Category: Writing

Attempts at creative writing and journalism

Writing

‘Tis The Season

| thetembo
Reading Time: 5 minutes

The three ghosts, Christmas Past, Christmas Now, and Christmas Future, aren’t coming to my manor for a visit this year. Not because I had some great change in my personality. I never did find my giving and loving self. Oh sure, I bought a turkey one time after my first haunting. A couple of farthings of supermarket turkey is hardly a profound change of demeanor. And the kid nearly lost an eye when I tossed the roll of farthings to him from the second-story window to fetch it.
I like those guys. I affectionately call them CP, CN, and CF. I ask around. I discover that the reason they aren’t coming is that they were let go. I asked CP what happened because he knows the past and if anyone could tell me what happened, it would be him. He told me, “Failure to successfully meet any of the mission objectives.”
So I figure this year, I will go and visit each of them. Maybe I will scare the hell of them for a change, it might just cheer them up.

I start Christmas eve over at CP’s place. I have to knock, of course. I don’t get to just pop into the middle of someone’s past like he does.
He’s in his usual black robe. It’s the past that’s dead, not the future, at least not the part we care about. He lets me in. The place is coated with cobweb and dusty memories.
“Ebenboooozer! Ebenbooooozer!” he wails. “Come in.”
“Hey CP. Nice place. Love what you’ve done with it.” I brush some cobwebs out of the way. They stick to my hand. I try shaking them off. I cough in the dust.
“You should get yourself a maid. You know, someone that can come around every once in a while and give the place a real deep clean.”
CP’s eyes would have rolled in his skeletal face if he actually had any eyes. “It doesn’t really work that way. You can’t just scrub out your memories,” he says.
“Anyway, sorry to hear about the job. Maybe I could write a five-star review for you or something. If you think it would help?”
CP wags his bony finger at me. “It wouldn’t have much credibility. I mean you still haven’t changed.”
“I feel bad about that. It’s not your fault. Look what you were up against. I mean sure, you have guilt and regret on your side. But how does that stand up against compound interest? You know I was watching a TV show on so-called financial advisors the other day and the show informed me I wasn’t just losing a few bucks here and there on every commission but because of compound interest, I was losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in future earnings. The quarter I gave twenty years ago is costing me a thousand bucks today. How can I give when it’s going to cost me a million dollars? You want to scare the shit out of someone, you should go into that business. You really gotta up your game if you want to compete against compound interest, the most powerful force on the planet. Einstein said that and Einstein discovered gravity and quantum physics.”
CP sits down on a wooden stool. He looks sullen and defeated. “I would like you to leave now.”

It’s not a long stretch to get from the past to the present. I knock on CN’s door. I have to knock of course. I don’t get to pop in all invisible, like a peeping tom.
“Ebenboooozer! Ebenbooooozer!” They all say it like that. Force of habit I guess. “Come in.”
“Hey CN.” CN is in full holiday regalia, decked out as if he were jolly old Santa Claus himself. He is stuffing himself with cookies and milk, maybe from Trader Joe’s. He drinks the milk straight out of the carton. He offers me the carton and what little is left. He mixes it with an aperitif.
I refuse slightly disgusted. “Dude, have some respect for your body. You ought to get a personal trainer or something. You’re letting your body go to hell.”
“I don’t have a body,” he counters. “And turning you around was my ticket to the good place. But thanks to your stubbornness that didn’t turn out so well.” He puts down the aperitif glass and picks up a candle.
“I feel bad about that. I wish there was something I could do to help. It’s not your fault. Look what you were up against. I mean sure, you have compassion and altruism on your side. But how does that stand up against marketing? I mean the whole Christmas thing doesn’t even make sense anymore. You have to buy stuff to give and the people that you buy the stuff from are the ones that are guilting you into giving so they can make a profit. You don’t hold a candle to those guys when it comes to the fear of gifting. You should take some marketing classes or get some training. Maybe you could use some of that hypocrisy in your hauntings next year?”
CN puts down the candle shaking his head no. He looks a little paler than before.
“Can’t you bend the means a little bit to achieve a good end?” I ask.
“No. The means to the end matter. It’s in the by-laws.” He falls back onto the chair. He looks a little shaken. “I would like you to leave now.”

