The Edge

            The world stilled for a moment. Nom studied the swelling carnage that threatened to engulf him, a swirling maelstrom of chaos and blood. The din of war felt far away, muted. He felt the weight of his sword threatening to slip from his grasp, the tip burying itself in the cold earth. Nom's breath slowed, and he watched its smoky form dissipate into a sky grey as iron nails. White tufts of snow floated down, catching a chilling breeze that  swept over the lifeless sacks of meat that were once living men. So many dead. Why was he here?

            Across a sea of muck, blood, and broken spears, he saw the shape of his brother swinging a great iron hammer into someone's skull. It erupted in a red flash of gore – the man didn't even have time to scream before his headless body slumped to the ground. A chill wracked Nom's body, icier than the wintry wind. His brother turned, started walking towards him. The hammer dragged behind him, its head bouncing off the corpses littering the barren earth. Nom couldn't move. His sword held him fast, its tip frozen into the muddy earth. His hand wouldn't release it. The weight rooted him to the spot, and he could only watch helplessly as his brother lurched ever closer. An ivory flash of skull glinted from a deep, bloody fissure that split his helm.

            His eyes were gone.

            “Nom...” the apparition moaned, his mouth a black hole growing ever wider.

            Nom couldn't scream, couldn't breathe. The trapped sound strangled him.

            “Brother,” the word poured out of his brother's mouth with a trickle of blood, then a deluge.

            The face drew ever closer, Nom's ears drumming. The sword wouldn't move. He looked down and saw himself waist-deep in crimson mud. Every move felt too slow. His legs strained and swam in the muck. The face drew ever closer. Its empty eyes drowned the light.

            Nom struggled to keep his head above the rising tide of filth, his hand still fast around the sword-hilt.

            The face right there. Silent.

            Then a scream.

            The world reasserted itself around Nom with a blinding flash, the echo of that dreamlike wail still ringing in his ears. His bed, the familiar grain of wooden walls. The world beyond his window too bright to see. His door hung open, with a man he knew standing inside it.

            He realized the man was saying something. “-alright?”

            Nom shook his head and rasped, “Say again?”

            “Is everything alright, Master Nom?” The man's hand eased off his sword-hilt.

            Nom looked around, and swallowed spit. His throat felt raw, and he coughed mightily before responding. “I’m fine,” he paused, turning to face his huscarl, “Thank you, Finbar. I must have been dreaming.”

            Finbar looked uneasy as he strode to Nom's side. “Aye, you'd given me and Maven quite the scare with all that screaming. Must've been a hell of a nightmare.”

            Nom nodded, but said nothing. He merely looked out his window, the sea waves slowly focusing in his blurry vision.

            Finbar stood silent for a moment, then added, “Anyway, breakfast is ready. Need help gettin' out of bed?”

            Nom shook his head and lowered his feet to the cold wooden floor. He stared at his emaciated thighs, the liver spots trailing up and down his arms. His soft, fat belly wrinkled with age. “I'll see you at breakfast, Finbar.”

            Finbar nodded and walked out the door, closing it behind him.

            Nom couldn't keep his hands from shaking. Only bits and pieces remained of the night's dreaming. All he could remember was that face, the horrible visage of his dead brother. Long dead. He looked out over the ocean again, hearing them crash and reel against the cliffs below. Somewhere in the steady pulse of the tide was the scream, a haunting from the inky black depths beneath the sea.

The Good Ole Days

Summer in a day winter in a day autumn and spring in a day

three days and four rough equivalents

still the days feel hot and slimy like a dying thing gasping

they're looking at nothing just breathing heavy in that

cold alien death

the death way of animals I suppose that's just

nature.

It's green and it was never like that before

not those last summers on the mountain where we were all

beating fans at our faces and muttering – we said nothing of real importance, then

just that it was hot

that we were hot

this devilish forsaken rock was never intended for human life

but ah progress

how can you be anything but misery

in new and exciting contexts?

When we colonize the planets in the solar system, and fill them with

our foul progeny, all fat and whining, we'll know misery on mars too

and fathers will herd mothers and children into new and

exciting vehicles, bound to every interesting thing to replace

the dead dreams of another time and place.

But what is a man?

Ultimately, I think we're seeking the same question, or

answer, if you will.

But beyond this nomad grief, there is a sense of familiar dread.

Production is a dead scene, long live the culture of consumption.

Our greed will not kill us before our stupidity – just as the bloated corpse of american dreams

all you need is a little water, a little rope, and a little concrete.

After that, the rest is easy

they'll find it days from now downriver blue and pus-filled

half-eaten

and cold.

But remember son that you are heir

to the legacy of pain, beholden to the

fingers beckoning from the past

all our legends peeking out from under

the hood of death.

And whispering the good ol' days

the good ol' boys in red white and

The John

In mornings we

among underwhelming streetsign crumble concrete, cast a longing gaze over the polluted rainbow sun as it blushes over the mountainpeaks, flickering over the valley with a vacant traffic buzz and moan while blue shadows gather over a distant lake, a dark spill over the neon sky.

