[x]

The Solipsist's LotThere's something about yourself that you don't know. You probably don't remember the circumstances very well, but I do. If you enjoy things the way they are, if you revel in even the smallest speck of ignorance, you need not read ahead. I won't force you. But from what I know of you, you don't like secrets. Especially not when they are about you.

You see, when you were born, so at once was everyone else. Your mother, she sprang into existence, just like that, the instant your tiny infant brain achieved the smallest semblance of self-awareness. Woven out of the ethe

Gnome Noir  "I did it for the money and I did it for the girl.
        Well, I didn't get the money – and I didn't get the girl."
::  Walter Neff - Double Indemnity
So I point the flintlock at the guy – and that's no easy thing, big musket like that on a little gnome like me – and I peer down the sight. Not many people know what it's like to stare at a man through a glass. But in those sacred moments, the whole world takes a breath and it's just you and him. I line up the shot, and I think about the girl, and--

What? That is the start. What do you want, Sheriff, my life story?

Alright, well, I'm Gniles Brody the Third – that's

The Price of Dying“I want to be interred after I die,” Mr. Peters said. He made that clear to his family while he was still lucid, before old age and illness rendered him unintelligible. Seventy wasn’t that old, but he recognized the symptoms that were creeping up on his ailing body – the aches, the fatigue, the feeling of helplessness and despair. Despite his daughter’s attempts to assuage his concerns, he sensed his own mortality.
The worst part about dying, Mr. Peters thought, was what happened afterwards. Even since he was a small boy, he had been afraid of fire. He could never forget the scorching heat of the orange flames searing his skin, the dark billowing smoke entering his nostrils. The time that his house burned down, the fire almost took him with it. How ironic then, to escape the fire only to be fed into it after death.
So one day, he sat his son and daughter down after dinner. “I want to be buried whole,” he said, emphasizing the

Five Seasons (Alternate) There was this moment, early last May, when I could have glanced up from the book I was reading at the breakfast table.
I could look out my window and see you standing on my lawn, this waif in a windbreaker grinning at a daydream you're probably too old for. I could bring you an umbrella. I could invite you in for coffee, and we could lose the whole day debating questionable Scrabble plays. We could take to the streets after dark and try to find an all-night diner that will feed us both for less than fifteen dollars. I could fall in love with you.
But I don't.
...spring
You go home with nothing but a story about how springtime leaves you feeling lonely. Your roommate blows off a dinner date to take you out for drinks. You send a Chardonnay up to the stage between sets and the singer takes you home.
The new girl at work works up the nerve to ask me out.
I don't have a reason to say no.
Your

They Also Serve Who Only Stand and WaitI don't know when we first went underground. I don't even know if it was one mass exodus, a swarm of mankind trickling through the earth's crust so vehement we carved our own caverns by the force of trampling feet, or whether it was a gradual process, perhaps even a repetitive one, a family here, a neighborhood there. For all I know, the echo of the damp subterranean machine has always reverberated off the cave walls, created long past by the Angels, who think of our well-being even while they shake their heads helplessly at our flaws.

They say that those who remained on the surface were raptured away in a great flash of light, like a millio

Across the Sea and Around the KotatsuSpring

Taco Rice

Mom starts with rice. Japanese rice, one, two, three Japanese cup-fulls of rice grains into the cooker, because Sis eats a lot of this stuff. It's one of her favorite dishes, taco rice, and Mom's always happy to make it for her because it's the only way Sis will eat her tomatoes. But back to the rice. "You want to rinse at least three or four times, until the water's kind of clear," Mom says as she cups her hand under the cooker pot, letting the cloudy water wash over her hand.

Rice cooking's easy though – just fill enough water to the point the rice's covered, punch in a time (or set it to "Quick Cook," which with our cre

001. beginnings.Beginnings are vague things. Quite often you can't pin them down to one event – you have to trawl back further and further through foggy past, peeling apart what ifs and untangling strands of memories.

Eventually one has to go all the way back to the start of the universe, and that's a question even the experts have to shrug their shoulders at. It's not like you can plug it into a calculator and come out with a balanced algorithm. At least, not yet.

