August Literature DD Round Up

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Deviation Actions

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Where Seagulls Dare    “There’s no escape, you know.”
    Thomas put his head on one side, slapping the water out of his ear. “Sorry?”
    “There’s no escape...from the island.” The heavily bearded man gave him a stare. “The same rocks that sank your vessel have defeated my every attempt at floating a raft.”
    “Oh.” Thomas wasn’t sure exactly what one was supposed to say in this situation. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
    “There’s food enough to get by here, if you don’t mind bitter roots, insects, sour berries. That’s almost the cruellest thing.” Beneath his stitched-leaf hat, his eyes gazed out to sea. “Compared with the open ocean, this place offers a fair chance of survival. But can it really be called living? Trapped here...on the island?”
    
five.Five is the number of times you worry he’s stopped breathing, as the surgeons carve around his heart, twisting away the plaque ridden arteries, and pulling a vein out of his leg. Five is the number of heart wrenching hours you and your family were waiting in the hospital room, worried that your lives would crumble, that there would be five members of the family instead of six, that five days out of the week he would not come home for dinner, that five kisses from him would no longer be given to his wife and four children. Five was the amount of fingernails you bit off while watching people enter and exit the waiting room, and the amount of minutes your mother spent on the phone, explaining that something was wrong. Five is the critical difference between holding a father’s hand as your mother cries into his heart shaped pillow. The difference between rejoicing and smiling weakly because he’s okay or carrying your father’s American-flag-covered-casket and watchin Blank EntryInspector Andel removed her contact screens and allowed herself a small sigh of nostalgia. She had borrowed a tablet from the archives department, and now weathered hands were flicking their way through cold case files. Hand-typed files. She'd almost forgotten that she used to deliver reports just like these.
"It's not the 20s any more, Andel. We don't use tablets."
Andel had been too absorbed to notice Dieter sneaking up on her until the overbearing git had pulled up a chair opposite. Dieter was tall, young, charismatic, and by all accounts was everything Andel was not.
"Cold cases," she said, with a lot less venom than she had intended, "It's the only way to view the reports."
Dieter leaned back and propped his feet up on her desk. "Ah yes, cold cases. Well I suppose you have to do something while your officers are out with the response teams."
She ignored the feet bouncing obtrusively at her. It was too late to say anything now – she had to pretend they never bothered h
The BeginningHe told them, of course. He told those idiots everything, the whole damn story, including the blunder he'd made, and its consequences. Looking back on it later, he realized he had probably been in shock the whole time. It made sense, anyone would have been.
Soph was about twenty years old, and he'd been that way for a couple of years already, ever since the Hoarde had started attacking humanity from the past. Every day that passed, they ate at another day in the past. It sickened him. Those creatures had absolutely no regard for proper time and causality protocols.
It didn't seem to affect anyone else that way, though.
The Hoarde was the result of a human creation, of course, like everything bad in the world, though no one else knew about them. Then again, no one else had undiluted access to the power of creation. Even he didn't know much about the Hoarde, only that they appeared through some tear in The Fabric of The World and started killing people off. They appeared at some point in
dead dog julyI.
the summer heat lays limp in the city’s lap,
breathing long oppressive breaths.
it does not even lift its lolling head
to bark out hoarse indignancy
when a strange man brings the mail.
II.
there might be heavy rain today,
they say,
brought by some swollen, murmuring cloud.
so what?
the world will whirl and howl,
then settle down,
to die a little more.
III.
o, quickly, love,
press your back against the wall in fear
as the universe spreads her arms and
shuts her eyes
and starts to summon the end of all things.
o, quickly,
come with me
to the place of windows full of speechless afternoon
hot windy whispers of half-formed solutions and resolutions,
sweltering sunlit meadows we’ll wander and then forget.
o quickly, love,
let’s to the season of forgetting
and unwind all of our harshest memories
and fill the universe’s mouth
with mute cotton.
IV.
i’ll whisper these words to you some evening
with all my exigency in the hand i rest on your arm—
and you
Red Riding HoodI want to believe people so badly when they say they won’t bite
that I contemplate climbing into their smiling jaws
thinking that it might be better to be split in two than left hanging.
But always, I draw my red hood and flit back into the forest
running in the shadows of pathways, never stepping into clearings
because I’ve spent my whole life in the wilderness
and I still can’t tell the wolves from the woodsmen.


