As we move into 2026, it’s time to recall the little joys of life.
Fleeting moments, quietly kept, ready to bloom.
🌱🌸🌱🌸🌱🌸🌱🌸
Rising sun appears
Morning dew on weathered grass
Met by sprouting seed.
🌱🌸🌱🌸🌱🌸🌱🌸
Raindrops gathering
Pink buds on moistened soil
Open with sunlight.
🌱🌸🌱🌸
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Today marks the day of the 2004 Tsunami that struck the shores of several countries worldwide.
Leaving devastation.
Loss.
A weight that must be remembered.
🌊🌊🌊🌊
I watched, my waves tense, as children left chocolate wrappers on the pristine sand. Fishermen lingered at the shore, ignoring the curious dolphins poking their noses into their nets. I regarded them coldly – patient and endless, as they pursued their selfish joys.
Waiting.
They were close. Too close.
The tension caused my wavy hands to clench, ready to unleash. The veins in them were about to burst. I found myself listening to my rising impatience.
I pulled back further, gathering myself. My form stretched across horizons, waiting to release. There were the lovers. The thoughtless fishermen. The wrapper-throwing children. I recall bearing the careless weight of their ways. Each mistake, each inconsiderate act, each denial – bore into my waves.
My spindly, watery hands stilled. Grey covered the skies, along with a blanket of silence. The wind stopped blowing on my cue. Thunder growled softly, ready when I was. I stayed upright, silent, as all on the distant shores laughed without care. I waited, testing their false confidence. Nothing they did – wasted food, offensive plastic bottles – escaped my notice. I stood poised.
Ready for the inevitable.
Meanwhile, plastic bottles lay, unrisen corpses, on the shore. An angry crowd of thunderclods gathered, silent, in the background. In my watery hands were dangerous nets, uneaten food, dead fish – ready to return to those who owned them.
I carried their forgotten burdens. Each small, yet costly mistake.
Their responsibility. In my grasp.
My dirty blue fingers painfully remembered each transgression. Each misstep cut my sides.
Still, I lingered, patient, endless. Responsibility cavorted, unaware, on the trash-ridden shore.
I remembered. Always remembered. So would they.
🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊
If you like this story, do join me on Patreon! Buy this blog a coffee — it keeps the words flowing and the lights Your kind donation via Paypal would be greatly appreciated!
Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
If you like this story, do join me on Patreon! Buy this blog a coffee — it keeps the words flowing and the lights Your kind donation via Paypal would be greatly appreciated!
Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
The smell of chocolate chips in Canberra’s town hall was sweet.
Cloying.
Accusing.
Cookies marched to a precise line-up over long tables, their dark chocolate chips arranged in exact spaces in perfectly pressed dough.
That shaped the baker’s hearts in absolute symmetry – they HAD to get the taste of the cookies JUST SO.
A donation jar was a gracious sentient on a corner table,
greeted, then ignored.
Because the chocolate chip dough had to rise to yeast perfection.
🍪🍪
The judges’ eyes swept with laser exactness over the cookie lines, their nods synchronous- the cookies had to grace the sides of the moulds, with no hint of space.
The fingers of bakers pressed into dough with near-obsessive force, the thumps of their hearts orchestrating as they eradicate each offensive lump within.
Their eyes fell quickly on the donation jar.
That sighed, unnoticed.
🍪🍪🍪
The day of the great chocolate chip bake-off dawned, grey clouds masking sunlight.
People entered Canberra Hall in droves, greeting the immaculate cookie lines with polite applause.
The sound of the claps fell hollowly on the floor.
The donation jar stood on a table in the corner, a consummate wallflower observing the proceedings.
The guests passed it without glance or greeting.
🍪🍪🍪🍪
The day ended, success resounding from the walls of the hall.
Dusk fell with discoloured red hues.
The cookies were gone.
The donation jar peered keenly from the shadows.
🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪
If you like this story, do join me on Patreon! Buy this blog a coffee — it keeps the words flowing and the lights Your kind donation via Paypal would be greatly appreciated!
Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
If you like this story, do join me on Patreon! Buy this blog a coffee — it keeps the words flowing and the lights Your kind donation via Paypal would be greatly appreciated!
Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
If you like this story, do join me on Patreon! Buy this blog a coffee — it keeps the words flowing and the lights Your kind donation via Paypal would be greatly appreciated!
Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
Today is Small Town Election Day – when small communities vote on what matters.
Small voices matter – when sounded together.
🌳
🌿Evergreen was a town at almost perpetual rest – one where activity crawled. Shops opened late; restaurants shut right after dinner.
And its people seemed to tread with the help of walking canes.
A dense forest fringed the edge of the town, its thick shrubbery rustling like gentle whispers. The weight of generations-old trees, leaves brown with age – pressed on one’s shoulders.
