. This couldn't be true. She was gone. This note could have been for anyone...and it could be from some named Simone, Sara or something ridiculous and cute like Sally.I smell it again and there it was. Her smell.That could only belong to her. No one else.

I guess you found my note?

My whole body stiffens when hearing that voice.The voice that I thought I would never hear again. I close my eyes, considering insanity and other unwanted possibilities. Confused at what really going on around here. If it was a dream, or was it a nightmare that was about to crash me?

That's not... - I start uncertain and here a long sigh filled with pain.

I know, baby...but it is.Even in this crazy world that we live in, miracles still happen.

I don't say anything, let alone manage to think straight.I was going mad and need help from a professional and quick...and then I hear her voice again, like soft velvet against my ears.Gentle and apologetic.

I'm sorry that the note got so late to you. I wrote it years ago...But something failed and they couldn't send it then.It took so long before it broke through the wall...

I finally look up at the source of the sound, too tired to fight with the basic instincts that told me I needed to see her...even if she was just an illusion, a figment of my imagination.Even if everything was happening only in my head and I was going to wake up in some kind of asylum tomorrow.I had to see her, just once...The images of her blurred by the years gone and the passage of time...my heart starts to pound faster as I look at her beautiful face. My eyes grow wider with every second trying to take in the bigger picture. her long brown curls cascading down her beck,resting on her slender shoulders...she looks thinner then I remember, her face more tired, dark circles under her eyes. And yet she never looked more breathtaking.

How is this even...? - I start to ask, once again lost for words.

It's complicated Mark, I wouldn't know where to start...At times I don't even believe it myself.

You can't be real...you're gone...the police...

I know, but I'm here now...and you have no idea what it took me to get back to you.

Where were you all this time? - I ask, for the first time toying with the idea that this could be true and yet not let myself truly believe it.

You probably have someone else in your life now... - her voice cracks at the last word and yet she still manages to smile at me - but I just wanted to say that I'm back...

I stare at her,disbelieve that this was the thing that she was worried about,I move swiftly to her without even thinking and wrap my arms around her tiny body and inhale deeply, deciding I will never let go of her again. She leans in and starts to sob.

I can tell that she has been through a lot. I lean down and kiss her lips. Feeling the happiness sipping through my body and for the first time in five years, I feel like I can breathe again.

I plucked the following names from the Quantum Consciousness:

01) Kade Coldwell - prickly antihero/badboy*

02) Dartem Magahag - crazy villian/badboy*

03) Wes Gussek - nonchalant antihero/badboy or villian/badboy*

04) Jevin Voaddel - sophisticated antihero/badboy*

05) Zyfen Jox - comedic antihero/badboy*

06) Xayne Lock - unsuspectingly cheeky antihero/badboy*

07) Gattem Skell - dark/brooding antihero/badboy*

08) Tomaj Iilioni (eel-E-on-E) - quietly lethal antihero/badboy*

09) Hexin Quill - no-nonsense antihero/badboy*

10) Payce Reddington - methodical antihero/badboy*

* these descriptions are simply the notions I got with the name.

If anyone reading this wants to use a name or part of a name, please do. I offer them freely. You may also tag me on the post you use a name in, I'll read it and comment.

| another_proser |

For what feels like ten years ago,

I fell down into this wet, cold cavern

I still can see the circle of sky,

the color of Bluebell,

from the mouth of the well.

I still can hear others’ laughter

when it echoes down against the stone walls.

I still can talk to the rare people who nearly fell

and discover me in the hidden well.

The salty water chills me to the bone,

as well as the stone walls that surround me.

I’ve forgotten the feeling of warmth, where I dwell,

 here in the cold and lonely well.

I tread the water for as long as I can,

to keep my face surfaced above the water.

Sometimes I try to climb up the walls,

but I slip on the mossy stone.

Other times I grow too tired from the energy I expel

and let myself sink deeper into the well.

I find that it’s so peaceful and calm,

submerged in the salty water.

I want to sink deeper and stay there forever,

but I resurface each time and smile up 

at the light shining down bright like a golden bell,

unlike the dark and murky ocean water of the well.

The years passed by and by,

as I could tell from down here.

It was spring when the chirping of newborn birds,

echoed down the walls for me to hear.

It was summer when I was most found

by wondering kids who discovered me.

It was autumn when I saw flames of color,

with red, yellow, and orange leaves falling and gathered.

It was winter when I would beg to die, unable to leave the hell

of the frigid, bone-chilling water of the well.

I sometimes try to forget,

that I’m stuck at the bottom of this hole in the ground.

My mind floating away to escape into a land of fantasy with dreams of freedom,

where I can imagine the warmth of what love is, but I can never really feel it.

When I finally recall where I still am, reality breaking the spell,

I float in the water made from my own sorrowful tears which fill the well.

My brain and heart are split in two,

my brain sees the lines between the stacked stones as bars that cage me,

in my heart, I have fallen in love with the way the moss feels against my feet,

like soft green velvet along the stone below the water.

My mind is so broken that I can’t decide,

whether I want to be saved or if I should just stay.