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Features by inknalcohol





i vanish.a few excessive kilograms
adorn my body,
stubborn in their departure:
like an uninvited guest
too dense to perceive
the subtle hints i leave
on my skin;
not feeling as blessed as i
could have been
if i were
thin.
if i am too much
then why do i feel like
i am not enough
for the starved society
that eats away at my insides
& feeds me
empty, palatable lies,
(a fabricated portrayal of reality's demise)
leaving me wishing
that each bittersweet tear i cry
is enough to rid my body,
my healthy home,
of excess salt
all through my eyes;
not realising that the number
beneath my feet
does little to measure
each person who feeds
off of my kindness, my sincerity,
that each time i bleed
myself away
in a well fed wish
to vanish,
i'm just another one of society's prey
losing themselves
to what they weigh.
:thumb448086385: :thumb443208918: Charred remains of a modern society    The little girl was dancing on the street, among the entrails of a once bustling suburb now strewn chaotically across the scorching asphalt. Her blithesome essence shone through her skin, in the whimsical way she twirled and threw her arms in the air, brushing her wayward curls aside. She crafted a dust storm and trapped the sunlight in her eyes, oblivious to the rubble sinking into her toes and the loaded gun in her brothers hand. 
   Bang.
   She fell, asphyxiated by her own storm as the bullet carved its way into her flesh. And as the last gleam of light left her eyes, poppies blossomed from the cracked pavement, their crowns swaying in the chemical laden wind the way the girl never would again. 
Thirty Three Percent"What are you doing?"
"I think…I finally figured out percentages."
"We learnt those in the third grade."
"Yeah, but we always complained that we'd never use them in real life."
"And you know how to use them in real life now?"
"Eighty four percent."
"What's that?"
"That's the percentage of how many basketball matches you lost to me when we were kids."
"That's not fair! You're taller than me!"
"Fifty two percent."
"Is that how much taller than me you are?"
"No. That's the percentage of times you speak out of turn and get into trouble for it."
"Very funny."
"Twenty three percent."
"Let me guess, that's how much I annoy you?"
"That's the percentage of times your mother told you she loved you when you were a child instead of the amount she should have."
"..."
"Seventy nine percent."
"I don't think I like this game anymore."
"That's how much of your heart loved that guy who broke it so completely callously."
"Look, I'm serious. Stop."
"Ten percent."
"Please stop."
"That's how sure you a
:thumb462411546: eugenics in bulkBy the time she was twelve they had already decided she would marry a man who could run a five minute mile and speak seven languages.  They chose her a husband the same way they had chosen her eyes and her legs and the pale freckles that interrupted her nose - the same way their parents had designed their children and arranged their marriages, strategic.
Her father called her petite reine. He owned an antique chess board carved from ebony wood and maple.  Some days she'd sneak into the library, pry open the old chequered box and pick out one of the queens, and she'd turn it round and round, searching for imperfections. It was a plain, ugly thing, huge and fat in her tiny grasp.  She had wondered if he thought of her this way.  
She wondered the same now.  
Her hands were not her own.  A businessman in a white coat had grown them slender and strong, built her carbon fiber bones and nails like arrowheads.  Her mother reminded her of this when the
Ain't No Redemption - Chapter OneOf Gunpowder Deeds


    There are many ways to kill a man. A blade in the night, poison in his drink, or hands around his throat. For the unjust, who ride the wastes on malignant steeds, the question of death had many answers.
    To those who sit on the thrones of justice, with scrutiny in their eyes and the word of the law upon their tongues, the answer was the hangman's gallows or the headman's block.
    For he who stalks this Fragment, where the Deadman himself comes to play, the question of death has but one answer. But he is willing to repeat it six times.
    -From, The Lay of the Gunfighter,
    Thibian Crass, 3092 AFL
     
     
    The Deadman's Waste,
    The Fragment of Tume,
    3090
:thumb446298391: :thumb474810438: :thumb471648127: what love is not.it was a s l o p p y first kiss where
my drunk lips fumbled against yours.
the dull thwack of my heart,
locked behind curved ribs
cleared my groggy brain, 
clouded with lustful premonitions.
it was an e l e c t r i f y i n g first kiss where
you entwined your hands in my hair.
your mouth encompassed mine and
my breath became lost in the steady
rise
&
fall
of your chest.
it was a s h y first kiss where
i pulled away before you could explore.
your tongue grazed my teeth, 
searching for a way past the ivory gates.
i dug my finger into the stubble along your jaw,
my nail lulling your carnal desires.
it was my first kiss with you.
A Guide to Writing DialogueWhat is dialogue, exactly? The definition from Merriam-Webster’s dictionary was several lines long, so I shall summarize it in a short sentence for the sake of the readers; it’s the writing that illustrates conversations between two or more characters in a story. We read and hear it all around us, but creating it in your own work can be a challenge. However, if you find dialogue an obstacle in your writing, then don’t push the panic button. In this tutorial, you’ll find by analyzing what dialogue can do and how to use it, you can turn your greatest fear into your greatest ally in your story.
What dialogue is
Like I’ve asserted before, dialogue is basically what the characters are saying to each other. It can be found in multiple mediums such as books, movies, comics, video games, etc.  We even engage in dialogue daily without even thinking. When you talk to your best friend, a co-worker, or even your dog, you create dialogue. It’s exchang
:thumb373715871: :thumb472131346: Short PoemHer eyes return my gaze,
A gentle “Hello” at first glance.
Those chocolate brown coloured eyes,
So full of love and compassion.
                                                           Without a sound from my lips,
                                                                 A solitary cry escapes.
                                                           Her serene marble-like stare,
                                   