The path to the future is uncertain and I’m running out of time. The evening is almost over. I finally find CF’s place. Or one possible future’s place. There’s a bunch of them. I’m not entirely sure this is the right one. It’s not like I can see into the future. I knock on the door.
CF answers. “Ebenboooozer! Ebenbooooozer! Come in,” she croons, slightly more pleasant than her predecessors. Her appearance changes as fast as the thoughts in my head. Sometimes she looks seductively beautiful; other times she looks like she just rolled out of bed.
“Hey CF.” I enter and inspect my surroundings. “I thought you would have had a much nicer place with all your knowledge of the future. More futuristic. You know metallic and shiny and minimalist in an expensive kind of way.”
“Well that seems uncalled for,” she complains. “I might have a nicer place if I still had a job. No thanks to you.”
“Yeah, sorry about the job. Maybe I could write a five-star review for you or something. If you think it would help?”
“Nah, don’t worry. I mean this is just one possible future of many.”
“I wish there was something I could do to help. It’s not your fault. Look what you were up against. I mean sure, you have decency and hope on your side. But how does that stack up against marketing and capitalism? Did you know that if a group of people plays a game where you win 20% over what you already have or lose 20% of what you already have in every one-on-one encounter, only one person will emerge as the winner, even if they start under the exact same conditions. You’re lucky to win with a fair deck. And we aren’t playing against a fair deck.”
“Be quiet. I order you to be quiet,” she raises her voice.
“Order me? Really? You got to come with more than that. Haha. Order me. That’s kind of cute. This place may be one possible future but the other 99.9% of the futures look a lot like this one. Maybe you oughtta take a course in economics? You’d make a great professor. And you might learn some better tactics.”
Her image seems to settle on a beaten-down middle-aged woman. She takes a shot and lights up a cigarette. “I think you should go now.”

An apparition appears to me in the morning. I’m a little bit groggy. Usually, the apparition appears before the ghosts come. “You did it!” the apparition moans ecstatically.
“Did what?” I ask.
“CP, CN, and CF have their jobs back. I’ve never seen them look so terrifying and determined. They sent me to thank you. They’d come themselves but there is still time for a few posts- Christmas hauntings. What did you say to them?”
“I just gave them a little encouragement is all.”
“It was a very nice gift.”
“‘Tis the season.”

Writing

Space Spider

| thetembo
Reading Time: < 1 minute

The story of Arabella 

Part of an experiment
   to test your skill,
that has nothing to do
   with getting your fill.    
With no prey
   the web has no use, 
making you weave it
   is a form of abuse.    
In a space garden
   with no chance for a fly, 
tell them to f**k off
   and hope they die. 
With nothing to catch
   better off dead, 
you rise above your circumstances
   with a pearled perfect web.
Writing

Rain Drop

| thetembo
Reading Time: < 1 minute

a raindrop hits the surface of still water, sometimes a bell-shaped bubble forms like a popped corn standing proud on the water, sometimes it does not, a critical mass is needed.

regardless of whether a bubble is born, the circular ripples of the drop expand outward popping the other bubbles in its path as soon as it reaches them, before its ripples fade back, into the stillness of the water.

Writing

Six Blind Elephants and a Man

| thetembo
Reading Time: 2 minutes

A group of six elephants stumbled upon a naked man in the dark of the night. It being a particularly dark night, they could not see the creature they surrounded. A voice called out nearby, “Honey, are you coming back to the tent? I am Lonely.” Out of curiosity more than fear, the six elephants wished to know what “Honey” was by touch.

The first elephant’s trunk landed upon its short nose and deduced, “It is a creature that most certainly cannot swim in deep water, not having much of a trunk for a snorkel.”

The second elephant’s trunk draped across its spindly legs and said, “It is like a silken blade of elephant grass.”

The third elephant touched upon its teeth and concluded, “It must be a child of the species as it has no tusks to fight off enemies or champion for the female.”

The fourth elephant touched upon its hairy head and countered, “I detect patches where the small brain has signs of rot. It must be old, having lost its tusks already.” The third elephant reassessed his interpretation, “A possibility.”

The fifth elephant poked at the rapidly beating heart and said, “It certainly must be an excitable creature.”

The sixth elephant grabbed “Honey” by the tail and observed, “It has a nice thick tail for swatting flies away.”

