The Stone Seeker: A Myth of the Wandering Soul

October 2, 2025

A departure from my usual posts — this one takes the form of myth, an inner journey written as an allegory. I offer it as a companion to my ongoing stories.

He was called Stavros, which means Cross, and that was his burden — and his path.

One day, in a time that was no time, he heard the silent summons. Not from the sky, but from the pulse within the earth. He set out, carrying nothing but his breath and the ache of questions. He climbed the ancient spine of Sinai without sleep, ascending stone upon stone, as if walking up the ribs of a forgotten god. At the summit, the sun did not answer him — but it showed him he was not alone.

The descent was harder. That is the truth of all peaks. He reached the foot of the mountain and sat by the monastery of Katherine, where silence grows like lichen on old stone. There he met the Gatekeeper — a monk whose heart had fossilised into ritual. Stavros spoke the sacred tongue, but the Gatekeeper did not recognise him. He uttered the Word — “Yunan” — and dismissed him like a leaf blown against the stone walls.

So the Seeker left the sacred walls and returned to the road. It was on this road that he met the Trickster Guide — a Bedouin named Mohamed, who spoke through music and mischief. He offered herbs not for healing but for vision. He rolled a joint while guiding the chariot at great speed. Smoke curled like a serpent toward the heavens, and the desert began to shimmer.

Mohamed showed him the living map: dunes that were coastlines, mountains that were camels in repose. “This is Sinai,” he said, “and there is the Red Sea.” In that moment, the Seeker saw geography become prophecy. The land was not just land — it was a scroll unrolling.

Mohamed led him to a mosque, a café, a grove of planted trees. “We are of the 15 tribes,” the Guide said. “We plant what will shade the unborn.” The Seeker ate with him, drank the dark tea of mystery, and vanished into moonlit streets.

Then came the Labyrinth.

In the night city, he was lost among alleyways, where cats whispered secrets and doors led nowhere. He emerged by chance, or fate, and met the Scribe, who wrote his name in the language of the ancestors. “All men have three names,” said the Scribe, “but only one is true.”

The Seeker travelled again — across waters, under stars, on feluccas that rocked like cradles of time. He met companions with names like runes: Linda, Olga, Shayari. Together they smoked, drank rakii, and watched angels dissolve into the air like incense.

He arrived at a threshold: the City of Columns. There, under a sky bleached of memory, he sat on sand and turned a plastic bottle into a shrine. He waited for a chariot to carry him across the Nile of forgetting. Someone called him “the Greek with eight children,” and he laughed. He had none — and yet carried thousands within him.

Then came the Two Georges.

One was a Potter. One was a Priest of the Inner Fire. They saw in Stavros something he had hidden from himself. “You evoke the honour of Christ in others,” they said. “You wear innocence like armour.” They fed him macaroni and truth. In return, they asked for stories.

And so he spoke.

And in speaking, he remembered.

Dialogue became divination. Each question was a key. Each story a lost scroll. “In dialogue,” said George, “there is living transmission. The book you write is not of ink. It is breath, shared.”

They spoke of the monk on Athos who gave him a stone. “Leave this on the mountain,” he had said. And so Stavros carried it until the burden became a prayer. They spoke of karma, of grace, of gifts that are given but never earned.

Then came the desecration.

He passed through Luxor and saw the sign — McDonald’s, Temple of Luxor Street. The Golden Arches beside eternal stone. He took a photo, not to remember, but to mourn. Some desecrations are not loud. Some come wrapped in convenience.

And still, a stranger in Cairo whispered: “Welcome.” One word, like a flame in the dust.

The Seeker came to understand: giving and receiving were not separate acts. He had received shelter, food, names, music, silence. He had given stories, listening, laughter, witness. There was no accounting. Only flow.

He saw now that the journey had not been from place to place, but from self to soul. He gave before he received. He received before he gave. It was not barter. It was the hidden law.

And then — the Word.

“Sorry,” they said, “is just a word.” But he knew better. The Word began the world. Words held power, memory, vibration. Words could curse. Words could carry. Words could redeem.

He left the stone on the mountain.

He returned carrying only light.

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The Fractured Cosmos: Crime and Capitalism Unveiled

December 10, 2024

The monster lives—a being of primal, vestigial flesh, ancient yet evolving. It is our charge to nurture it, to coax its grotesque beauty into full bloom. This is no ordinary monster, for it is not of the material world alone. It embodies all that is untamed within us: the rage, the lust, the fleeting glimpses of transcendence. Our task is not to suppress it but to help it grow, for only through its growth can we understand the fractures within ourselves and the universe we inhabit.

We do not dwell on the petty crimes of the cradle—the foolish missteps of a fledgling species. Such crimes are symbols of a planet still finding its place in the greater cosmic order. They are phases, reflections of a culture struggling to reconcile its roots in the soil with its dreams of the stars. The criminal mind, at its core, is narcissistic—a mirror too focused on itself to see the vastness beyond.

