Wrote you a love letter
Then tore it up to bits
Took the shredded pieces
Threw them in a pit
Setting it on fire
Watched the passion glow
Each piece flared from another
The flames of nevermore
Wrote you a love letter
Knew I would not send
Wrote you a love letter
Sealed it with my blood
Stood there with the ashes
As they crumbled away
The wind sent some flying
Forever out of reach
The seasons took the rest
Let it slip away
Walked away in silence
Left behind a stain
Wrote you a love letter
Knew I would not send
Wrote you a love letter
Words etched in my head
Wrote you love, and
Sealed it with my blood
Woman meets Woman. Women split. Misdeeds and transmogrifications happen. Women become one. ℵ2+. Time is a douche. Love rules. The end.
What was this all about, Stu?
In the end, Love. You may argue this, but for me it was about Love. There are many interpretations of Love the emotion and Love the word. Then there is a sliding scale for every iteration. Love astray. Love together. Love.
Add Love with: Existentialism + Nihilism + Greek Mythology + Block Universe Theory + Quote: “Time is liquid. One moment is no more important than any other and all moments quickly run away.” by Kurt Vonnegut + Quote: “Time is an illusion” by Albert Einstein + Time Conceptualization & its relation to what we’ve been experiencing in the last year plus + the quotes I used, all picked out before I began the challenge + Philosophy + Physics + Math + Assorted Doodads =Liquid Time.
No animals were harmed during the writing of Liquid Times. No drugs were a part in its evolution.
My experience(s) with Liquid Time
I put in a shit-load of research, playing around with (and still hating) the formatting of the “new” WordPress Block Editor. And, of course, writing the darn thing. I gave myself many stress headache moments, simply because I am a Pantster and write my A to Z post ON THE DAY as the letters roll by. I usually have Story Beats/Story Spine floating somewhere in my mind, but as the characters & plotting develops, I may end up in a whole different direction. 2019s A Car In the Woods (Science Fiction/Horror/Thriller, 27 posts) is a prime example of that. I originally planned 26 separate flash fiction pieces on the theme. By D, I dropped that idea as it became a larger whole story.
So it goes.
Liquid Time was unlike any other of my A to Z’s in that I had NO CLUE what to do with it. Time has been on my mind for a long while. That was the starting point, and my meandering tangent mind went where it went. I also knew that this needed a very different approach in how I tackled the subject(s). Plus, I needed to really challenge myself in writing style(s); I started to feel I was getting in a semi-rut. As I was discovering the story along the way, I pushed myself even harder.
Tales of Tale Spinning will bring you to a listing of my previous A to Z worlds. You’ll get what I mean.
As to the overall mechanics of Liquid Time:
The color blocking (or with specific words/concepts) are all related to the normally accepted meanings of those colors. Slight variations occurred as needed: Red could be anger or danger. The context around it drove the interpretation. The colors themselves will most likely need to be excised if this is to be taken further. I am thinking on what to change and how.
I choose to work with the line verifications (left-middle-right) with a variety of thoughts: POV change, dialogue without the “she said/he said” designations of who was speaking, change in the style (prose vs pinprick, almost bullet-like, actions/thoughts), free-form poetics, and one or three other things. You might realize that I do not like conjunctive words and did my best to minimize their use.
The formatting on this drove me crazy. The Block Editor of WordPress (great horror story title) that I hate with a passion. The inability to highlight one word or idea without the entire block changing really threw me for a frustrated loop. Same with adding color to one word/name. Couldn’t do it as a whole.
A lot of my “choppy” lines were forced on me due to this not being really user friendly. Probably the only positive out of this whole formatting mishigas.
As to the rest: I know that Liquid Time was challenging to read. I did my best to reincorporate things I threw down. The big one I never came back to was the Snow/Ice demoness from the first of Janaculum. If I DO return to LT, she will definitely play a bit of a larger role, in a way. Does the letter K connect anything for you?
Also, If you’ve read my previous work, you should know I’m not a big fan of spelling everything out. I enjoy books where I have to dig to get it or let my interpretation be and move on. Cloud Atlas, Ulysses, and other books anyone?
I saw by stats that I had a decent readership with a larger reach than last year. Yet, I had a HUGE drop in comments after the first five posts. I know I blew it on my blog hopping and I plan to rectify it. Liquid Time was too much, at Times. Pun intended. So, pretty disappointing, but as Lou Reed sang at the end of Perfect Day: “You’re going to reap just what you sow.”
Bottom Line: will I be back for next year’s A to Z? I plan to, but who the heck knows what the frig I will be up to in 2022. So, most likely yes. Maybe. Probably. We’ll see.
Time will tell.
What’s A to Z April Blogging Challenge Got To Do With This?