I’ve been down here too long, as I can tell,

for I don’t know anything but this well.

I can not even imagine

what life is like outside of this hole,

outside its cool air and wet walls?

Was I ever not in this wellspring?

Was I ever running free on the earth above?

Were there people I knew before my fall?

Did they even know of my fall?

If so, do they know how I ended up down here?

Because I can’t remember how this happened to me.

Did someone tell me to jump in?

Was it a dare? Was I pushed in?

I traverse the forest of memories in my mind,

as I desperately search for an answer.

Sometimes I think I have found an answer to tell,

only to have it slip through my pruney fingers like the leaves that fall into the well.

I’ll probably never hunt down the answers

Should I accept this fate of mine?

Why am I in this hell?

Being forever trapped in this well.

My fate proving true as the water level drops 

whenever my tear ducts dry up for days,

Leaving me mindlessly treading the water.

The hole grows smaller as though tiny cracks

the water would dispell

until my tears start to refill the well.

A few months go by and I’ve come to accept this situation that I’m in,

That I can never leave this dank hole.

But it’s mossy stone walls are my home in which I dwell,

and I’m always held and rocked to sleep by the calm tear sea of the well.

But something isn’t right,

I can’t call my home by just “the well”.

No, this hole is special, it’s something more for me to retell,

This is mine, and mine alone, no one else will have my well.

I’m finding myself sinking more and more,

losing my motivation to keep my head afloat.

Haven’t I been in this bore long enough for me?

I deserve to let my peaceful fantasies become real with a spell

and allow me to leave my well.

How easy it would be,

to just stop treading the water.

To sink deeper than ever before,

and reach the bottom of this waterhole.

To never have to feel myself cry anymore,

submerged and unable to tell new tears from the old I dispell

that make up the water of my well.

The voices in my mind have kept me company

for the years I’ve spent all alone.

But even now, they are just telling me to say farewell,

to give into the ache of my bones and just sink down in my well.

I’m just tired.

Tired of trying to survive.

Of searching for the reason of why I fell.

Of the questions echoing in my mind like my choked sobs off the stone walls.

I’m done with coming up with no answers to tell.

I’m done with the lonely silence of my well.

What am I to the outside world?

I do nothing to contribute to anything

as I’m just down here in this spring.

I’m not helping anyone,

and no one is helping me with getting out of here.

I have no worth in this world,

how can I have any worth when I’m barely living.

I’m a nobody.

Just a broken, tired body.

No one would care if I gave up and gave my soul to sell.

No one would even know if I just drowned silently in my well.

I give into my exhaustion,

and sink down into the teary ocean.

My lungs burn for air as I stay under,

my body screaming out to surface.

I ignore my lungs pleas and let myself go limp

my thoughts leaving, one by one they each fell

as I sunk lower in the murky water of my well.

The closer I get to drowning,

My body takes over in panic and finally pushes itself up, breaching the surface.

Gasping for breath as the fresh gulps of oxygen

clear the fog in my brain from half-drowning.

I’m not sure if I’ll attempt to escape another way again,

but for now, I’ll just remain as I am,

living on the endless ride of a carousel,

treading the tearful ocean of my well.

There was a hum that is distracting me from falling asleep. On a red-eye flight to New York that was going to last at least five hours and my utter exhausting from a week of conferences, the hum was literally killing me.

It wasn’t the low rumble of the turbines on the wings a few rows ahead of me. It wasn’t from the few computers that people still had on. It was as if I could almost feel it as well as hear it. It haunted me that much.

I go through all of the possible sources and eliminate them. Eliminate them until I am left to my general area. I’ve filtered out all of the other white noise sources, but the hum. It was so faint, that almost in any other mental state, I could filter it out too. But, in its own way, it was like a gong in my head now, it countered all of the other white noise to stand out like a song.

I look toward the lady sitting next to me, sleeping soundly. The hum wasn’t bothering her. I look toward the one person sitting one row ahead of me on the other side of the aisle, snoring miserably. I could filter out that train wreck of noise, but not the hum.

The lady next to me lets out the softest of sighs, so I turn to look at her again. Sleeping and nearly still, one of those too-small-to-be-effective airplane blankets draped over her lap. I nearly turn my head to hunt for the hum when the lady gave the slightest of shivers. Her breath was controlled, but not quite relaxed. She was almost still, but not still in a restful way. It was easy to overlook when not really looking. Now that I was looking, however, she had enough tells that she was only appearing to be sleeping that it was impossible not to see it now. Just like it was impossible not to hear the hum.

I couldn’t escape the hum because it was coming from her. I couldn’t escape it because perhaps I could feel it in the most minute of ways. The slight arousal that was building as I realized what the hum was,made it even more impossible to try to forget about, not less.

I took my eyes off of her, yet her restful face seemed burned in my vision. She was pretty, if not beautiful. Soft lips, glowing skin, face framed in a raven black bob. But, it was a face of a woman currently trying to pleasure herself while believing the few around her were unaware.

Now that I was aware, my mind ran away with the thought. What wonderland did her mind take her while her vibrator buzzed away? Did it excite her more or less that someone was sitting right next to her while she was getting away with getting off in public? Did she dream about getting caught or just getting away with it?