And you're not here. I'm not exactly

holding my breath on this one he

makes you smile and I suppose that's good

enough or at least it has to be. For me.

When your hand bobbed behind your back

waiting for mine to come and close the

circuit I knew I had to withdraw, to think out

my strategy, because beside you strode

your big tall man who makes you

wanna have a million little babies

a wedding in the snow in your white dress

don't you know that I can't spend a whole life

just holding onto that hidden hand,

that piteous touch you cast over me

like a little lucky charm or a memento

a reminder, string around the finger

or a kiss just below the curve of your chin

making you squirm in that little secret hour

you'll probably never speak of again

and hey I guess i'm cheap that way.

I feel like i'm getting your love second hand

we don't talk the way we did because now you

have your big tall baby making man, whose

love I know perhaps a little better than him

is that selfish? I hope it is. I sometimes hope

i'll rot and die before I hear you say his name

again, but I know I won't – I'll just sit and take

it like you want me to. Cuz that's my place

that's my little dusty space on the shelf

in your heart. And if only for a moment

you would shine your eyes over it and

pour your heart out into my hands

but it's never all here when I need it

and that's why I never wanted you or

your snow marriage, or your million

baby army love, but wanted you.

A Resolution Revisited

To anyone who has heard my bold talk of writing 3,000 words every week, I must apologize to you and to myself for not delivering on that promise. It psyched me out substantially, and knowing I'd never meet that lofty expectation each week caused me to write even less. So, after some careful consideration I have decided to no longer hold myself to an unrealistic standard, and merely commit to put forward a bit of my writing every once in awhile. It's going to be a little bit rough and a little bit strange. It might be prose or poetry. It will alternate madly between self-reflection and character study, but ultimately I'm just going to use this blog as a way of putting together all the works I feel are worth getting some eyes on them.

I'm going to shoot for at least 300 words every week. I know my school schedule is already chock-full of writing assignments, so I won't promise anything too ridiculous. I'll be shooting for more, perhaps in the form of more postings throughout the week with little ideas and snippets of thought, and I won't get too hung up about it if for some reason one week I can't deliver on that 300 words. I know it's not much (not even half a page) but we all have to start somewhere, and "humble" is nothing if not a good starting point.

So, expect less radio silence from AM11AM, and enjoy what you can from whatever I can offer you.

Cheers,

Henracious

Lonely Dan

All the beautiful songs were written by someone else, in a home studio in a forest in a big white room with perfect beautiful acoustics and that afflicts, and, pains, me, a little, but only just that, a little, can we ever free ourselves from this perfect mess of sound and color, like a warm and tide, crush and swell, not look at the page while we type, but hear the weeping like a newborn day

and realize it's been too long since last we slept, and find ourselves constantly pounding fists against the walls of impenetrable enlightening, curses ringing out and mingling among the new snowfall, but never heard.

I must be dreaming, or unhappily awake, afraid to sleep, to miss a single moment of my own indulgence

because it's not pleasure but fear that drives these lusts and cravings of mine, the overwhelming seduction of disgrace

and the feeling of an empty bank account, scared of looking inside or outside and realizing you've trusted all the wrong people all your life

like they'd ever put themselves on the line for you

but none of them actually care, do they

you just buy them in, like they're that easy, like you can put a dollar sign next to someone's number

and call it quits, right?

That's all they need

and why you always have to pretend that it's yours that you have it in spades

your secret shame that you are poor

A Miracle 1100 AM

A Miracle 1100 AM rolls over the hill and catapults itself past my car for a moment the promise vexes me that such profound divinity should only be announced on the signboard outside the First Congregational Church where are the news reports and other media reminders it's only 719 AM so far I'm sure we have some time to let the masses know that something is afoot to keep their eyes peeled for the coming miracle scheduled 1100 AM MST it would be a shame to miss this historic reality shattering event let it slip past our vigilant watch to not have cameras on the scene reports of which political party is to thank or blame what this means for the current administration every facet explored probed by economists politicians reporters and other pondscum halfwits to seize this 1100 AM Miracle whatever it is and whoever it happens to whatever it means and whichever god the madness must be sorted and it must all needs be coming into a single point a singularity of vision must be chewed swallowed and vomited up in red white and blue and smeared over teary eagles swooping over This Our Proud Nation under white middle class Jesus god we must make it all American and pure like imperialism and consumerism and global terror when will we weaponize this 1100 AM Miracle gift from Jesus god and how will we sell it to murderers domestic and foreign what will the commercial be like a hideous racket screaming through television pixels buy one now buy it today it's yours make your empty life complete when will there be a children's toy a cartoon show glorifying it and Jesus god and our violent rape culture when will we take this divine and drag it through the toxic lens of entertainment media where is the hit song and where is the inevitable multipopstarcountrysinger anthem where we put our hands over our hearts and cry single picturesque tears for this one Miracle 1100 AM I passed along my way