But even as we wrestle with our own shadows, the angelic influence stirs the heavens. It is said that once, in an act of rebellion or grace, an angel threw the moon toward the Earth, setting it into motion. The tides rose, the rhythms of life were born, and yet, with this gift came the seeds of discord. Every cycle of creation invites a counterforce, and we now stand at the precipice of The Last Days, where the battle lines are drawn between mammals and machines.

The Pole Shift looms on the horizon, a magnetic upheaval echoing the chaos within. It is not just a geophysical event but a metaphor for the inversion of values, the tilting of the moral axis. What was once revered is now reviled, and what was once reviled is now celebrated. This shift connects to the crimes of our age, each a wound inflicted upon the fabric of existence.

Crime and Capitalism: are they one and the same? The boy who stole from the computer hackers their gift of hacking—was he a criminal, or was he simply redistributing stolen fire? Capitalism, with its rising tide of insecurity, extracts not just the essence of labour but the very essence of the sea, of the Earth, of the soul.

The Flower-Telepathic Computer: a marvel of sentience and sensitivity, it blooms in the minds of those who dare to connect. Yet, its very existence exposes a cascade of crimes—against family, against nature, against space and time. What is the theft of a wallet compared to the theft of an epoch? What is a lie told to a friend compared to the lies encoded into the nervous system of our galaxy?

Holo-Crime: crimes against the holographic unity of the one. These are the incursions into the sacred matter of space, the violations of the thin, shimmering membrane that separates what is from what could be. The maniac who murdered—did he act alone, or was his hand guided by the collective desperation of a species that has forgotten how to dream without violence?

The Essence of the Sea: shell extraction, the taking of the ocean’s soul. As we strip the Earth of its treasures, we strip ourselves of meaning. What rises in its place is a tide not of water but of fear, insecurity, and longing.

The crimes mount, layer upon layer, until they form a tower that scrapes the edge of understanding:

The crime against the family, for it severs the roots.

The crime against nature, for it poisons the soil.

The crime against angels, for it mocks their grace.

The crime against demons, for it denies their necessity.

The crime against the planet, the sun, the nervous system of the galaxy.

Each crime is a fracture, yet within each fracture lies a seed of potential—a lesson, a call to reconciliation. If the monster within us is to grow, if we are to nurture it into something more than the sum of its appetites, we must confront these crimes not as judges but as witnesses. We must see them for what they are: the echoes of a species learning how to wield its power.

And what of Capitalism?

Is it truly the villain or merely the mask we have chosen for our shadow? Like the essence of humanity, the nature of crime is neither fixed nor simple. It is a hologram that reflects the one fractured into infinite pieces. To heal, we must not only piece together what is broken but also embrace the fractures as part of the whole.

In the end, angelic influence will not save us, nor will the machines, nor the rising tide. Only the monster—the raw, unfiltered essence of ourselves—holds the key. To nurture it is to nurture the cosmos, for we and it are not separate. The crimes against the sun, the moon, the Earth, and the stars are crimes against ourselves. And in their reconciliation lies our redemption.

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The Apple and the Cosmos: A Dance of Reality

December 9, 2024

Before me sits an apple, ordinary yet radiant, its waxy surface catching a sharp glint of light from a lamp above. It is tangible, immediate—its crispness confirmed as I lift it to my lips, its flavour vibrant and undeniably real. Beside it rests a protractor, leaning against a globe, and an astrological chart sprawled across my desk. These objects—tools of measurement and mapping—whisper of realities far removed from the apple’s tangible presence. The apple anchors me in the here and now while the instruments gesture toward the distant, the abstract, the infinite.

The apple is a feast for the senses. I can touch it, taste it, smell it, and see it. Though its atoms appear tightly packed, they are, in truth, vast spaces of energy and vibration. Magnify one of its atoms, and its solidity dissolves into a void where particles exist only as probabilities, dancing in fields of energy. Yet, this solid illusion sustains my bite, my taste, and my knowing.


The horoscope beside it lacks the apple’s tangibility. It cannot be bitten or held, but it represents something equally profound: a symbolic map of the cosmos. Where the apple’s reality is immediate, the horoscope projects patterns of meaning across time and space, binding celestial rhythms to the human story. These two things—apple and horoscope, immediate and archetypal—remind me that reality is both seen and imagined, both concrete and infinite.


This paradox of perception defines our existence. The apple, so close I can taste it, is not as solid as it seems. And the stars, so distant their light has travelled for millennia to reach me, are not as unreachable as they seem. Between the apple and Alpha Centauri lies an unfathomable gulf, yet they are part of the same web of existence, bound by the laws of physics and the rhythms of the cosmos.


Newton, watching the fall of an apple, saw the invisible thread connecting Earth and sky. Einstein deepened this insight, showing that space and time are inseparable and that matter and energy are two forms of the same thing. Quantum physics has unravelled the idea of separateness, revealing that particles are not isolated entities but relationships—waves of possibility collapsing into form through interaction.