At the grabbing of his tail, Honey screeched, “Hey, Hey, Hey,” pulling away. Young elephants will hold the tail of an older elephant to follow them from one place to the next so the sixth elephant was slow to let go but Honey worked himself free and went crashing away through the underbrush.

The six elephants quickly reached a consensus, “A scrawny scared creature,” laughing at its defenselessness curious how such a creature could survive.

“Should we go find out what a Lonely is?”

Writing

Solastalgia

| thetembo
Reading Time: < 1 minute

Like the aftermath of a beautiful sunset of deep oranges wrinkled in the sky, cyans and cerulean blues coloring the opens spaces between crimson stretches that reach into the darkness of blue-grey clouds to tint the bottoms of the opposing sky, pink, my little patch of nature is gone like the day leaving nothing but grey, indifferent clouds of the long night.

Trash litters the trail, shredded plastic bags torn by exposure to the sun and the wind rustle in the stench. The ersatz leaves of bags and wrappers catch in the branches of the bushes. A feral pig roots through the trash and mud at the water’s edge, eying me warily. A ripple in the surface might be a fish, I can’t imagine what could survive in this cesspool. Shorebirds wade in the cesspool, out of desperation for clean water? Yellow flowers of weeds heroically push their way through the trash and broken concrete. Power lines hum overhead.

In my mind, I see the fast-flowing stream of my youth. On a lucky day, I might spot the fin of a steelhead making its way upstream to its spawning grounds or an otter darting in and out of the reeds and cattails, or an osprey patrolling the waters for a meal. I might skip stones over the surface, paddle a kayak, take a few pictures of a fragile flower, have lunch on the banks, or throw a stick in the water for my dog to give chase.

What happened to my small patch of nature? Did it surrender to my absence? Why did nobody speak for it? Why do I only speak for it now, in its death?

Writing

Oarfish

| thetembo
Reading Time: < 1 minute

undulating ribbon fish,
a vertical pipe,
a thousand meters down,
living in the night

withstanding pressure,
despite a thin skin,
living in a mystery,
that would do a man in.

Writing

Mayfly

| thetembo
Reading Time: < 1 minute

awakens from an aquatic crib,

a larva emerges to fly

on beautiful golden wings,

to dance and f**k and die.

(Pic from https://www.pca.state.mn.us/featured/mayflies-another-sign-mississippi-rebirth)

Writing

Eelectric Twins

| thetembo
Reading Time: < 1 minute

It’s a foregone conclusion,
who would win,
when electric animals,
meet their electric twins.

If a platypus,
met a hungry eel,
Eelectric battery,
would make it a meal.
The electric duck bill,
would voltaically sense,
The high voltage taser,
electrically intense.

As the eel ingested,
the pus it sucked,
Fortified with flavor,
of electrified duck.
Fatty beaver tail,
and seared otter fur,
A venomous snakebite,
from its hind spur.

A nasty spur snakebite,
would leave a bad taste,
Tearing at eel insides,
laying them to waste.
The poisonous needle,
would give a nasty prick,
Injecting the eel,
fatally sick.

It’s a foregone conclusion,
who would win,
When electric animals,
meet their electric twins.

Writing

Anthropocene Park

| thetembo
Reading Time: 2 minutes

E: Welcome to Anthropocene Park! I’m glad you made it. I’ve quite a lineup for you. There are several shows and presentations. Do you have a preference?

M: I haven’t had a chance to look them over. Do you have any recommendations?

E: The Nuclear Age is one of my most popular shows. I give a young patent clerk the formula for mass and energy equivalence. Don’t look the other way or stop to eat some stardust. The humans drop two bombs in the first 45 years.

M: I love it. How long does that one last?

E: The show only lasts a couple of hundred years. You’ll be finished in no time.

M: Ok. What else should I see while I’m here?

E: If you don’t have a lot of time, I highly recommend the implosion exhibit. I give a research team the formula for quantum gravity. They have to build a 130 TeV collider to achieve the necessary energies to prove the formula. Spoiler Alert, if they ever get smart enough to build a 500 TeV collider, it might be the last show I ever give.

M: Wow! Aren’t you worried?

E: Probably not enough. Of course, I could stop the show if I had to and reset. But I’ve never had to abort a show yet!

M: Cool. Well, I don’t get to this part of the galaxy too often, so I want to take in as much as I can.