Its reputation? For taking what it shouldn’t have.
38-year-old Clara Moon, school teacher and avid history buff, wanted to give these tangled murmurs a more audible voice. She sensed the gravity of stories etched on every tree bark.
She was wilful about it. And notorious for that.
🌳
🌿It was time for Evergreen to make a decision; election fever hit. Townsfolk assembled in droves at the polling station, their voices tinged with raspy excitement. The station’s hall resounded with their whispers.
To preserve – or not.
Developers gathered at the gates, plans in hand. Then, quiet, materialistic murmurs about profit.
Clara’s eye fell on Little Elliot. The child had wandered into the forest, his teletubby legs wobbling after a rabbit. Before long, bramble bushes grasped his ankles.
A hush fell over Evergreen. The forest had opened its mouth for –
Its prey.
Clara bit her lip. This was more than a child losing himself in the forest-it was the forest’s refusal to release him.🌿
🌳🌳
🌿 Clara rushed into the forest, hoping to grab the child before the forest swallowed him completely.
She did discover – not a child, but a sapling grove no one thought existed.
Baby trees shaped like infant animals.
At the periphery of her vision – chainsaws and axes.
Developers and dismissive grimaces.
The trunks of the saplings twisted towards them, like sentinels marching to an errant beat.
Clara’s eyes darted from one sapling to another. They stared back at her, leaves parted, almost pleading.
She wanted to help them. But that meant exposing Evergreen to their truth –
One the backwater town was not ready for.🌿
🌳🌳🌳
🌿Clara was torn.
To preserve? To tell the truth?
Her solution – a new approach.
The savvy schoolteacher arranged tours for a few of the town’s more open-minded residents.
Some backed away when they saw the saplings, their mouths open.
Others reached out to the leaves – and fingered them gently.
Clara faced those who dared touch – and cajoled.
“Such green magic is rare – your children need it in their meals daily, to grow.”
She turned to the others, their mouths still agape.
“They frighten you. But they also protect you – your peace.”
A few days later, the vote passed. Thinner than a blade of grass.
Plight mattered more than a fight. 🌿
🌳🌳🌳🌳
🌿Clara showed the way with soft hands – and won the vote.
The forest had parted its leaves quietly, revealing a clear path.
Not just one leaf or tree – piles of them.
It wasn’t just one sapling that marched – they all did.
To a single beat that played in perfect rhythm -for the greater good. 🌿🌿
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Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
Letting go isn’t the easiest course of action, but it is a powerful one.
Some things are meant to fly away.
🕊️🕊️🕊️🕊️🕊️
Memories
Fading, stand poised
Pure white wings bend, stiff
Unfurling now with gentle breath
Take flight.
🕊️🕊️ 🕊️🕊️🕊️
Thoughts still
Wind’s breath pulls memories’ white feathers
Rain clouds cover with grey
Blurring edges-
Mind flies.
🕊️🕊️🕊️🕊️🕊️
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Today marks the day of the Geminoids Meter Shower Peak and the 12/12 portal – associated with transformation and reflection.
Technology and the forces behind it are certainly transforming.
On this day, we remember that stories need souls, not circuits.
✨✨✨✨✨
Story
Machines filled my upscale apartment, their purposeful humming low and efficient. They balanced ledgers in Excel, with uncanny precision. Cursors darted left and right, scrolling to perfection- an ideal I could never reach. My heart drummed, beating an unregulated rhythm.
🌐🤖🌐🤖🌐
The city pulsed with humanity – lifeless, unrecorded, unencoded. Emitting thoughts no machine could grasp.
A bot performed in my son’s AI-generated video, its moves precise and unfettered. I glanced at my physical ledger, its blue ink suddenly turning bright red.
A warmth that the bot would never know came over me. I was far from perfect.
I was alive.
✨✨✨✨✨
What are your thoughts on technology vs. humanity? Do share in the comments!
If you like this story, do join me on Patreon! Buy this blog a coffee — it keeps the words flowing and the lights Your kind donation via Paypal would be greatly appreciated!
Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
Today, 10 December, is Human Rights Day. A day we remember that every human has the right –
To speak and sing.
Sometimes, friendly comparison carries weight. Where expectations run high, we must guard our ground. Protect our boundaries, for they mute our voices.
We often sing for others…let us sing for ourselves.
✨🌿✨
A World of Song
Notes for all to sing-
But the echoes of some drift
Muted by high walls
Lost, faded.
✨🌿✨
I hold these notes close
Trapped within my throat,
Making my lips quiver –
Into nothing.
✨🌿✨
Still others sing freely
Chirps resound, but drowned out –
muted echoes.
✨🌿✨
One note pierces the walls
the still silence
Sweetly singing
Till it’s heard.
✨🌿✨
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Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.
The Getting Literal Writing Alcove 