David Bohm’s theory of implicate order expands this vision further, suggesting that the universe is a seamless whole where every fragment reflects the entirety, like a hologram. In a hologram, each fragment contains the whole image, even when divided into pieces. Similarly, the universe is encoded in every part of itself. The apple before me is not merely an apple; it is a microcosm of the cosmos, its atoms vibrating with the same energies that fuel the stars.


The horoscope, too, speaks to this interconnectedness. It is not about planets and rocks but about relationships, patterns, and cycles. The zodiac mirrors the rhythms of life, like the apple tree that blossoms, bears fruit, and eventually returns to the Earth. The horoscope encodes the rhythms of the cosmos in symbols, reminding us that the patterns above are reflected in the patterns within.


This interconnectedness challenges the illusion of separation. The apple and the stars, the immediate and the eternal, are not opposites but facets of the same reality. Our senses, while invaluable, reveal only a sliver of the whole. Light, for instance, is just one octave in a vast electromagnetic spectrum, and beyond the visible lies a universe of energies—X-rays, gamma rays, cosmic rays—that remain unseen but ever-present.


Similarly, the frameworks of language and culture limit how we perceive and interpret the world. But within these limits lies a profound truth: we are not separate observers of the universe; we are participants in its creation. As physicist John Wheeler suggested, the act of observation itself shapes reality, collapsing waves of probability into patterns of existence. Our consciousness, like a hologram, reflects the universe within it.


The apple before me, the stars above, and the chart on my desk are all threads in this web of unity. The apple speaks of immediacy, the stars of eternity, the chart of the connections that bridge the two. At this moment, I recall a walk in an orchard with my father years ago. He handed me an apple, freshly picked, and told me to hold it carefully as though it contained the world. I didn’t understand him then, but now I see his wisdom. The apple was the world, the stars, and myself—all woven together.


So, as I bite into the apple now, tasting its crispness and feeling its tang, I know it is real. But I also know that in this simple act, I am connected to the stars, to the atoms that form both fruit and flesh, to the patterns that govern the universe.


In the apple, I taste the infinite, and in the infinite, I find myself.

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The Art of Magic, the Magic of Art

December 1, 2024

True art is magic, and any true magic is art. With the touch of a pen, a brush, or even a finger, an artist—if aligned with the essence of their vocation—commands worlds both seen and unseen. Percy Shelley once declared that “poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world,” and though his words echo from an era long past, they feel uncannily prescient.

But what does this mean in practice? Some might argue that if poets and artists truly wield such power, they are the most woeful rulers ever to preside over humanity. After all, if art is shaping the world, why do the screens that dominate our lives churn out nothing but dissonance, despair, and empty spectacle? Is this dystopian noise truly the vision of today’s artists?

I imagine Shelley himself interrupting from the shadows of the ether: “Don’t be so literal! I meant it metaphorically. Art isn’t governance by laws; it’s governance by ideas, by imagination, by what transcends the mundane. But for heaven’s sake, don’t turn poetry into a cargo cult—worshipping its form as though it’s divine by nature rather than by what it creates within you.”

And yet, there’s a peculiar magic in this metaphorical cargo, in the words, images, and sounds that tumble into the open space of our minds. For those who see the world in myths and metaphors, art carries immense weight. It is both vessel and spell, weaving meaning from the chaos.

Take, for instance, the ancient stories we hold as sacred. The tumbling walls of Jericho. The resurrection of Christ. The creation of the universe in seven days. Do these stories endure because they are literally true, or because they resonate with something deeper—something ineffable? These tales are, above all else, poetry, built to inspire, to guide, to anchor us in moral or spiritual truth. Their magic is not in their factual accuracy but in their capacity to awaken a sense of wonder and move us toward the good.

In this sense, the Bible, like all great art, is a magical artefact. It is less a document of historical fact than a talisman, transmitting its moral and poetic energy across centuries. It scarcely matters whether Jesus of Nazareth held an identity card or walked among us as a historical figure. What matters is the poetic proof—the themes of redemption, sacrifice, and hope that compels us to strive for something greater.

Even today, this ancient poetry retains its power in a world awash with “meaning packages” from advertising slogans and clickbait soundbites. The cynicism of the modern world would have us believe that such stories are relics of the past, yet their resonance persists. True art, like true magic, touches something eternal. It reaches into the ineffable and makes it visible, if only for a moment.

But here’s the tension: if art is so powerful, why does it so often feel powerless in the face of modern chaos? The art world seems increasingly commodified, trapped in an endless cycle of trends, likes, and algorithms. It’s tempting to believe that the magic has been diluted, reduced to spectacle, or even silenced altogether. Yet, history reminds us that art’s power isn’t always loud or obvious.

Think of Picasso’s Guernica—a painting that “legislated” not through laws, but through the weight of its horror and the clarity of its vision. Or Maya Angelou’s poetry, which legislates even now, carving spaces for hope and resistance. True art doesn’t demand attention; it reshapes the world quietly, insistently, often long after it is created.

