Building a Fire

Rapture

Here in the silent times, I remember the thoughts and words we share. I remember the lessons. I remember the hunts. I remember the soaring flights that we took. Johannes was not the only one who was taken into the fold of a wing. He was not the only one to experience the connection.

I too, was chosen.

Yes, mother, you were.

For us, it is not one over the other. It is us together. We are of one mind sharing the disparate bodies. We gain the experiences of one another for a grand collective to be shared further on down to the new generation. It is not just for you or I. It is for us all.

I too, am sharing.

Yes, mother, you are.

What we have is beyond intimacy. Our symbiosis has given each of us so much. Our decedents may one day understand what passes between us. It is beyond love. It is beyond care. It is beyond what could ever be explained in the mundane world. Our destinies are intertwined and will always be so.

I too, will be with you.

Yes, mother, you will.

Leap of Faith

Blue Moon

In the darkened and foggy streets of the city, you can find just about anything. There are deals born of need and want, of greed and satiation, of desperation and hope. There are trades done in brick-lined alleyways and underneath coal smoke. There are commodities traded by men and women that have never seen the light. Prayers are whispered by these denizens in the gritty underbelly of a decaying facade.

The Crown, more concerned about keeping what little is slipping through their fingers, props up straw men in power while formulating plans for the colonies abroad. Jack-booted Guardsman keep the streets with newly minted machine pistols.

Grizzly cigar-smoking toughs do not only work for the gentlemen adventurers and lady dilettantes, but also for those shadowmongers who manipulate the destinies of many unfortunates. Dragon-chasers seek underground dens of moldy racks in order to find dreams or escape. Hatchetmen flex their muscles under silk suits and top hats making sure that the opium keeps flowing.

Technological savants working deep into the night form wondrous marvels of steam and steel and brass. Their laboratories and shops range from the exactingly precise to the violently disheveled. Still, the minds of these engineers are in tune with a force of unsurpassed skill and motivation.

Mystics and self-styled magicians meet in secret chambers to discuss the future of mankind. Cabals formed for both good and evil use their powers to roam the unknown realms beyond the veil to exact their presence upon the things that man was not meant to know.

Throughout it all, one brave soul decides to to make her way into the sooty nights and gas lit streets. It is more than a dalliance in order to keep a brilliant mind at work or a restless soul occupied. She cannot walk away. It is her calling.

In her own way, she is shaping the future of the Empire. Her ways are not the only ways, but they are effective. Her own light tainted by the darkness around her, she fights the the denizens of shadow in the only way she knows how — with lethal intent.

A Siren's Call

 

 Art burgled from @NicoleX (NicoMysterriou)

I could tell you what you want to know, but that isn’t what you want.

You want to keep me like this, in a bottle, let out every so often so you can see me naked, so you can rub grubby fingers on me. All you want to do is pinch my nipples and slap my ass. You want to slide yourself into my lips and keep my hands bound.

I could tell you what you will become, but that isn’t what you want.

You believe the hype that you spread thick like butter on bread. It is so obvious that you think your strength comes from ownership. A macabre sense of entitlement comes from my silence. You mistake it for weakness. This is your mistake. You are a means to an end.

I could tell you what is going on, but that isn’t what you want.

You think that flesh is the end all be all of existence. You think that there is no magic in the mind. You don’t know that I have worn the phylactery and taken your power long ago. You don’t realize, dear man, that you are the mere puppet performing my bidding.

I could tell you what I am, but that isn’t what you want.

You think there is no pattern to be unlocked. You think that the blood surged and muscle strained work I put you through is somehow love. Love is longer. Love is dedicated. You, in your fleshform are temporary and are no match for the divinity within me.

I could tell you what your weakness is, but that isn’t what you want.

You gaze upon my naked flesh and dream of my nipples and lips. You focus on my breasts and hips. You never realize that my eyes are hidden. You don’t deserve them. You are mere grist for the mill powering all of my spangle.

I could tell you all of these things and more, but that isn’t what you want.

You close off your mind and let your thickness move towards me, within me, through me. It is here within the rituals that I have set in motion that you lose yourself. It is my power that is being fueled by your disposition. It is your weakness I have targeted.

I could tell you of your sacrifice, but that isn’t what you want.

You cannot see the illusion. You cannot see how I have set the machinations in place. You cannot understand the power of sex and what it holds. You cannot understand how a fish can be made to climb.

Dream Ship

Year of the Black Water Dragon

In the summer of the Year of the Black Water Dragon, I visited the Middle Kingdom.

I saw the vistas, smelled the air, ate the food, and became one with myself. I learned about ancient monuments and holy sages. I heard about Qin Shǐ Huángdì and the Silk Road. I learned how to walk into tombs with reverence and the magic of jade.

More than all of that, I learned what it was to be a guest in another country. It taught me humility and showed me my own hubris. I saw humble people willing to help a stranger. I saw miraculous technologies and wicked charlatans.

I lived in a back alley hutong in Beijing. I had a glorious hotel in Xi'an. I saw the Bund and the structures in Shànghǎi. I rode the bullet train and climbed the Great Wall at Bādálǐng. I ate street food and saw the night markets.

For a time, I was just one of the many billions of people in the Middle Kingdom. I was encompassed in history and art, in language and culture, in a maelstrom of confusion that led to a blissful existence. I had no worries, other than conversion rates, and learned to truly appreciate what it meant to live in the present.

The trip gave me many story seeds that are still percolating today. It moves me to seek out legends and how the philosophies and teachings could be brought into today's world. It fuels much of what I do.

It has made my gōng fu strong and has made my art stronger.