Created in 2009 by Arlee Bird, the A to Z Blogging Challenge has united hundreds (thousands?) of Bloggers throughout the Blogaverse. If you blog, you can join & post 26 times during the month of April, beginning on April 1st and ending on April 30th. Sundays “off” for good behavior. I’ve been involved with the challenge since 2011, not participating a few times. I’ve been introduced to many bloggers whom I may never have come across without the A to Z; many I can now call friends. There are too many to link to at the moment. Look at the commenters from April 1st forward on Tale Spinning. That’ll be a good start.
Arlee has had a semi-rotating team of amazing talent surrounding the event(s) and the site(s). They all need a big hand of applause. This year, his co-host team has been: J Lenni Dorner, Zalka Csenge Virág , John Holton, Jayden R Vincente , and Jeremy Hawkins . Please click on their names to visit their blogs. To find the other bloggers who participated:
I am most likely moving Tale Spinning to Blogger by the end of May. I’m in the setting up phase, doing my best so it looks and acts like I’d like it to. Tale Spinning Redux. I’ll announce when the time is right to end my time with WordPress and go back to Blogger. Gotta figure how to link up all of my work here to a new hosting site. Not today. Headache arose just writing that.
“Time is a feature of creation, and the creator remains apart from it, transcendent over it.” ~ ~ James Gleick
EVERYWHEN
♁Ananke
Is witness to all beginnings; to all ends.
The End of All Things rips apart the progenitor with every erasure.
Erasures are Endless.
Endless.
There is nothing to measure.
It is or it is not.
Everything Is.
(☿+♀+☾+♂+♃+♄+♅+♆+♇+☼)+∞³⋝ω
Khronos is a part of the process, as is
Ananke
They were
♁ ⋝ t (⨍⨳⊎∞) =⨿
Khronos upset the balance
The Screams Must Stop
JANICULUM
(ZV) feels the sacred knife from their temple slice into the ethereal-corporal sync they have manifested. They feel a rift, a change, yet pain is of the past, not the present. What comes can not be seen from here. They have been severed from an aspect of themselves that has left the feeling of <.
Only for that time of piercing
A great severing occurred.
They experience the force within them ascend to a higher intensity
What was a standstill finds Khronos waver
Wavered
Khronos meets level meeting level
Balance happens
Khronos identifies the truth
(ZV) shares the truth
Awareness that the blade Ἀστερία bore sliced through the other
“Realize that now, in this moment of time, you are creating. You are creating your next moment. That is what’s real.” ~ ~ Sara Paddison
JANICULUM
The Oracle of the Peak leaps from the outcrop
The sacred knife is raised
Blood smeared from tip to hilt
The Oracle’s descends at the rate of 10-21 seconds, a trillionth of a billionth of a second.
She becomes her own variables, phasing through every who she is/was/might be
Her scream is infinite
At a standstill, the god and the goddess
Clash for control over the other
Seek non-existence for the other
Fight for what is theirs
He was right; they were wrong
They were right; he was wrong
Time hangs in a balance
The scale does not tip
Still, The Oracle of the Peak falls
As she prophesized in dreams
In her dealings with the dead
Seeing the future
Living all of her linear pasts
Breathing through all of her linear moments
Seeing nothing nothing nothing
Of what’s to come of her
She falls, with the sacred knife now in both hands
She screams, with the sacred knife now thrust forward
Ἀστερία
The Oracle of the Peak’s name
Ἀστερία falls, and as she does
The sacred knife plunges into
Prebioticorganic synthesis ooze
Ἀστερία’s screeches fades…
THIS IS NOT
LAB
FLOAT POD
CONNECT
A touch of a thought
Breaks the seal of the trap
The shrieks, set free,
CoalesceThe particles bond
A form arises
Changes pitch and tone
A Goddess, intervenes
They have somewhen to be
“Time flies over us, but leaves its shadow behind.” Nathaniel Hawthorne
JANICULUM
elsEwhen ∞
Z is drawn back to Janiculum
V is drawn back to Janiculum
Timelessly
Flawless, pristine
War ravaged, wasteland
The Gates of Prógramma Spoudón
Open, barred, derelict
The streets, the homes, the shops, the temple
Upright, tumbled
Green, rocky terrain to the spires
Decomposing back to green
Merged (ZV) or apart (Z) (V)
To Janiculum they come
This Moment, among many many many
their presences announce themselves
there, now together
they're flowing into the others arms
hugging, stroking, tender
cheeks, napes, torsos
the lips, the lips
fingers glide along protein rich strands of keratin
lengths, volumes, grow to moods
all for the other
the want
the need
the caresses'
the hunger
the anger
forgiveness
understanding
accepting
tactile, stimulations
deeper, horridly,
gasps, roars,
trembling, quaking, shudders
breath
remember to
they hold each other/themselfthe mantle of the goddess Alcyeyxis restored
Janiculum passed around (ZV)
sending ripples
sending ripplessending
“Life isn’t a matter of milestones, but of moments.” ~ ~ Rose Kennedy
(ZV) withered
(Compositions + Substance) Bond
Broke
A rupture
Null unit { }
Z
V
Unjoined
The moment slipped out of their control
elsEwhen Z
anger anguish escalate/s/d to nth level extremes bringing a mind blankness overruled by the raging mixture of emotions Z had no awareness of the deaths the sundering caused in Z’s wake diseases transferred at rates unimaginable when all Z was brought to islands of quiet of peace of centering only to be jaunted into the swirls of destructive force to return to peace to seek out violence to destroy to quiet to all things detrimental all until Z challenged Khronos who slapped Z down rejected rejected snubbed erased until
elsEwhen V
V filtered through equations, all equations
Dispelling the soul freezing zemblanity
That washed over and through V
To return to equations, formulas,
Routine
While suffering this travesty of moments
That soothed, touched, cherished, ached
That itched, burned, chilled, ached
In a melody of high bliss
Counterbalanced by exquisite agony
An emotional/pragmatic overload
Where it all led to Khronos
Who had no sense of V
Draining V
until
“Time isn’t the main thing. It’s the only thing.” ~ ~ Miles Davis
TRANSITION
Karen will think/thinks/have thought OH SHIT!