Art’s magic, much like a magician’s sleight of hand, often works unnoticed. It transforms us subtly, weaving itself into the fabric of our lives without our conscious permission. Consider a song that makes us weep, a novel that reframes the way we see the world or a photograph that stops us in our tracks. These are not passive objects; they are spells cast by creators who reached into the ineffable and returned with something transcendent.

The danger, as Shelley warned, lies in worshipping the artefact itself rather than the spirit it conjures. Too often, we mistake the form for the magic, clinging to what can be packaged, sold, or commodified. But art’s true power is never in the object—it’s in the transformation it invokes within us.

This is where the artist becomes a magician, conjuring meaning from raw material and shaping worlds from chaos. True art challenges the status quo not because it seeks to destroy but because it dares to create—to reimagine what is possible. The poet legislates not with authority but with imagination, reshaping the boundaries of what we believe to be true.

Even in today’s fractured world, art retains its quiet, ineffable power. The greatest works endure not because they are timeless, but because they speak to the timeless within us. Art—like magic—relies on the participation of its audience, on our willingness to suspend disbelief and step into the unknown.

So yes, art is magic, and magic is art. Both touch the eternal, both pull at the ineffable. And whether we realize it or not, both shape the worlds we inhabit. The artist’s hand, like the magician’s, is at work all around us—transforming, challenging, inspiring. The question is whether we are brave enough to recognize it.

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The quote is from Percy Bysshe Shelley who said that “poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” This famous phrase comes from his essay A Defence of Poetry, written in 1821 but published posthumously in 1840.

“Poets are the hierophants of an unapprehended inspiration; the mirrors of the gigantic shadows which futurity casts upon the present; the words which express what they understand not; the trumpets which sing to battle, and feel not what they inspire; the influence which is moved not, but moves. Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.”

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The Swirl of Coffee and Questions

November 21, 2024

I was having coffee with a friend who happens to be a teacher. I watched the steam spiral as my companion clinked her spoon against the porcelain, stirring her cup absently. As these coffee conversations do, we meandered from the mundane to the metaphysical. From the internet we went to the meaning of life. My friend has a knack for asking the right questions at the right time.

“So, tell me – what’s the point of it all?” she asked as she gazed through the cafe window where a woman passed by pushing a pram.

“I don’t know. When I die, when you die, my and your senses are dead, so we’re not here. So much for the factual world,” I replied, trying to remember which philosopher said something like that.

She smiled and, looking directly into my eyes, replied, “But you believe in reincarnation, don’t you? Isn’t that laden with purpose?”

I shrugged, “Sure it’s romantic to believe in some kind of afterlife. But, look around – does this scream purpose to you?”

She brushed her hair away from her forehead then her eyes wandered to the window again. A street performer decided to stand in front of the window and perform some clumsy juggling.

“Religion tries to make sense of it all,” I pressed on, “But even the high priests of science kneel before an empty throne. Their emptiness includes weirdo quarks, quantum realms and even god-particles – they say forces beyond our comprehension. It kinda sounds poetic that Tao dances in the heart of the matter, even beautiful. But sacred? No way.”

Her brow furrowed. “So science is the new religion?”

I leaned in, gesturing toward the phone lying between us. “No, not science. Scientism. It replaces reverence with results, mystery with measurability, quality with quantity.” I picked up the phone, “And it’s not just the gadgets.” My voice softened, “It’s the mindset: sharp edges, hard lines, reducing everything – life, death, the cosmos itself – to equations and particles. Even love is written off as a bunch of chemicals sloshing in the brain.” I shook my head, placing the phone on the table. “Wow, what are we left with?”

Her silence invited me to continue.

“Don’t you see?” my voice quickening. “We’re told we’re nothing but the products of chemical accidents on a spinning rock around a Type G star. What is prayer? It’s just some sound waves pushing through the air. Yep, random collisions of chemicals over the millenniums mutated into creatures who love, create, play and pray. OK, the ancient gods may have been illusions, but at least they offered dignity. What does scientism give us? Purpose replaced by algorithms, reverence and a sense of the sacred by replicable results.”

I stopped and leant back in my chair. Took another sip of my coffee. Her hands folded, her expression thoughtful. “But isn’t technology also liberating. It connects us and makes life easier.”

“Ah,” I said, raising a finger. “I love what science has given us. Science didn’t just discover miracles; it made them. Instead of AD – as our way of marking history, I would like to see AP – After Penicillin. I love that technology has freed us from chores. But that freedom might also free us from the planet. No, not sending seed ships on interplanetary and galactic colonization trips. I mean a final liberation – our extinction.”

Now, I was on a roll. I couldn’t stop the impetus of my talking, “Science didn’t just explain lightning; it gave us bombs more destructive than Zeus’s wrath. It replaced the sacred with equations, prayer with noise, and purpose with randomness.”