My mind played out scenarios faster than I could process them. My blood was pumping hard and burning quick as it rushed faster in my body. My arousal was more intense than was comfortable, knowing I had few possibilities to relieve it.

I closed my eyes and tried to block it out. Instead, my mind weaved a fantasy of the lady being less discreet about how she pleasured herself. Blanket gone, skirt hiked up, fingers dancing. She was wearing a smile watching me watch her.

The more I tried to not think about her, the more explicit she became, the louder the hum seemed to become. As if drawing me deeper into becoming an active partner to the illicit behavior.

With my resolve slowly disintegrating, I allowed myself a moment of utter foolishness, and let me hand fall so it rested between my leg and hers, the top of my hand barely resting against her pathetic blanket. I could feel the hum against her leg.

I heard a slight gasp, but forced my breathing to be a slow, restful rhythm, my eyes softly closed. I wait for her to shift her leg away, but she never does. Did she catch me in my subterfuge? Did she believe me asleep but having the contact, slight as it was, added to the danger? I played out both scenarios and everyone in between in my head, more aroused than I have been for a long time, ensnared because of a haunting hum.

I feel the blanket move my hand, and suddenly feel my hand make direct contact with her warm thigh. In the process of adjusting her blanket, she makes sure my hand is now underneath its warmth, hidden. The jolt of it all was almost too much. My brain racing. Again. Am I caught, or is she adding more danger to increase her own thrill.

My fingers itched to be on the other side of her thigh. My cock quivered in the confines of my pants, currently the worst torture device ever devised.

I think about pulling away and ending the game, but I find I cannot. I think about opening my eyes to see, only to feel her rest her hand against mine. My breath caught and my eyes opened in reflex.

I caught her staring at me, with the softest of smiles. A gentleman, innocent of his crime, would have pulled his hand away, apologetically. She let out a gasp, I felt the smallest of quakes from her. She either caught me or deemed I wasn’t quite the gentleman. She lifted my hand to rest on top of her thigh, and pretended sleep once more. The invitation as clear and the delicate hum.

I closed my eyes as well and let my fingers slowly melt toward the source of the hum. It felt like it took forever to get there, the journey was the most blissful journey ever taken though.

The warmth increased, as did the humidity. The pulse of the hum felt stronger, countered to the pulse of her pulse. My fingers finally reached the hot wetness of her core, and I was struck with so much pent up lust my fingers caused her to hiss through her teeth.

I opened my eyes and saw wanton hunger staring back at me. The lady could have been the ugliest on the planet, and in that moment, she would have been the most gorgeous wearing that hunger.

My fingers fought the vibrator for surface area, the lady didn’t seem to mind. I was slowly forgetting where we were, so was she. The pleasure was giving way to a deeper need of intimate connection. And the power in that the only pleasure that could be directly tapped was hers, mine forced to hover in a strange limbo.

As if reading my mind, she rested her hand on my crotch and squeezed. I grunted and she beamed. In response, I dove my fingers as far down her as our positions allowed. She squirmed and got lost in them. I pressed my palm againsts the small vibrator and it pressed against her clit and then I fucked her just like that, beyond sane, just driven by lustful need.

I felt the warm wash flow over my fingers and she bit into her pathetically small pillow and trembled. I let her ride my hand and let myself enjoy the moment, even in my tortured limbo. It felt like forever, yet it was over way too soon.

Our little world smelled like her. It was intoxicating and maddening. She smiled, the most wicked of smiles. I tried to return it. The speakers suddenly cut into our private moment, “I am sorry passengers, but we are being diverted to Denver because of the weather. The airline is making arrangements for getting you all rooms for the duration.”

The lady smiled as if she won the biggest prize in the world, “It seems like we will be getting rooms for the night?”

“Or, perhaps we could save the airline some money by sharing one?”

“Perhaps…” Her eyes twinkled with all of the promises of a lover desiring to pay back in full.

Time fell and I knew it. My face towards the sun, and never leaving. 

<>Backspace, that doesn't make sense, <> :My mind: 

Time is the best thing ever, and I know it. 

<>You can't make a story out of that! Backspace, <> :My mind: 

Uh........................................... 

I don’t know what to write!

Friends weren't something 

That I ever came easily by, and so

I spent my summer days alone,

Climbing trees and walking our dog

And playing in sprinklers,

Each summer getting lonelier and lonelier.

There were friends, sure, that I met 

Once a year at camp and that was it,

And I had my siblings, but they got

Jobs and once again I was climbing trees

And playing in sprinklers, and walking our dog,

Alone and by myself, wishing that,

Even though I was too old for it,

That there was someone to draw with

Sidewalk chalk, and jump in puddles with,

And ride bikes, and giggle over cute guys

And make music with, or to hike in the woods

And get lost. But no one ever came to me,

And even today, I find that though there are

Those that I call occasionally and talk to, but

They are much older than me and live

Many miles away, so I sit and watch ripples

On the water, the waves in the grass, and

The sun set

Alone.