AndromedaAmongst the darkened skies
Brightened by only starlight
Children play
Delightfully across
Every land,
Field & Sea.
Gravity is only an afterthought
Hilltops become ladders into the sky while
Inferior planets stare down upon the Earth
Jealous of such simplicity yet contemplating grandeur.
Keppler only thought of science
Linear, elliptical, movement…
Mythology had no such thoughts
Neptune & Nebulas both inhabit space
Orbiting across the lonely darkness
Probably never worried about mundane things
Questioning their existence
Right now or for all eternity such as us.
Shooting stars make us joyful while
Terminator is an otherworldly spectacle
Unknown to all those hidden in their houses
Various stars await us outside
Waiting to play like we did before
Xenagogue & inviting
Youthful but ancient curiosities.
Zenith induced euphoria continues until daylight…
You Were Not An Aquarium BoySea-glass became your bones,
brine your blood, and seashells
melded into your skin.
You were not quite an ocean
when you said "This is your sign to love me."
My body was like a building;
tall, cold, almost unbreakable.
I was metallic and sharp,
towering over your waters.
I remember taking your hand in mine,
conch and coral shells scrubbing
my skyscraper wrists, and laughing
about how one day you would
submerge every last bit of me.
Your lips, riddled with argonauts,
found my cheek and I cringed
at the coarseness.
You asked if they bothered me
and I finally told you "I
think I love you."


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Features by neurotype-on-discord





:thumb411617561: :thumb446388815: :thumb432420575: The Girls My Mama Warned Me About--- FFM Day 3You see, the thing my mama would never understand is that a woman needs to have her friends. I’m not talking about the girls she meets in a book club that she randomly signed up for online, or the ones she calls friends but never sees outside of the breakroom at work. No, I mean real friends. The girls she’ll always surround herself with, like a queen does a court.
  I had my girls, and my mama didn’t necessarily approve of them. She thought I partied with them too much, and often told me that I needed to give it a rest. But, these were my girls! My best friends! I don’t think Mama has ever had girls like I did. They’ve never abandoned me, and I could never have dreamt of abandoning them.
__________________________________________________________________________________________
   My girls were so unique. Each one was as different as the colors of the rainbow. There was Vonda and Teena, the two wild girls I met at a party some time while I w
GrandfatherI recall,
He was white.
But, not the
--"controversial at political dinner parties" and "this racist comment will cost him the election kind"--
Stark, snowy, riveting white.
His hair was always victim to the static that came from
resting against
the mountain of pillows that topped off his hospital bed.
He always lay there,
a beacon in the middle of the dark, mudd brown, living room.
I suppose it was hell to live the last of his life there,
but at six, I thought he was God,
living on a cloud that was Heaven.
I remember his warm hands, their blue lines, and their wrinkles,
the way his smile never met his eyes--
and his eyes said he had more in his mind than his mouth could say.
I would study him for hours while he slept,
Hoping he would wake up, be glad that I was there to cure his loneliness,
and give me secrets to the world.
Once in awhile, I was lifted to the wintery heights of his bed,
Set beside him to talk.
And his warm hands would cup over mine,
Whilst I told him about the dandelio
FaeriefireWe all hid when the faeries dueled.
You and I were in the closet, wishing to each other half-secretly among the motes that the duels could be rare as dragons, at least.  Instead they were only rare as quarter-moons.
Ground liquifies, sometimes, during a duel.  The stars brighten and fall faster, leaving holes in the ground and setting forests alight.  The sun hides in a bird’s nest, they say.
We did not see when the damage was done.  We were accustomed to avoiding to know even the names of those who fought.  Our eyes were far from windows.
But duels always ended the day after they began, and we stepped out as if we were free.
Your eyes caught the light first, and when I followed them my air caught in my throat.  Like going underwater without the protection of a mermaid.
That day our world was on fire.  The glass of the town hall had melted to colorful puddles on the ground.  Some houses were gone - some people too, I realized.  Surviva
TrivelaJanice didn't rush towards the dome wall. She limped as fast as she could, shifting weight to her good foot, painfully moving forward. She splayed her hands on the transparent wall and gazed at the growing crack. I realized I was holding my breath - everyone was - but I relaxed when the crack stopped growing. Janice sighed, lowered her head and just stood there, hands still on the wall, her silhouette framed by the red sand outside.
I wanted to get up from the gray grass, to tell Janice it was all going to be okay. I wanted to tell her it was just a surface crack and that I would fix it in the morning, before I did my rounds checking the air conditioning. It would take me just a few minutes and it wasn't a big deal, it was just a matter of using a liquid neoplexiglass gun to refill it. The wall was fine and I was sure Janice knew it. I couldn't understand why she looked so upset. Was it her leg? Was it hurt that bad?
"It just… burst," Janice said, not even bothering to
love people"We call everything a river here."
                    --Richard Brautigan
there's a love parade
this sunday
beautiful blue and white houses
spill children into the street
like beads of happy colored glass--
music all over.
the trees are spring,
fall, and summer,
apricot angels
green yellow maples
all love people
two moons to a face
I think of a quiet
pebbled stream in this moonlight
and a younger woman,
like a single brush of ink,
dipping softly,
as the pebbled stream dips,
into winter, or untimed wild.