She frowned and looked at her near-empty cup of coffee. “You make it sound hopeless.”

“Maybe it is,” I admitted. “Scientism is a product of rigid thinking and religious fundamentalism has the same rigidity. You know – dogma in robes and dogma in lab coats. The kind of thinking that says it has the answers but does not know how to listen.”

She studied me for a long moment. “So what’s your solution?”

I smiled, took another sip of my coffee and looked out the window at the juggler. “I don’t know if there is a solution. Maybe we don’t need one. Maybe we just need to live without demanding it be solved. To sit with the questions, like we’re doing now.”

She chuckled softly. “Sounds like you just reinvented faith.”

I laughed. “Maybe, but I like to see scientists do a bit of Zen Koan thinking. You know, like wonder what is the sound of one hand clapping and have their logic scrambled just for a short while.”

What’s left for us, I asked my friend, when both gods and reason fail? My coffee had gone cold by then. The swirling depths had disappeared, as had the steam. But the question lingered, unanswered.

And maybe that’s all it ever will be—a question.

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A Letter to My Absent Guardian Angel

November 20, 2024

To My Ever-Absent Guardian Angel
66 Automatism Road,
Mammonville, 6666

Dear (Supposedly) Watchful One,

It’s been a while—decades, in fact. I thought I’d drop you a line, not because I miss you (I don’t), but because I need answers. Primarily: Where the hell have you been?

You left without so much as a celestial Post-it. For us mere mortals, words matter. Even a basic “BRB” would’ve sufficed. But no, you flapped your wings and ghosted—ironically, since you’re already sort of a ghost. I won’t harp on it (much), but if “guardian” is still part of your job description, it might be time to recheck the fine print.

Anyway, life update: I’ve applied for the position of Director of My Own Life. Admittedly, the pay isn’t great—it’s public service, after all—but the benefits include fewer existential breakdowns and a slightly better carbon footprint. Sure, it’s a one-man gig, and the office hours are ridiculous, but hey, somebody’s got to steer this shipwreck.

Now, a burning question: why did our last encounter happen in a pub? Of all places, I imagined you’d prefer to appear in a shaft of light through a stained-glass window or something appropriately divine. Instead, you nursed a lager while I lamented my woes over a pint. Do angels even drink? Is there a heavenly liquor license I should know about?

If this sounds like I’m whining, well, maybe I am. But cut me some slack. You’ve been AWOL while I’ve wandered the planet armed only with Google Maps and a vague sense of purpose. The truth is, my life’s compass—whether literal or metaphorical—seems perpetually broken. Magnetic north? Useless. Tarot cards? Cryptic. Apps? Battery-draining. You get the idea.

On a related note, your detachable angel wings are still at the dry cleaners. The guy said something about a stubborn stain on the last feather, the one shaped like a bow. Blood, he thinks. Care to explain? I paid the cleaning fee, by the way—you’re welcome.

Honestly, I’m starting to wonder: were you scraping the bottom of the celestial eligibility list when they assigned me? I mean, it’s not like I’m top-tier humanity, but c’mon. Did you lose a bet? Draw the short straw?

And don’t even think about rolling your eyes or straightening your halo as you read this. I can picture you now, muttering, “He’ll never get that Director job. No chance.” Well, here’s the deal: this time, I’m doing it without you. No divine interventions, no whispered nudges in the right direction. You’re officially off the hook.

If you’re just a figment of my imagination—my brain’s way of outsourcing responsibility—then fine. But if you’re real, consider this a resignation letter from our arrangement. Not out of bitterness (okay, maybe a little), but because I need to stand alone, facing the metaphorical wall. And who knows? Maybe that wall will turn out to be a door once I stop expecting you to open it for me.

If I land the job, I’ll rescind all the childish grumbles I ever sent your way. If I don’t…well, at least I’ll know I tried, unsupervised.

Yours (conditionally),
Stavros

P.S. I’m busy this week, but after Sunday, feel free to drop by—no expectations, no feathers, no complaints.

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Soul Drinker

November 20, 2024

This is something I wrote many years ago when I was working. With #MAGA, #Trump & #ChristoFascism in #USA this story shows the same kind of interpersonal dynamics were and are happening in #Australia. What do you think?

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I know this may sound paranoid, but I work with a vampire. Not the kind with python teeth and a penchant for late-night bloodletting, but the kind with a benign smile. You know the sort—so utterly benign that it edges into something too teethy, too wide, and too weird.

Don’t get me wrong; I like smiles. Who doesn’t? A good smile can make a room feel alive. But this one? It didn’t bring life; it siphoned it. The vampire I speak of looked perfectly mundane, almost banal—a “Mrs Jones” type if Mrs Jones wore floral blouses and talked about her kids’ gymnastics meets. Karen. That was her name.

When I first met her, I didn’t see it. I thought she was just another office mate with a knack for workplace small talk. She was a born-again type, constantly referencing “grace” and “renewal,” but not in a way that seemed threatening. Not at first. She didn’t want my blood—oh no, she was far too devout for that. She wanted something deeper. She wanted my life force.

