Prose poem prompt: Retell a well-known tale — Welcome, my son said the Divine Presence in a froth of chilly mist and ineffable thought I trust you’ve been well? Lucifer nodded his noble head Eyes wide, deep and blue-green as a primordial sea chiseled jawline sharp as a razor’s edge skin glowing deep bronze and flawless under the perpetual golden hour of…

Your mileage may vary — Recently I’ve thought that my writing on Medium has seen far too few narcissistic self-indulgent listicles. This piece aims to remedy that shortfall. Below are some books I first read between my early teens and mid-twenties which affected my worldview or my philosophy or the way I string a sentence…

“Why didn’t Leander bring bacon?” — Marcus Aurelius, ruler of the Roman Empire from CE 161 to 180, was widely considered a wise and just emperor. Today he is admired for his Meditations, which exemplify Stoic philosophy and the virtues of wisdom, moderation, courage, and justice. Recently a British tourist sleeping off a bender in a…

Imagine a zombie apocalypse in slow motion — Stupid science. Just when we all got chill with the mass delusion that COVID-19 was over, a study in British medical journal The Lancet suggests that the real fuckening may be yet to come. The research looks at individuals suffering from long COVID, aka Post-COVID-19 condition (PCC), and the conclusions…

Calm down, people, not like that — Yesterday was a pleasingly quiet day at the gym pool. Each of the three lanes had only a single occupant, and I was enjoying floundering my way up and down my row without risk of collision. As I was almost ready to leave, a dark, attractive woman in a bathing…

Technology is making phone cons more convincing —learn to recognize the signs — My ex-wife C was over at the house, temporarily relieving me as the adult in charge of watching our son play online games. She’d just arrived when she got a phone call. “No. No. Definitely not. That wasn’t me.” As someone who’s had my identity stolen twice — I’ve since…

The in-between places — When I was a boy the path to the Borderlands was straight and sure there we could be anyone hunters, heroes, sailors on unknown seas builders of worlds We were immortal, we were. Then without warning, we were grown not caring that the path was gone exploring further, faster roads snatching more than…

The King visits the Shire with a message for all hobbits — The Shire had already been abuzz with the news for days by the time the trumpeting of the heralds sounded at the borders. “He has arrived!” cried the hobbits to one another, flushed with excitement. As far as anyone knew, no king had ever visited them, and certainly not one…

“Methane may be providing the first indication that a very large-scale…reorganisation of the climate system is already underway” — If the ongoing year of climate catastrophe hasn’t got you pondering global warming, maybe this will help. A recent study in the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles details some unsettling findings about methane in the Earth’s atmosphere. According to the new research, the current situation resembles something in the geological record…