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Earlier in the morning, a putrid-smelling sun greeted Prudence and me when we boarded the airship “Pirate’s Lace.” “The Outer Rim is no place for you!” the airship’s goodly captain informed me. “My good lady,” I responded. “Don’t concern yourself.” And now with the airship at some height above the thick-forested Earth below us and… — read more

I wish I had an Airstream that I would sit in during a thunderstorm at night near an ocean and the salty breeze would flow through the trailer’s open windows and I would make another mojito, and wonder about the “how” and “why” of the Universe before laying down on the comfy bed and closing… — read more

There is a certain time when you must go to the forest on a late fall afternoon when the cold rain comes down hard on the conifers and splats on the water-saturated ground and close your eyes and listen and recover your soul. — read more

I’m still groggy from the suspended animation as my starcraft “Phanes” outjumps from Owen Space without issue. The A.I. maneuvers the “Phanes” into park orbit around a blue marble of a planet in the Sol system. “Landing zone acquired,” comes the A.I. “The Tualatin Basin. It’s sunrise there.” “Indeed,” is all I muster as the… — read more

Equinox cometh. And north of the forty-fifth parallel the transition from the carefree clothes-free summer to fall, and the artifacts of that Season: warm apple cider, bundling up, pot roast braising in the afternoon whilst the sunlight fades, and, perhaps, a kiss on a cold star-filled night when your exhale appears ghostlike and intertwines with… — read more

Earlier this morning, I navigated my vehicle over a nondescript bridge (which is more culvert than bridge) spanning the width of the Seely Ditch, its narrow straight-line channel pregnant with a swollen torrent of cold water from last night’s heavy downpours; water that, it seems, has a determined resolve to ride gravity to confluence with… — read more

Late September. The last of the summer heat presses down on me. The air is still, humid. I slip off my shirt press on. Thunder is in the distance, and I go on the worn dirt path that parallels the old abandoned railroad tracks. The path takes me to her, and her blue house set… — read more

She takes me down, deepTo the sticky place men fearYet hearts long for. O’er to feel her touch Her breath on me, rapid,Yet, her lips beguile me,And her hips draw me. All in an instant in theValley of Forever. — read more

And the waltz plays on and my hand is on her lower back and her body touches mine and her warm scent entangles with her perfume and washes over me as we move in step ‘round the hall’s wooden floor and, intuitively, I am cognizant of Desire, but in a fleeting sort of way like… — read more

“Was she murdered?” the sergeant says. Yama closes his nondescript notebook after pressing the dull-tipped pencil against the book’s interior spine. The body…scratch that he mutters and chastens himself, the woman, the dead woman, on the open metal stairwell was, herself, nondescript. Yama looks at the sergeant. She sees his frown. “Sorry, sir.” He exhales.… — read more