Life force is a slippery concept. Call it vitality, essence, or spirit—it’s the thing that keeps you upright, that makes you feel connected. And Karen? She was a vampire of will. Soul vampires, will vampires—they’re not some romantic delusion spun from a gothic fever dream. They’re real. These are the people who drain you not with fangs but with their presence. Their words, their gaze, the sheer gravity of their existence. They’re P&C mums, footy club treasurers, and school fete organisers. People you’d never suspect. People you might even admire. You might be working with one right now.

“Come in,” she said the first day I met her.

I was standing in the staff room, scanning the cluttered noticeboard plastered with calendars and community events. Filing cabinets lined the walls, their surfaces piled with papers. It was ordinary, so ordinary, until I turned and saw her.

It wasn’t her floral blouse or her wavy, shoulder-length hair. It wasn’t even her shoes—practical, beige, and unremarkable. It was the way she stood. Like she was bowing to something invisible. Supplicant. Devout. A silent pledge of loyalty to… something.

Her smile was radiant, toothy, and hollow.

“Hi, I’m Alex,” I said, finding my voice.

She leaned forward, her posture impossibly still, and said in a tone that seemed to pierce the room’s fabric, “But I’m Karen.”

The air shifted. The walls of the room folded inward. No, not the walls. Space itself. She had, in one breath, devoured half the distance between us.

I glanced out the window behind her, desperate for grounding. The sky burned blue, the horizon a pale, parched curve.

I felt my feet in my shoes, my hands trembling slightly. I counted my breaths.

Karen didn’t need to speak to steal something from you. It was in her presence, her gravitational pull. She made every word feel loaded, every glance feel like an interrogation. She never asked for your trust; she simply assumed it.

Over the weeks, I noticed strange things: Karen’s uncanny ability to dominate the room without trying, the way she could turn a casual chat into an inquisition about my beliefs, my fears, my hopes. She wasn’t just a born-again Christian; she was a predator in sheep’s clothing, a hunter of souls disguised as a suburban mother of two.

Her questions weren’t questions. They were extractions.

“So, Alex,” she asked one morning as I sipped my coffee. “Do you ever think about salvation?”

It wasn’t the question that unnerved me; it was the direction it came from. Not her lips, but somewhere deeper, darker.

I started to avoid her, but it didn’t matter. Karen’s presence seeped into everything. My dreams, my work, my moments of solitude. She had a way of collapsing the world around her, making you feel like there was no escape.

It’s not just Karen. She’s a symptom of something larger. This century, the world feels like it’s unravelling. The greenhouse gases, the looming threat of nuclear holocaust—it all feeds the energy she represents—the born-again zeal, the clutching for certainty in uncertain times.

There are too many Karens out there, and they’re not going away.

I moved inland a few weeks ago, thinking the shift would help me escape something—what, I wasn’t sure. But instead, I found myself sharing a room with a vampire.

A soul vampire, a will vampire, a Karen.

When I look at her, I wonder if I’m paranoid. Then I see her smile—the way it widens just a fraction too far, the way it hangs there, benign yet bottomless.

And I know I’m not.

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The Playground of Shadows

November 16, 2024

Boredom sat heavily on him, like dust on an old, untouched shelf. He stretched out his limbs, a shell adrift with no anchor, skimming across some dull, endless sea. Nirvana, the world whispered, was an empty thing if this was it. Peace? It felt like the slow pulse of something unfeeling, a lifeless melody humming in the background.

But there was a whisper, too, some echo of Buddha, prophets, and wanderers who saw meaning where he could find none. “The world is your playground,” they seemed to say, and yet, the toys scattered around him were chipped and faded, the games already won and lost. The thrill was gone.

He looked down at his hands, at his shoe, at the cigarette butt lying desolate on the cracked pavement. He saw only a cigarette butt, but when he reached for it, his fingers were wrapped in some spectral glove, ancient and unknowable, numbing his touch. A silky chant rose from the earth, and in the flickering haze, he caught a glimpse of her—the forgotten Madonna on the run, the ghost of a purpose that had long since slipped through his fingers.

And so, he took to the highway in the wind, that endless road North, where the sands met the sky and eternity seemed to lie just around the bend. The prophet in his mind handed him a book and an angel with curls handed him his soul. Here, he thought, is something close to freedom. Here, he felt the weight of all things lightened by the wind as he climbed mountains, lit fires, and let his words drift into the stars—alone yet somehow complete.

But the nights were haunted by shadow games. By candlelight, he felt the passing of unspoken truths caught in the heavy air, thick with incense and echoes. Sitting across from him, his companion cast her glance, a holy arc, over him. No mirrors were needed, only the quiet acceptance of their hearts pulsing in time. Together, they watched the fall of all things—leaves, bottles, lives—and knew that letting go was the only way to hold anything.