But it is true that sometimes you can fasten down an occurrence or a moment or even just a single breath, like sticking a thumbtack through a dead butterfly, and label it as a 'beginning' i

Ottumwa ShamanIn Iowa, weeping willows dream of
Tigers, born in pagan fog, their
Coat of stripes singing shaman
Songs; shrill symphonies of grief.
Heaven tilts, crashes, and we race
The dirt to get away. We drink the
Earth with bullets of air and grow
Dizzy, light-headed from breathing
Some far off flame. Perhaps a poet
Who braved the fog of Ottumwa, and
Caught fire. Every cowboy has his
Six chances before high noon, before
The fog forms wispy jackals to take
Them home again. Every son inherits
An empty gun, six voids to fill with
Answers, skimmed and guessed from the
Covers of books their fathers used
To read. There is no other way.
In s

This Common BloodI am young when I first hear the word 'adoption'. I am so very young, perhaps three, maybe four. I accept it easily when my mother sits me down and explains that I did not grow beneath her heart, but rather in it. I nod my head, smile big, and ask when I'm getting a little sister. My mother kisses me on the forehead and puts her hand on my head as she stands up. "If you wish on a star, Sarah, maybe she will be here very soon." I practice my wishing until night's companions wink merrily in the sky.

Dear Anna,
I turned seventeen just recently. I thought of you when I woke up, and I wondered if you were thinking of me. I like to think that you

Nathan Turner Nathan Turner, aged thirty, was a modest earner, if nothing other. Son of no

father and a flighty mother, and raised in most part by troubled brothers, he was never

one to put his trust in those upon whom the dust of age had scarcely settled. For a time,

he had meddled, even peddled, looking for the light in his own eyes. But never enough was

it, just as well, in his own mind, for the brand of fire which he desired was the sort a

man might chase until he dies, and even at the gates of Hell, never find.

But one cool evening in July, he chanced to meet - just walking by - a woman with

an empty stroller. "Empty stroller?" he asked at on

cosmic background radiationThey say that the big bang was not an actual "bang". It was really just static. Static, like the interference of radio waves. Of course, the universe did not happen instantaneously. The big bang took 760,000 years to happen. 760,000 years of static, and bang, the universe happened.

I get myself together and actually go out. I go to see the New York Philharmonic perform the works of John Cage at Lincoln Center. I walk out during the second movement of 4'33". There's a very small difference between life and death. I walk home, my chin pulled down against my neck. I hum a constant note, providing myself with my own tinnitus.

I focus on this no

my howls are silentI, too, see the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness. We are decomposing too early, our souls dying before our bodies can catch up. We are silently ravenous, a quiet craze in our hearts, not quite the same as your generation, Ginsberg. We do not shriek "Holy! Holy! Holy!" as we burn. We drown soundlessly.

The overeducated, proud products of postmodernism dissolve in a lukewarm soup of ennui, bored balloons filled with hubris rather than helium. Fragile dolls with flaking bones and hair and skin like flowers wilting, weighed down by indomitable wills and insecurities... these plastic girls starve to death and diabetes in the car b

SouvenirsWhen her mom went to check the mail at breakfast, she returned with a thin box in her arms.

It was a package from her father.

Her dad was sort of like a traveler... at least, that was what she assumed he was. His job always had him jumping from city to city, country to country. He'd been to almost everywhere around the world, and every few weeks, he would send her a letter with a little souvenir from his stay. This time, it was a miniature Eiffel Tower.

So he's in France again, she mused, studying the two-foot tall replica. A small chuckle escaped her lips. It was about time he remembered to get it for her! He really should've thought of b

Survival of the IllestAre those hints of lemon I detect?
Look, I'm just here to get wasted, don't try
to make it more than that.

I'd drink motor oil if I thought
it could get me high; chase it with a shot
of antifreeze
so
you can keep your survival instincts,
locked up
in that pretty velvet box (along with all
those other things
you thought you could convince yourself
you lived for). Instincts are the bare
bones of the impossibilities we wanted
to believe in,
remember,
those times you tried to tell me that
adrenaline was God's way
of saying
that
we were His chosen ones, we were
special, we were free.
I tried to tell you that instincts an

Escape VelocityF = G(m1m2)/r2

Black – true black – is the absence of light. Darkness is defined by what it is not, by the lack of something else. When we say a black hole, we truly mean that; black. Blacker than black. An absence of not only light, but of time, distance, anything.

