Darkness Until Dawn

Water down the mountain Dripping from the snow And as the droplets gather A Stream begins to grow Slowly Ripples join each other And down and down they flow In that moment beautiful Like that crystal snow As the stream grows larger and speeds up as it goes It descends down the rapid slope And the beauty begins to show First, it takes some time to pool Gathering poise as it slows With grace it lifts from clifftop heights seeking new life down below And so it comes to freefall From those distant heights Creating its own show of hope In that early light. And now what can be seen for miles And in morning sunlight glows Is a flight of color in the air That only the heavens could truly know. ©️ 2023, Accountec, LLC

 After it bit me, I dropped the gun and started running. I hadn’t run but maybe 20 yards when I had to stop, bending over to welcome back the contents of my stomach. There I was, all sweaty and huffing and trying to stop heaving. My hands shook, and I felt weak in the knees. I looked back. The house was farther then I thought. No sign of the dog or the thing that bit me… or my buddies. I thought maybe I could hear them calling for me, but my heart was pounding so loud that I couldn’t be sure. Then there was the wind and the darkness that obscured so much. I looked up as I panted, to see the moon coming out from behind the clouds. In the distance came a howling.  Suddenly, to my surprise, I joined in. It was a shaky but throaty howl there in the sight of the full moon. I looked down at my paws and did a double take. My knees bent under my weight as I realized that what were once hands were that no longer. I hunched over on my forelegs and ran off into the forest, never looking ...

 I had never been so lost, and of all the places to be lost… the suburbs? A true forest, a true city, either would do. You can prowl urban sprawl as easily as the wild. But this? Far too civilized. Leave it to that crazy cousin Vinny to give me bad information. I couldn’t even get a good view of the moon. One night I even caught myself howling at a street lamp. If anyone saw me I’d never live it down.  I got bitten almost a year ago, and I’ve been on the run since. Me and my buddies were out drinking outside of a small town where I grew up. Someone came up with the fool idea of tryin’ to put down the crazy old mutt that the Rileys owned, but we were all scared of old man Riley and his shotgun. For good reason too. The old man was nearly blind but he was so trigger happy that the Sheriff’s office had been up there maybe half a dozen times to tell him to lay off. The mutt was mean as the devil to everyone but him. So we took it upon ourselves to do a public service, drunk as we ...

They think I did not know. Yet even an old bat with a hangover could hear them. My father always told Vlad, verk that sonar, my boy, that’s what makes the Drakuls who we are, our famous (sometimes infamous) listening skills. You never know what you might catch. Yes, yes, I knew the girl was there. The why escaped me at first. Yet even with that blabbering dolt carrying on below, even without twitching, Vlad got the gist of the conversation. Strange, they were to me. Strangers that seemed stranger then Vlad himself, which of course I found impressive. Perhaps my arrival was vell timed, if a bit undignified. Zee legged one was more irritating in his oddness. Vlad tried to give him the benefit of the mortality. Life can be rough, I don’t know how they do it. It mystified me how anyone could choose to live here. It vasn’t dark enough, cold enough, and was made entirely from wood and fiber. Verse, it was a long fly from zee nearest cave or castle.  Vhile the little crazy one fumed, I ma...

 The Nerbe of dat bat. Spidey scrub and scrub and di floor is still stained. He had been fussing about Vlad for what seemed like hours, scrubbing, stopping, crawling back and forth fuming, and on and on. You’d think with eight legs he could scrub faster.  Sunlight was streaming through the window and vlad hung from a rafter, fast asleep ever since Spider chased him off the floor. The critter was so in a tizzy that he didn’t even notice me slip out the window. My name is Jess, though they sometimes call me Dust. I’m almost 16, but I left home years ago. Even before my fading, when I became invisible, people didn’t notice me much. I can be very quiet. I saw on the roof for a few minutes, looking out towards the Southern horizon. It was beautiful, all blue Skye, wisps of clouds, and sunlight above trees, houses, and streets. The people of the world were coming out.  “Almost time.” A shingle said. Gradually the outlines of a lizard became greener. Jess smiled. Below, she coul...

 Somewhere in the Carolinas Spidey found this attick on my own, I'll hab you kno. Then came the others, much to Spidey's chagrin. Yees, dey can be useful, but an arachnid needs his space. Cobwebs to hang, wardrobe to store.  A Spider's werk is nebber done. Deese humans... clumsy, but big. They built a house and did nuttin wit di attick! Spidey fix.  All Spidey wanted was to bring the attick to its full glory, arachnid style. It was going just fine, tank you berry dutch, but den one night Spidey woke to a fluttering, and there he was, lying on the floor...      Vlad take it from here. You tell it wrong. Peter Vladimir Drakul II, Prince of the Northern Wood, Wallachia. Yes, yes, I know your question. Drakul, like Dracula? He's my father's father's second cousin. Why he mutilated the name, I do not know. Vanity, Vlad suspects. He also likes to mutilate, on occasion. My family was considered a bit odd by local standards as we dislike the human form. Zee Batty D...

Where does your mind go in your moments of doubt? When fear runs wild, you run and hide behind a wall of ignorance So eager to find someone to blame You fail to stop to consider if you should. And so you wrap yourself in false righteousness pridefully creating narratives to preserve That ignorance that grants you your superiority While unleashing primal fury on anyone who fails to acknowledge it. The mind, like a vine, it sprouts its passions The mouth, like a chute, fires off its venom You call it love as if that makes it so. You’re lost within the biggo tree. In your frantic desperation to be right You blind yourself to your own actions Do you see, within you, your own perversion? No, you’re lost within the biggo tree. You know you’re right because you tell yourself so pronouncing it as often and loudly as you can You feed on your hatred and lust for its power So you can look down on your fellow man You’ll always hate because there is evil, Not in others but in yourself. Your obstina...