He felt the years burn away like the slow ember of his cigarette, holes punched through the fabric of his past. In the distance, a gladiator carried worlds on his shoulders, a Da Vinci gaze locked on some distant horizon. Yes, he thought, pull the plug on life’s bath. Let it all drain away. And as the waves of what was and what would be crashed against his pedestals, he let them crumble, the sand running through his fingers in memory of time slipping by.

The smell of white night, nostalgic and sweet, settled over him like a soft rain. He closed his eyes, feeling the weight and lightness of it all. His life, his love, and his losses had collided like the gentle kiss of billiard balls, a game played without cues, a moment that had once perched on the tree they’d planted in the garden of then.

As he let it all fall, he saw that his life was neither storm nor fury but dew on a flower, a brief glisten in the morning light that would, by noon, disappear. Smiling to himself, he walked into the wind, his footsteps soft on the path toward meaning or maybe just toward peace.

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The Temporary Angel: A Journey Beyond Reality

November 15, 2024

No rainbow hues crowned the dilapidated house across the asphalt. A lone weed struggled through the crack in the cement to greet the constant passersby. She could empathize with the weed. “What’s a weed but a plant discarded from the mob?” she thought.

Her hair, from a distance, looked like a lion’s mane. Up close, what you thought was hair was clusters of thin lines of flame with light blue ends. Was she an angel? A messenger of fire descended into this neighbourhood? Or was she just an illusion to occupy a mind locked into a cube of space? Could she be both? Like a profile that is a vase from one view or two faces turned inward from another. How long she had been watching was anyone’s guess.

George felt her eyes on him, an unsettling sensation that sharpened his awareness of his subterranean existence. He had carried the underground in his soul for so long that he feared being recognized—feared it might destroy him. To be seen was to be known, and to be known was to lose the only freedom he understood: the fragile equilibrium between necessity and whim. His underground world was a realm of shifting sand, where heaven and hell were interchangeable kingdoms. Above, the surface world was a place of silhouettes; below, he clung to the parallax of a lost star.

The worry beads in his pocket offered little comfort. His father had given them to him, claiming they were carved from the thigh bones of a Turk killed in some distant war. The macabre story had been a joke, his father’s way of mixing humour with his dark compassion. But the beads—smooth, ivory fragments of elephant tusk—still felt like relics of a troubled inheritance. He turned them over in his hand as if their smooth surface might anchor him to something solid.

At the station, Sophie appeared, filling the empty space with something familiar and alien. George noticed her wings first—scarlet feathers that seemed too vivid and alive to be part of any costume.

“Who are you?” he asked, his voice wary.

“Good, you see me,” she replied, a grin teasing her lips. “Can you see all of me?”

He squinted. “I can see you’ve got red wings.”

“Scarlet,” she corrected. “That’s even better! You can see my wings. Most can’t.” Her hands moved as she spoke, graceful as a dancer’s, and George found himself oddly captivated. “I’m a Temporary Angel,” she continued, “and I need your help. I want to be made permanent.”

George shook his head. “You’re telling me you’re an angel? Walking around Redfern Station? And I’m the only one who can see you?”

“Yes,” she said simply. “What other people?”

George looked around and saw that the station was deserted. The people who were walking around, looking at their watches, holding their bags, waiting for a train—there was no one on the platforms or the stairs. It was as if the world had been blown away with a breath, leaving only him and Sophie in this crystalline stillness. He glanced at his shadow, unnervingly sharp against the ground in the fading twilight. The light around him seemed too pure, too surreal, sharpening every edge and making every detail glow with impossible clarity.

Sophie handed him a cup of coffee, her thermos producing exactly what he liked—short and black, no sugar. “For now, silence might save you. Just listen. Let your heart speak louder than your head. Don’t let your head scalp you.”

As George sipped his coffee, she crossed her legs and leaned back slightly. “You know,” she said, “some people believe you must suffer to reach salvation—hairshirts, long vigils, self-denial. But my colleagues and I have learned that you can sit at the gates of salvation with a cup of coffee and not be asked to move on.” She winked at him.

They sat in silence until the air shifted. A moth the size of George’s hand appeared, landing delicately on the rim of his cup. Its eyes—dark and unblinking—seemed to peer into his soul.

“That’s Moth,” Sophie said. “A fellow Temp. You’ll meet more of us soon.”

Moth took off, its wings slicing through the air like a blade. Sophie stood, her scarlet wings stretching wide. “What do you want, George?” she asked, her voice low and steady. “Say it aloud.”

He hesitated, holding his breath, the weight of the question pressing down on him.

“What do you want, George?” Sophie asked again, her voice softer this time. “Be honest. It’s not the past you’re after, is it?”

“I want everything,” he finally said. “Everything, including making it all like it was before—perfect.”

She smiled, a faint sadness in her eyes. “Everything, huh? Even a brand-new car?”

“Sure,” he said, though he knew how hollow his words sounded.

Sophie turned her head toward the distant stairs. “Look over there. If the timing is right, he’ll reveal something to us.”