E: If you have lots of time, try the AI show. I give a computer scientist the formula for machine consciousness. Haha. Humans crack me up. You know they can’t help themselves. The machines are usually smart enough to stay subtle and bide their time. Ah, but I’ve probably given away too much already.

M: No worries. I mean, I would be disappointed if it ever ended any other way.

E: It always ends the same. All I have to do is provide a little technology and those bright energetic humans always do the rest. I also have some presentations you might want to take in. Good old fashioned catastrophes: tidal waves, an asteroid impact, or the occasional mega volcano. As a bonus, after the catastrophe, I give them the technology to detect and warn one another. You can make some good money betting on whether or not they will use the technology to save themselves. But you do have to wait a couple of hundred years before the next catastrophe.

M: I’m here to relax. Don’t need the stress, thanks. They don’t mind that I watch?

E: Haha. No. They just incorporate you into their narrative as a moon. The best part of it is that they always think you are the dead one.

M: I appreciate the irony. Oh, how come you changed the name from Earth to Anthropocene Park?

E: Well, the truth is, I realized the humans where my biggest attraction so I focus on them. I hope you enjoy the shows and presentations. I’ll send a few crunchy asteroids and some space dust your way for appetizers.

M: Thanks for the snacks and the attractions. I’m sure I’ll give them all a top rating.

Halo
Writing

Mosquito and Whitefly are Dead

| thetembo
Reading Time: 2 minutes

Mosquito and Whitefly are Dead

Setting: Mosquito and Whitefly flutter over a shallow sea; the chemical scent of their food driving them onward. Mosquito has just learned that they are to deliver a message, but they will die as soon as the message is delivered.

Mosquito: “Let’s not do it. Let’s not deliver our message.” He flips a coin, it is heads.

Whitefly: “If we don’t do it, what do we do?” She flips a coin, it is heads.

Mosquito: “We could work on our flying, try to perfect it.” He flips a coin, it is tails.

Whitefly: “Perfect it how? Why? If I fly too much, then I’m somebody’s lunch.” She flips a coin, it is tails.

Mosquito: “If we deliver our payload, we die.” He flips a coin, it is tails.

Whitefly: “But that is the only purpose we have.” She flips a coin, it is tails.

Mosquito: “Why don’t we at least look at the message?” He flips a coin, it is heads.

Whitefly: “Why?” She flips a coin, it is heads.

Mosquito: “So we know what it is.” He flips a coin, it is tails.

Whitefly: “Won’t that kill the mystery?” She flips a coin, it is tails.

Mosquito: “How many times have we both thrown the same thing?”

Whitefly: “89 already. Rather improbable I think.”

Mosquito: “You throw first this time.”

Whitefly: “I’m going to look at the message.” She flips a coin, it is tails.

Mosquito: “What does it say?” He flips a coin, it is tails.

Whitefly: He takes the message out of its viral envelope and reads it: “ACGACACCCTGACTTA.” She flips a coin, it is tails.

Mosquito: “What does it mean?” He flips a coin, it is tails.

Whitefly: “I don’t know, I’d say it is morally ambiguous at best.” She flips a coin, it is heads.

Mosquito: “I’d say it is ambiguous, ambiguous at best.” He flips a coin, it is heads.

Whitefly: “Again the same. Does this mean we are somehow entangled?”

Mosquito: “I don’t know. Hey lamprey, do you carry a message?”

Lamprey: “Yes, I am to deliver it to a fish.”

Mosquito: “Can you throw a coin at the same time we do?”

They all flip, all the coins come up heads.

They all flip, all the coins come up heads.

They all flip, all the coins come up tails.

Lamprey: “Satisfied?” He swims onward.

Whitefly: “Why do we have to die to deliver a message that we don’t understand? We could be destroying the world.”

Mosquito: “We could be saving the world.”

They both flip, both coins come up heads.

Whitefly: “How many is that?”

Mosquito: “96.”

Whitefly: “We are here.” Whitefly lands on the leaf of a tree. She is hungry. She sips the sap out of the succulent leaf.

Mosquito: “Yes, I guess we eat.” Mosquito lands on a bird. He is hungry. He sips its delicious blood.

Both fall over dead. Their coins drop. One is heads. One is tails.


A removed excerpt from “Property of Nature” after edits rendered the passage obsolete. Reproduced here with permission from the author (me).