The night was scary when I was little. I hated the dark, but couldn’t bear to sleep so long as the light was on, any light, burning on the other side of my eyelids. I used to have nightmares about dark things in dark corners, shadowy figures with shadowy fingers trailing along my spine. I always woke up cold and fumbling frantically for the lamp, but the aura o

Browse More Like This

Download File
HTML, 3.6 KB more ▶

More from ~TheEmptyChest

Magic TricksShe's wearing a black dress with white lace and fishnet stockings that complement her fair-skinned legs. Her hair is done up in an intricate bun, her face coated with exaggerated makeup—white foundation, red lipstick, dark purple eye shadow, rosy blush. Monsieur Dubois said he wanted her to look as though she had popped out of a Tim Burton film. "I want her to have flair," he'd said. As it turns out, his idea of "flair" is an unbalanced, ghoulish look. I can't say I dislike it, though. Grace could make any look work.

That may sound cheesy, and I confess that it probably is, but it is the absolute truth.

I watch her twirl around for Monsieur

Not Too Far DownSometimes Danny would get real scared. He never did like to admit it, but sometimes when he sat on his front porch he'd start tappin' his foot and hummin' and fidgetin' and the like. His wife said it was somethin' with his brain. His rockin' chair helped. So did his cigars.

I remember when the men in suits came and had a hole dug in his field, lookin' for oil. "You just might be a rich man," they told him. One of 'em clapped him on the back and he broke down into tears. He sobbed for hours. I couldn't even tell if he was happy or sad. When his wife heard the news, she put her hand to her chest like she was about to recite the Pledge of Alleg

Broken Hearts Still BeatingThe lightning-spliced sky illuminates my bedroom
and I'm crouched in the corner, embraced by the dark,
thinking of how there could have been a chance
for me to wake up next to you, your emerald eyes
webbed with emotion, your body limp
from jerking in your sleep. I imagine ruffled sheets,
broken lamps, and permeating heat.

I think of how we could have jogged together
along roadsides and doubled over with thorns
in our ribs at your feeble attempts to whistle Dixie.
I'm collapsing inward, reminiscing on the truths
I should have told you and how every boy I pass
has your face, your dark brown hair, your lips.
And I cry. Oh, do I cry.

Schrodinger's CatA hermit died. No one knew.

RebeccaRebecca—
this is my name with the shades
rolled up, body exposed to the sun,
a simple word that I carry
like a badge or a cross or a scar.

It is my name
dripping from my lips like poetry,
hiding inside colors and pictures,
stories and music.

It's my name with the lights off,
me sitting in the middle of the room
with no one to say it,
arms crossed over my ribcage,
forehead on my knees,
shapes twisting behind my eyelids.

Rebecca—
this is my name burrowed in
the obscurity of language,
building bridges and raising walls.

It's my name spoken
through cigarette smoke and slurred voices,
caught up in an embrace,
wandering aiml

View Gallery

Featured in Groups:

#Writers-Guild-DA
writers everywhere

#Live-Love-Write
Literature Lovers

#Writers--club
A group for all writers!

#dA-Literature
Write to live, and live to write

#TheUnheardVoices
The unheard speak up.

#WritersAreArtistsToo
Writers of deviantART

#DD-Catalogue
The Home of Daily Deviations

#knownames

Show all (27)

Details

Submitted: July 29, 2012
File Size: 3.6 KB

Link

Thumb

Statistics

Comments: 302
Favourites: 574 [who?]
Views: 5,917 (0 today)
Downloads: 533 (0 today)

[x]

John at 3:16

by ~TheEmptyChest, Jul 29, 2012, 3:21:20 PM
Literature / Prose / Fiction / Spiritual & Occult / Flash Fiction & Vignettes

_{Dear Jesus Christ,

I went to bed at 3:16 last night and started thinking about John—John who pissed away every paycheck he ever made and only fucked virgins, John who beat up a woman's husband and spent a Christmas in jail, John who shot himself on the front porch of his mother's house. I don't think anyone shed a tear except her. I heard she shed many tears as she cleaned up the mess.

I thought about when I first met him. It was at church. He and I were both eight. He sat next to me and we stared at that stained glass image of you in your white robe with your outstretched, loving arms, and he leaned into me and asked, "Do you believe in Jesus?"

"Of course," I said. "Don't you?"

He didn't answer. But it was Communion that day and he ate your body and drank your blood just like everyone else, and I thought he had to believe in you because you were inside of him.

I asked him once, Jesus Christ, I asked him if he believed in you and he said, "I want to. But everyone says I have to find him. Why? If he's real and he loves me and died for me and all that, shouldn't he find me? Have you ever seen Jesus before?"

"No," I said.

"Me neither."

And then he cried.

I started praying for him after that. You remember, don't you? I asked you to find him, but I don't think you did, and then he ended up in the hospital because his daddy had given him three fractured ribs and a swollen eye. I wasn't allowed to visit, but I had his momma give him a note. In it I begged him to believe in you. He sent one back telling me to go to Hell.