At the top of the railway stairs, a man descended. With each step, his shadow lengthened, stretching until it reached the bottom, falling down the stairway like a spectral companion. He dragged a sack behind him, his movements erratic, like a puppet tugged by invisible strings. His patchwork clothes—a riot of velvet, canvas, lace, and denim—hung on his frame like a discarded quilt.

The Ragman stopped before them, his single eye gleaming. Sophie gestured toward him, her voice dropping to a whisper. “He doesn’t expect any sense from you. He merely guards the door.”

The Ragman began to hum, his voice rough and melodic, then sang softly:

“Pictures of Sophie burn at the edges,
In shades of blue, she keeps her pledges.”

Moth descended from above, spiralling in tight circles before perching on the Ragman’s head. Sophie’s wings shifted as she stepped forward. “This is the sign,” she murmured.

The Ragman shuffled closer, his one eye scanning George with a gaze that weighed him in unseen scales. Then, with a raspy certainty, he said, “The timing is right. The planets are aligned, and you’re here.”

Sophie turned to George, her expression shifting to something both tender and resolute. “What do you think, George? Will you take the next step?”

She extended her hand toward him, and he felt her fingers press through his chest, gripping his heart. A sharp crack echoed in his ears as his vision dissolved into light.

They rose together, Sophie’s wings propelling them upward. Below, George saw his body standing alone on the platform. He saw the weed standing defiantly alone as he ascended. Then, slowly, the world came into focus—a railway station teeming with people, their movements alive with purpose.

Higher still, the Earth appeared, a blue and white orb spinning in a sea of black. Sophie’s wings shimmered, their scarlet hue fading into white as they ascended.

The cries and groans of countless souls filled the air. “What is this place?” George asked, his voice trembling.

“The holding space of the dead,” Sophie replied.

“The sun takes those whose light burned too brightly to last. The moon cradles the quiet souls, the dreamers. And Earth… Earth takes those who still have something left to finish,” Sophie said softly.

“Is my father here?” George asked.

Sophie nodded. “He’s waiting.”

George felt the fear of taking an uncertain step onto a journey that had no clear destination. Sophie’s grip on his heart tightened, and he realized she had brought him to the edge of something vast and unknowable. The shifting sand of his old life was gone, and in its place stretched a horizon of infinite possibility.

“The stranger within you is no stranger to me,” Sophie said. “It’s always been watching, waiting for this moment.”

“What happens now?” George asked.

Sophie smiled, her wings glowing softly. “That’s up to you.”

George felt the pull of the horizon, vast and uncharted. Somewhere in the distance, a new path was waiting. He took a step forward into the light.

The above images generated by AI from the story.

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My Lady of the Earth: A Tale of Renewal and Time

November 12, 2024

In the heart of a forgotten desert, a lone figure trudged down a cracked highway, each step scraping against the sun-scorched asphalt as if metal clanked against stone. His feet felt like tin cans, hollow and beaten, dragging his weary body forward as he clutched an old glass bowl—its only inhabitant a sliver of something ancient and alive, a glint of Time itself suspended in water. His arms ached, heavy and empty, as though they’d died long before, holding nothing but the fragile keepsake of ages past.

But just as his strength waned, there was a shift. She appeared as if conjured from the dust itself: My Lady of the Earth, the Sun’s seventh Queen. With a graceful lift of her arms, she raised him above the smoke, the Screen of all that clouded and concealed. Her touch was unlike anything he’d known, reaching through the rusting paths of his veins, setting them aglow with purpose. In her embrace, he felt something long lost—a feeling like Home, a warmth too timeless to describe.

He looked upon her as her veil began to dissolve. Beneath it, her face bore the quiet strength of mountains, still and unyielding, forever patient. From her eyes spilt silver brooks, flowing over her cheeks without urgency, slipping past with a gentleness that defied the chaotic world below. The brooks whispered of hidden peace, where Madonnas rested in perfect balance, and saints lay quiet in their coffins, untouched by mortal turmoil. Shadows of the powerful faded here, hollow ambitions dissipating like smoke. Even the rooster—herald of dawn and disturbance—lay silent in her presence as if Time paused.

She was both familiar and fierce, the Only Child of Passion and Earth’s eternal heartbeat. Winds swept through the dust, weaving through her form, rooting into her flesh, and carrying the age-old whispers of forgotten stars with them. Her body, raw and untamed, glistened in the light of the Sun, bound to it yet free, dancing in an endless circle of life and death, decay and rebirth.

With a flick of her golden feet, she nudged the Moon, sending it into an orbit known only to the wise and the wild, beckoning all with a silent proclamation. The man held his breath, feeling the weight of her gesture, her assurance—this was no end but the beginning, an age reborn. And as he stared into her eyes, he understood: he was no longer lost in the desert. He had been brought back to her, the soul of his journey entwined with the spirit of the Earth, who whispered to him that, like her, he too was eternal.

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