Azrael's Children

It's getting to be That Time of the Month Again:

Nathan gave me the Highest Praise on the special one in the corner: "I'd put that on a Trapper Keeper"

Not From Grace, But With It

I was on my afternoon walk when something bright on the sidewalk caught my eye.

a flutter of fallen wings

At first I was delighted- a big, beautiful butterfly!  But then I realized the movement came from the wind rather than any animating life force, and after a moment's mourning I was delighted for a different reason: a big, beautiful, dead butterfly!  I knew just the person who could use such a spectacularly lucky find, so I carefully scooped it up in my hand and carried it back to the office, where I proceeded to creep out my boss with it.  Everyone wins!

Procrastination- Not Just for Homework Anymore!

Rewrites are a wonderful thing, because they give you a chance to go in and flesh out characters that only got a passing glance in the rough draft- and to invent entirely new characters as needed.:

And then, as a way to procrastinate, you take the time to doodle these fourth and fifth tier characters...

Speaking of procrastination, all the non-carpeted floors in my house now smell like peppermint.  Why?  Because I scrubbed them all down with diluted peppermint extract in the hopes that it will keep the frigging ants away.  I have no idea where the little bastards are coming from, but I will figure out a way to kill them all (hopefully without poisoning the cats...)  Once upon a time I'd have been more lackadaisical about it, but that was before I was married to a man for whom ants can quite literally equal death.  So if you guys have any ant-slaughtering advice, feel free to chime in...

(Side note- this experience is making me hate carpet even more, because for all I know there are thousands of the little suckers marching back and forth beneath the gently wafting fronds of shag, and I would never know...)

Today's other adventures included hiking in Forest Park (short but sweet), hanging the guitars in the studio (plus a few other pieces of art), and selling a distortion peddle (ie, transforming it into a new photography equipment).  All in all, a pretty good day- and I still have another day off to go.

Mini Wars of Autumn

It has apparently reached that time of year in which Tiny Crawling Things believe that moving into my house is probably their best available Course of Action. Needless to say, I disagree with them; I believe their best available Course of Action is to stay outside and friggin' freeze to death.

And so begin the Mini Wars of Autumn, wherein they fling their unending ranks against my fortifications, and I ruthlessly slaughter them in ones, twos, and colonies. Books, shoes, the brute force of my thumb- whatever comes easiest in the moment. And still they come.

I'm investing in a new weapon tomorrow- peppermint oil. Supposedly it keeps ants away, without doing any harm to cats. We shall see. It will certainly be the best-smelling defense I've ever mounted.

The Ugly Bugling

Once upon a time there was a mommy grasshopper. She was very excited. She had laid her eggs back in the autumn, pushing each one carefully beneath the soil to keep it warm all through winter. Now it was spring, and the time had come for her eggs to hatch!

(It may be worth noting at this point that the mommy grasshopper was a ghost- a fact only tangentially relative to our story.)

She watched with pride as one by one her babies tunneled their way out of the soil. Each one was a beautiful miniature version of herself (or her mate) called a nymph. The mommy grasshopper was feeling very pleased with the whole situation, and was just about to go ahead and follow the Light into her next incarnation when she noticed one nymph that just didn't look like the others. She moved over to it to get a closer look.

It was true that he had bold and dashing stripes like all of his siblings- and it was true that he had gloriously strong hind jumping-legs. But his body was oddly truncated- it looked almost humped, as though someone had just pushed his head and his tail toward one another. And speaking of his tail, he seemed to have a pair of... well, the mommy grasshopper wasn't sure what was protruding from the little creature's posterior, but she knew that no self-respecting grasshopper would be caught dead with them. And she should know because (as mentioned) she herself was a ghost!

The other nymphs soon noticed the ugly little bugling in their midst, and they immediately began taunting him. The ugly bugling started to cry- after all, he was only a very young bugling, and had not yet had time to grow accustom to the basic cruelty of the world. All he wanted was to be loved and accepted by his hundred siblings! Also he wanted some food, and the grass the other nymphs were gnawing on just didn't seem to do it for him. So he was sad, and he was hungry, and all in all a pretty miserable (and ugly) bugling.

Just then, a powerful creature landed in the thick of the nymphs and began casually eating them. The mommy grasshopper was, of course, horrified, but then she remembered the waiting Light, shrugged, and Moved On. The ugly bugling watched in terror as the nymphs were gobbled up one after another. He couldn't help but notice that the insect eating them was boldly striped, with powerful jumping legs- but no wings. The creature paused in its meal long enough to give him the eye.

