Tungsten sky sits heavy across heaven
Impassable barrier dividing life and Life
Crushing the air from tired lungs
Faking dusk
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed.
Over the clover fields and far away
Beyond the rolling hills
Where unsettled horizons pulse and stir
And a roiling ocean caresses the sky
Blowing kisses, day and night
White lips pursed to darkening blue
Always touching, just
Sea spray and stars, they meet in love
Aside a jilted moon
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed.
We, by which I mean me, endeavoured to do right by each other. I spoke kind words, and she shoved them down my throat. I held open the door, and she vacated it. And so on, and so forth. This was our way, use and be used.
Time was not kind to us, by which I mean me. The bruises grew larger, her rages ever greater. I grew timid, as she grew robust. And still, I did my best. Still, I tried.
She, by which I mean they, buried me one cold and windy November afternoon. It rained upturned buckets. Another man already held her umbrella.
Now there was no we, no she, just me. For the first time in forever, I was alone. Nothing lasts.
I returned from the darkness like a roosting bat, flittering around our, by which I mean her apartment, every evening after lights out. She was never alone.
Our paths crossed when she went to the toilet shortly after midnight. I held the door for her, or tried.
“Do I know you?” she sneered. “You remind me of someone I once used.”
The fact I was a ghost seemed inconsequential, her attitude unaltered. I shrugged a delicate breeze, for words were beyond me now.
She rolled her eyes and got down to business.
“Well! Don’t just stand there, pass the toilet roll,” she commanded, upon finishing.
I laughed as I flapped and flailed, unable to acquiesce to her wishes. I tried so hard. Yet, this simplest of tasks was beyond me, and so I left and never returned.
We, by which I mostly mean me, often talk of her, and if she sits there still, stinking and swearing, whilst waiting for another to service her.
The End
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed.
Unattended roses gather dust in churchyards.
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed.
A look,
a raising of the eyes,
lashes batted,
half a smile,
the wiping of a lock,
the slightest cough,
flirtatious traits exaggerated
by an impudent desire
to remain single.
This is the girl in the corner.
This is the girl for me.
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed.
A ghost in the fog is only ever a pair of bashful eyes. Odd that the darkness gives them such desperate clarity?
Richard M. Ankers
Sometimes the need to breathe overwhelms. Our throats constrict, tongues swell, eyes bulge like bullfrogs. A blue sky darkens to ocean, the world reversed, our bodies upside down. Not even the earth offers a steadying reassurance, volatile like an undulating sea. We drown, eyes open. We gasp for air. The worst of it? There’s no rational explanation. Just another day or night in a life of many. Just another second on this road called life.
These moments are fleeting, though occasionally, they linger. But the body always remembers what to do, after all, without a predisposition for breathing, why even have lungs?
Breathing is what we do when we close our eyes. We leave the body to do its thing as we dream of better. Unlike the accordion that requires a good squeeze, or the bike pump that demands manipulation, our bodies do not. So, why do we need so many teachers to help us? The answer is simple: We don’t.
Yet we have apps to follow and sites to see, gurus to advise, and leotarded superstars to offer salvation. If only we could breathe like them. If only we could do it right.
And we try. We try so very hard to understand. To appreciate. To live the dream. If we do it right, who knows, perhaps Death will never take us.
Death, the dark force behind it all. The one who wants us to fail, to gasp, flounder, capitulate. He cares not that we breathe or that we might only sometimes breathe, just that one day we won’t. Even thinking about it makes our chests constrict, breaths shorten, noses block. As dogs before a desert without master or chain, free to explore, but scared to stray far from the puddle at their feet, we hesitate. Death smiles.
Hesitation is his dark foot in the door. It is doubt. It is a taster. That instant of will our breaths return, even when knowing they should. So, we regather like they’ve taught us. We control ourselves with the skill a baby would admire. We breathe, deep and long, our cheeks puffed out and brows sweating.
They teach us to listen to our breaths and from there ourselves. The body will know. The body will calm itself. But in this calmness, this cosmic realignment, we hear what our breaths have immersed. An app shuts down. A website fails. A guru collapses to the ground quite dead. The leotard splits to howls of universal derision.
We breathe because we want to. We breathe because we must. But one day in the not-so-distant future, we won’t. On that day, Death can take us. On that day, our accordions shall not require being played. I, for one, shall welcome it, as I hope will you.
The End — Almost.
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed..
Only in sadness is happiness found.
Only in melancholy is there a shift to peace.
Only when the ravens bow is life acknowledge.
Only at midnight do we cease to die.
Why?
Only time will tell, and only if we listen.
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed.
Fingers entwine like November branches,
The chill offering pleasurable release;
There’s no benefit to being overly warm.
We swish amongst the decadent leaves
Raining down in shades of gone:
Ah, the bliss of the festering mind.
A moment in the meadow is a lifetime on the sea;
Translucent waves like polished glass
Revealing only an inverse night.
The hole looms like a collapsed bed,
And I can’t wait to draw the obsidian sheets high.
A raven rattles a warning, or a joyful dirge,
Flapping wings to dispel the buzzing bats;
They’ve already consumed the flies.
She bends low like an avalanche
Destroying all I’ve ever known, been, seen.
I welcome it, her, this unmarked legacy,
One colder than my heart.
The impossible shades of an afterlife found
Embrace this shell and pop out a nutlike soul.
And though I wish to scream ‘come back’
She spins a maelstrom, shifting time and tide for me,
Only for me, always for me, as she ever has and ever will.
For though our cold, cold love is abhorrent to most,
The universe has just gained two more stars.
Thank you for reading
Richard
Richard M. Ankers
Author of the brand new steampunk extravaganza Britannia Unleashed.
I feel very privileged to have had ‘The Silent Raven Calls‘ published by the wonderful Gobblers & Masticadores magazine. This is a dark fantasy story telling how strong the bond between a mother and her daughter is regardless of the circumstances.
If you want a good read offered in many styles (and languages) then you could do far worse than giving Gobblers and Masticadores a try. The good people who operate the magazine have also asked if I would contribute to them monthly, and I’ve agreed, so be prepared.
I hope you have time to read my story, and as always, thank you for reading this.
Richard
Richard M. Ankers - Storybook 
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