The next time he and I spoke was years later. We were in high school. He was taller, skinnier, and older. Me, I was just older. I said hi to him, but he acted like he didn't know me. I watched him incite fights in the hallways and flirt with random girls. I watched him cuss out teachers and get suspended for hiding a knife in his shorts. He never did anything to me, but I knew he wanted to.

And I prayed for him again, Jesus Christ. I prayed for him as hard as I could.

He left school halfway through Junior year, but he didn't leave town. He had nowhere to go just like the rest of us. I saw him off and on, working jobs, driving around. Two girls said he'd taken their virginity. Later I was told about a third—the one he got pregnant. "He only fucks virgins," I heard. "Something to do with control. Makes him feel all macho, turning young girls into women." And the drinking—oh yes, the lost money and DUIs and bar fights. People said he was drunk when he beat up that woman's husband. They also said the woman's husband resembled his daddy. He supposedly called the man a "child-abusing bastard" as he was cuffed and forced into the cop car. It was a few days before Christmas. If I remember right, when he'd gone to the hospital for the fractured ribs it had been around Christmas time too.

Your birthday. The day you came down here because your daddy so loved the world.

I didn't hear about his suicide until a good month after it happened. I'd come home from college for winter break, and while I was helping my mom do the dishes she said, "By the way, John died. Blew his brains out on his momma's front porch, right in front of her."

I didn't pray for him then, or ever again.

He couldn't believe in you, Jesus Christ. I'm not sure if I can either, but I want to.

I want to.

I thought about John at 3:16 last night, and I shed a tear.}

John at 3:16by ~TheEmptyChest

Literature / Prose / Fiction / Spiritual & Occult / Flash Fiction & Vignettes

I almost cried while writing this.

EDIT: I got a DD???

Thank you!!! <3

Daily Deviation

Given 2012-12-13

John at 3:16 by ~TheEmptyChest is "spiritual and surprising without forcing conclusions" (suggester's words). ( Suggested by *xlntwtch and Featured by ^neurotype )

~~mad 0 0~~

~~fear 0 0~~

~~neutral 0 0~~

*Sir-Herp-of-Derp 2 days ago Student General Artist

Thank you, AP Art History, for teaching me about religions! I would've thought of zombies and cannibalism in the part about the Communion, otherwise.

This was... wow. What a piece. The poor kid just needed some support and love. The saddest thing is, there's all to many kids that have walked or will walk similar paths in their lives, just because they didn't have enough tangible support. Religion only gets you so far...

Great work.

~TheEmptyChest 2 days ago

Hahaha! I know, right? Although I can understand how one would think of zombies and cannibalism (especially the latter) even with an education in religions. The whole Communion thing is... interesting.

Thank you very much! Yes, John definitely did not get the love and support he needed, and unfortunately his life is experienced by many, many children worldwide. Religion can do a lot of good (I've seen people dramatically change for the better because of it), but in an unloving environment, it's not much help.

Thanks!

~nuclearfirework Feb 9, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

Also, John didnt need Jesus, he needed someone to care for him, someone to protect him from his abusive father. Then he might have found Jesus.

~TheEmptyChest Feb 9, 2013

Yes, if someone had sat up and taken notice and had gotten him away from his terrible father, he may have led a different life, which may have included finding Jesus.

~nuclearfirework Feb 9, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

And maybe he did find Jesus at the end, but, in his own mind, felt that he had no right to be a live because of everything he did.

~TheEmptyChest Feb 9, 2013

That's definitely a possibility, and honestly, now that you mention it, I can relate. Not feeling worthy is absolutely terrible. Nice insight!

~nuclearfirework Feb 9, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

God, this is depressing, but still a wonderful piece.

~TheEmptyChest Feb 9, 2013

Thank you.

~featherback Feb 4, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

Oh my God I love this so very much. I love the way it's written, I love how the words resonate. Everything about it amazes me. It's more than deserving of a DD and I congratulate you on receiving one!

~TheEmptyChest Feb 8, 2013

THANK YOU!!!

More from ~TheEmptyChest

Featured in Groups:

Details

Statistics

John at 3:16

John at 3:16by ~TheEmptyChest

Daily Deviation

The Journal Portal

Polls

What is your preferred drawing software?

deviantART [dee·vee·un'nt·ART]

Keep in Touch!

Deviousness

Add Media

Style