A young man muttered at his bad luck and penniless situation.   He frowned all the days. A wise senior came across to talk to him, ‘Hey kiddy, why are you so unhappy?’ ‘I don’t understand why I’m so poor always!’ he said. ‘Poor ? I think you are very wealthy!’ the wise senior said sincerely. The young man was puzzled,  ‘Why are you talking like that?’ the wise senior asked. ‘Suppose someone offers you one thousand dolla...

 An ascetic came from a long journey to an obscure village on a gloomy night.  There were some villagers continuously walking to and fro in the streets. When the ascetic walked into an alley, he saw a dim yellow light approaching quietly from the deep end of the alleyway. A villager said, ‘The blind is coming!’ THE BLIND! The ascetic wondered. He asked someone nearby, ‘Is that person carrying a lantern really blind?’ The...

“Aw Mom,” whines Jeremy. “Do I have to take history? I hate history.” “Yes, you must take it this term.” “But history always leaves...” Jeremy thinks, “a bad taste in my mouth.” “I know dear, but we all have to do some things that are unpleasant at times,” she explains. “Besides, it's required if you wish to graduate.” Reluctantly, Jeremy takes the educational capsule and swallows it down with some water. “Yuck!” he grima...

You’re reading magazines wrong. See, if you’re anything like me, you treat these magazine things* as highly disposable sources of information. You buy them (or steal them, I guess, and shame on you), read them once (if that) and then never touch them again. You get that sweet, sweet content fix you were looking for. Then it’s over. Maybe you throw the mags away. Maybe you store them in huge piles that threaten to tip over...

Being a henchman (or henchwench, naturally) is not an easy calling. You’re the first line of defense (and offense, for that matter) for a supervillain (or alien intelligence, eldritch entity, force of nature, etc.) with big plans - the one who has to throw the switch on the Doomsday Machine, who has to take care of the clone vat, who has to make sure all the riddles make sense and the deathtraps have been placed just righ...

This week, I attended one university lecture a day. I took notes, tried to learn things, played the part of the good student.Only I’m not a good student. In fact, I’m not a student at all. I’m just a guy who’s stealing knowledge – and I’m loving it.Let me start at the beginning. See, I have a problem: I’m not all that smart, and I’m getting dumber every day.Now, I know a few things about a few things…but there’s just so m...

Over the past 14 years my friend has fought firstly to see his two boys (who at the start were 5 and 2.) Now he fights to keep the youngest attending a well-regarded Private school that he solely pays for. While the boys’ mother and stepfather have repeatedly removed him and now tell him he doesn’t need to go. The last time 2015 they removed him during his end of year exams so the youngest now has incomplete results. Also...

Hired for the dirty job of cleaning the dirty life Out of the corners of a house long lived in By a man recently dead. An eccentric intellectual hippie of a fellow Whom I had never met before he died But knew with an intimacy many missed Boxes of papers stood in the corner I pulled a random parchment from one His PhD from UCLA, signed by Governor Reagan. What is a doctorate without a man? All the work that went into this...

Diaspora  She asks me if I know what this means  Like the seeds of a dandelion  Blown by the harsh winds of intention versus expectation  I am a black woman and the seed  Is the marrow of my spine  The wind has caught in the thickness of my hair  Lifting me to this place among pale faces Liminal Being  She asks me if I know what this means  When I catch the sea at high tide  I will drift to my people in familiar waters  T...

The Lost Generation By Captain Midnight In the style of Gertrude Stein A prose-poem on what our generation faces as compared to the generation of the Jazz Age and beyond. You are part of a lost generation. By shuffling you round and round and round and round The powers that be have stripped you of much of your identity. By giving you standardized tests the powers that be devise Row upon row Of square pegs in round holes t...