Dr. Karen Capri envisages/verbalizes those words in the seven languages she speaks/thinks fluently.
Dr Capri has/had/will have the connective process to acknowledge what is before her endlessly
She is clinically absorbing an infinite vocabulary of experience across layers
That have layers intersecting mirrored rows of layers
Karen feels the emotional spectrum pour out of her
Her thinking process goes limp
(ZV) is floating there
Now Valentina
Then Zehara
Z
Karen has hated them
Individually
Especially together
If she could, Karen would clench her teeth, growling
They had gotten in her way way too many times
They are in her way now
Sensations go misty
She tries to fight the violation
Karen fails in every single way, across every possibility
Z knows/knew what was done to her
V now knows what was done to Z
Not even a blink: Dr. Capri is peeled away
TRANSITION
LAB
FLOAT POD CONNE
Interred
The leaded pod
Door sealed into one piece
Lies a howling, a wail, a shriek
A keening lament
A fragile cord
One not heard, never to be
Plight of one's destiny
Or not
GRB 080916C burst
K is undone
The scream continues
I started Tale Spinning at the beginning of 2011 as an offshoot of BornStoryteller. The latter went more towards non-fiction, rants, comparisons, and observations. Tale Spinning: an experiment in creative writing was the space I needed. Since then, I’ve gone through periods of both non-stop writing and those “dry” spells, where nothing inspired or motivated me.
Joining the A to Z Blogging Challenge in April 2011 was one of the smartest moves I’ve ever made. I’ve pushed my own boundaries over the ten years, always looking for that “challenge.” Taking risks is stimulating. A lot of what I write is expressing what is burning within me at the moment.
Which is probably why I have trouble continuing plunging into the worlds and characters I’ve built over the years. The roller-coaster upheaval of my life during these last ten years have jaggedly flowed from euphoric to complete and utter numbness. This isn’t a pity party. Just stating the facts, ma’am.
Many bloggers/writers I have “met along the way have become family. What is “Family is Chosen” for $2,000, Alex?” (Man, I miss Alex Trebek. Right now, I am Team Levar Burton to become the new host. Reading Jeopardy Rainbow!). It’d take me the rest of the day (it’s early here) to point you all out, but my thanks and love are hereby sent. I even met the woman I love writing these blog posts during that first A to Z. Present tense, even though we are not together anymore.
Shit happens.
Anyways.
List Time. In case, you know, want to read past (and present) A to Z attempts. Each set starts with A on April 1st of that year. There might be a few preceding posts/teases over the years as I tried out the new voice I was shooting for.
Here’s something not A to Z that I’d love to get your feedback/comments. I keep getting drawn back to it on an emotional/mental level, but have not added a thing to it in quite a while. These were written during the summer of 2011.
In case you did not notice, I am taking a huge leap/risk in style, content, and formatting with LIQUID TIME. So, who am I writing for? Just for myself? Just for the audience? 50/50?
Most times it is for myself, to see how far I can stretch, hone my skills. How, on later rereads, does it hold up way past the due date of the emotions that pummeled me while writing. I take risks. Not every one of them pans out. Some lead me to different approaches, different research, different observations of life.
On the readers hand(s), I do do my crafting for the reader(s) as well. I look for commentary, what pleases, what doesn’t, the whys behind either stance one takes. Suggestions are taken in the (hopefully) intention’s delivery, as a “have you thought about…?” or “Would you consider…”; a way that I construe as just that: a suggestion from another’s POV.
Suggestions, for me to think about, to possibly add to, delete, or turn things around. They are given to support, encourage, and give the author a different POV lens to consider.
I do not take demands into consideration. Nor the comments that essentially read “If I was the author…” or “You should not…” Well, you aren’t the author, that’s in my hands. As to the “should not…?” Really? Really?
“No” hasn’t a place here in Tale Spinning. My cranky two cents, plus inflation.