"Oh hullo there," it said around the flailing leg of a grasshopper nymph in its jaws. "So sorry- didn't realize you were already here. Do you mind terribly sharing?"

"Sharing?" said the ugly bugling, still trembling a bit.

"Well yes- I mean, I realize that grasshopper nymphs are something of a delicacy, but I shouldn't think that a little lad like yourself would be able to eat them all without some assistance!" The larger insect chuckled and helped himself to another of the ugly bugling's brothers. Or possibly a sister- the ugly bugling wasn't sure.

"I wasn't... I mean, they're my siblings! I had no plans to eat them!" protested the ugly bugling, although now that the other bug mentioned it, it didn't sound like such a bad idea.

"Siblings? Don't be ridiculous! You're not a mewling little herbivore of a grasshopper! You're a proud and clever cricket, like me! We're omnivores, don't you know! Here, try one- you'll see what I mean."

The ugly bugling took a bite out of his closest non-sibling. It wasn't making fun of his stumpy body now!

"You're right!" he said, smiling. "They're delicious!"

And that's how the ugly bugling realized his destiny as a totally kick-ass camel cricket, and learned that the best revenge is eating your enemies alive.


(Cricket?)


(PS A special thank-you to Nathan for suggesting the title and inspiring the story. Also, he gets kudos for not saying "I told you so" too often when it turned out he was right about the original ugly bugling.)

Kiss From a Visitor

golden light stirs me;
i turn my face to the sun
awaiting your touch.

sailing deep blue skies
you glide back into my life
tasting of nectar.

your honey-tongued lies...
i stand rooted by our past
swaying in this breeze.

gentle brush of lips
turns my trembling to a dance;
i have surrendered.

a final caress
from fluttering heart/wing beats...
your love flown once more.


(Visitor)

Ocelli

Whenever you read about psychics, or see a movie about them or whatever, they have really cool powers. Useful powers. Things like Seeing the future, or the past, or even the present- but the present hundreds of miles away. They can read minds, or move objects, or even light stuff on fire. Sometimes they can do all these things.

...but I am not that kind of psychic.

Sure, I have the third eye- apparently it's genetic, thanks Mom- but do you think it lets me See anything particularly awesome? No it does not. Do you know what it lets me See? It lets me see Light and Dark.

Now, I will admit it's slightly more cool that normal eyes, which only see light and dark. Notice the lack of capitals. Yeah, my third eye taps into Light and Dark, proper nouns- specifically the amount of each that you have in your soul- or whatever it is you want to call the thing that differentiates you from a corpse. What I'm saying is, I can tell whether or not you're good or evil just by looking at you.

And yeah, that sounds pretty good- maybe even useful, if one is prone to attracting the Wrong Sorts of People- but the truth of the matter is that most people? Neither good nor evil. Nope, just a nice balance of Light and Dark, maybe shading to one direction or the other, but not really enough to make them demons or angels (the existence of which, by the way, I choose to reserve judgment on). Even at my school, the kids are mostly in the middle. Yeah yeah, I know, I know- if I didn't have this Sight I, too, would swear that the vast majority of adolescents are pure evil- but they're not. They're just... hell, I don't know what they are. That's the other problem with this little "gift" of mine. It just shows me what is, not why it is. Which means I don't have any insights into the whole Nature vs Nurture thing, which is too bad, because I'm actually kind of fascinated by psychology.

But I digress.


(Husk)

Small Guardians

In the beginning, there stars were incapable of remaining aloft. They constantly fell back down to earth, for they were silly, clumsy things who could not focus long enough to remember their steps for a night (we must not judge them too harshly- they were very young, after all). This left the world in darkness a great deal more often than the world might like. Finally, Mother Luna had enough of such shenanigans, and she appointed the most gentle and sensible of her children, the moths, to help the stars learn their nightly dance.

For thousands of years, this was the way of things- moths gathering up the fallen stars and carefully ushering back to their appointed path- until gradually the stars began to be able to fend for themselves. To be certain, the stars were not perfect; no, at least once a night one or more would get distracted and fall again, and the moths would go and find that one (or five) who had strayed, and return it (or them) to their proper positions. Still more time passed, however, and eventually weeks might pass without a star falling: but the moths did not forget their purpose, and remained ever vigilant for their wayward charges. This is why, when man appeared with his false stars- his captured flames and his strange cold lights- the moths continually attempt to gather them up and return them to their distant, dancing brethren.


Moth to Flame