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Features by ShadowedAcolyte






making teain a warmed pot
hot water and tea leaves
meet in an intimate embrace
pleased by the tea leaves' attentions
the water becomes a sweet golden nectar
but the water is a cruel lover
and she turns bitter if held too long
so the tea leaves are left behind
tired and used, forgotten
the water has taken what she wants
The Son, the Father, and Whatever is HolyDo you ever stop to think about those
Old, old stories bound in myriad cantos?
The kind that are all in iambs and Latin
Or Italian – the language of a world in the grip
Of a renaissance that is seeping drip by drip
Into a darkened age, like so much lantern oil.
I do, but for purely selfish reasons –
I think of them as balm for lesions
That keep popping up in my mind.
Lesions, mind you, that are not literal –
They are but the inlets in the littoral
Region of my morbid thoughts.
When the inlets get flooded, I build leather
Boats to keep myself afloat. Whether
I construct them well is up to interpretation.
I cling to the old stories in cadent verse –
When I am particularly low I rehearse
Them aloud – as my mode of survival.
He never understood that, though –
He never really could, and no
Matter how I tried, it was no use.
He didn’t see that for me finishing
The rhyme kept me from diminishing
Into slow-burning insanity.
It hurts me more than him, t
WaitingGod never takes a number
at the DMV. He sits on the broken
chair wobbling over jaundiced
tiles and watches people come and go.
Young drivers, nervous and cocky;
mature drivers renewing tags;
muddled drivers taking a fifth picture.
God never takes a number
because He understands waiting
for what seems to be eternity –
for a plan to unfold, for His
work to be done, for Lucifer
to come home – and appreciates
the company of impatient
souls, longing to be elsewhere.
Don't Fall In Love With A Writer               Just because they will bruise your neck with pearls of metaphors; and splash palettes of colours onto your chest with reckless waves and boundless twilight. They will smear ink onto your lips as you kiss them because that is how they leave hickeys. They are wildest in their 2 a.m. diary, and liveliest in book racks of novels; they have butterflies in every heartbeat and they breathe living poems. They leave trails in libraries and coffee shops like Hansel leaves crumbs in forest and they have undying lovers because every love story is ever living in their abyssal oceans of analogies and similes. They know every cliché like the sunset knows the moon rise, and every wound in their heart like blood in their veins. They are terrifying because they weave you in splinters of fires rolling down their cheeks. They are weird because they don't smile much but sometimes you could catch their smiles in poems or tales. They are psychotic b Liquor is one way out an'death's the other The art of growing up,
is to pour shots of whiskey                                            
into your coffee in the morning
to make it through
the day.
when all you want to do
is lie in bed
instead,
but there’s nothing
beautiful
about that
either.
Spectraphotons
             like phantoms
                                   cross our paths
unseen                       except
             for their effects
                             every poem begins with sometimes
every dream begins with maybe
Nervous MovementYou're a dime a dozen in a sea of billions.
Individuality has no significance in numbers so vast.
And while this fact may make looking forward hard
we can't keep living in the past.
You're a nervous movement in a freeze frame scene.
Steady hands won't help hold up such a fragile act.
And while you take your time keeping character
you fake what you can't take back.
With nothing more than a thought we form our actions
and this is where we extinguish the lie they tried to invent.
The lie that we painted our lives without passion
well conclusions are useless with no attempt to commence.
You're a song I can't name stuck in my head.
I've  listened to you before and probably will again.
And while I can hum the melody all day long waiting
for it to hit me I still won't know where you've been.
You're a gust that has never changed direction.
Nothing can touch you you're only felt as you brush skin.
And while you can't be stopped, nothing lasts,
nothing can escape an end not even the wind.
W





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wispy-blue's avatar

:bulletblue: always good reads. 
:bulletblue: red riding hood :+fav:
:bulletblue: to everyone:
:iconcongratsdd1plz::iconcongratsdd2plz::iconcongratsdd3plz: