The bridge of Reika is the only path that connects two different worlds. One of them is the world of human. Naieve, ignorant, weak and yet foolishly arrogant race. The other one is the world of predators where ancient creatures called Norzas dwell. Creatures so fearsome that knows no mercy. Everything that is not them is food. They pillage they kill and they grab whatever they find. A baby Norza easily towers most of the full grown human.

And the one who guards this bridge of Reika is Arantha. A part Norza part Human. Long, long time ago, Norzas ruled the world. For them humans were just food supply. They would cross the bridge to gather food and return to their cosy dwellings made on the highest tree tops, swinging in the air, riding the clouds. But one day the Daughter of the highest of Norzas fell in love with the tiny creatures they gather for food. She saved one as a pet. In time that pet learned her language and they began to communicate. To her surprise, even food had feelings and emotions. She travelled to the far north, few over mountains, rocked the clouds and tamed the waters. After years she returned with Arantha. A creature who vowed to stand guard between both the worlds. To save humans from turning into just food.

For thousands of years nobody crossed that bridge. And today, here he stands, facing an army of human ants. Curious, greedy explorers ready to hunt down the only thing that keeps them from being hunted.

Call to Sea
Schooner at rest,
lines, sheets naked against clouds,
warfed.

Sturdy ship calmly awaits
call to rig three masts,
cast off with the tide,

hands heart quickened,
cries of gulls,
music wind strummed in guys and stays.

Blue water sailor at sea
longs for port,
ashore soon pines
for rolling deck,

salt air, straining boards,
great unknowns to call man to his best,
put heart and sinew to mortal test.

69 words. © Jack Mullen

Tags: #post, #pensivepost
January 22, 2017 at 07:21PM

*Shackles of Mortality*

When she finally returned her skin was unmarred, but her eyes hooded by pain. She looked even smaller than usual, wrapped in clothes that clearly weren't hers and hugging herself while glancing around. She smiled a bit as she saw me, but her heart was clearly not into it.

I moved to hug her, to try to comfort her about what happened just a few days ago, and she went limp in my arms, tears welling in the corners of her eyes. "W-why me?" she managed to sob out, before turning into an unintelligible mess.

I gently guided her towards the couch as I rubbed her shoulder soothingly, but survivor's guilt is hard to let go. We just sat there for a long time, entwined together, until well after she stopped crying, while I repeated her it wasn't her fault.

I, too, wept with her, thinking I could have lost her that day, thinking about how my life was now beholden to an alien entity - but those tears rapidly dried up as I dredged up my determination to make things better, my happiness at still having her by my side.

At some point she snuggled into me, her breath becoming slower, as she fell asleep. I just laid there, my eyes open as I stared at the white ceiling, not really seeing it - fire and blood and broken, twisted bodies dancing in my mind's eye.

Kiuubey didn't bother me that night, nor the day after that, and I didn't bother with it, despite the creeping darkness that threatened to engulf my Soul Gem.

"You'll need to find a Grief Seed soon, Francesca." came its telepathic voice as I slipped out of the door to my bedroom, leaving the love of my life alone with her nightmares.

"I know." I simply replied, the door to our house clicking after me. I transformed, my black suit replacing the battered hoodie and sweatpants I was wearing, and stepped out in the cold winter air, the dirty snow crunching under my heeled shoes, and jumped.

Ignoring the cold as the wind battered me was easy, even as frost formed in my hair, and I hopped from rooftop to rooftop across the city, until I found what I was looking for.

Two bodies laid on the ground of an unlit alley, a sprinkling of snow covering them, but the marks on their bodies weren't faded yet. I felt a pang of guilt at not being able to save them, but swiftly squashed it - I could beat myself over it after destroying the Witch that killed them.

The Witch's Barrier wasn't far away, partially hidden behind an overflowing dumpster, a scarlet distortion pulsing in midair. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and stepped through it.

The smell of iron instantly assaulted my nostrils and I almost retched, before once again taking control of my body. The corridor stretched for miles, hundreds and thousand of doors opening in its walls, blood seeping from under them. Screams echoed at irregular intervals, intermingled with muffled sobs.

I turned and, sword in hand, I started to walk down the corridor to where the Witch should live. Doors slammed open as I passed by them and the witch familiars - bloody, dirty bundles of money in the shape of human bodies with the head of a doll - poured out.

Almost bored, I slashed my way through them, thankful for the fact the corridor was not large enough to let them assault me in mass. I walked enough that my legs should have hurt, but I reached the Witch's chamber.

She stood tall, an immense and yet sickly thin body, faceless but with long, flowing tresses, trading blows with another Magical Girl. Her red wedding dress was ripped in places, a sleeve missing to show her right arm, mangled.

I quickly jumped against the wall to meet the back of her head, but her black hair whipped around and wrapped around my limbs, pinning me down and trying to pull me apart. I struggled against it without much luck, then manifesting four sword, cutting me free.

I jumped again, but not before slashing the Witch. My sword, able to cut through metal, nevertheless just opened a shallow cut in her neck. Blood oozed out of it, but I realized this fight wasn't going to end anytime soon.

I met the eyes of the other girl and we fell into a pattern - one of us distracted the Witch whilst the other one hit it - but tiredness was setting in. She stumbled, briefly, and the Witch clipped the side of her head with her talons.

Her hairpin - her Soul Gem, I realized - shattered in a thousand pieces, motes of light falling to the ground. And when that happened her body crumpled like a puppet whose strings were cut.

I shouted wordlessly, and dove forwards to thrust my sword in the neck of the weakened Witch. She died and her barrier collapsed into a Grief Seed, the little black ovoid nestled in the snow, but her body was nowhere I could see.

Numb, I picked up the Seed, touching it to my Gem to draw the corruption out of it. It overflowed, pulsing dangerously in my hand, the Witch ready to hatch again.

The white form of Kiuubey, almost invisible amongst the snow, jumped down from the roof and paddled silently towards me. "You should give me the Grief Seed.", it projected. "It'll hatch in less than a day otherwise."

"What happened? Where is the other girl? What happened to her?"

"She died." it replied simply.

"How?! It was just her gem, she shouldn't..."

"Why do you think they are called *Soul* Gems, Francesca?" it asked, no emotion I could detect in his voice.

"I... I didn't... Why?!"

"Your bodies are so weak and frail - too weak and frail to survive an encounter with a Witch, even with magic. Thus, your soul is placed in a vessel - this way, you can even survive the death of your body."

I couldn't help it. I laughed. And when Kiuubey tilted its head and looked at me, asking me why, I laughed even more.

"Most girls are upset when they discover this.", it observed.

I just threw the filled Seed at it and turned, jumping away. I was basically a lich - with my own philactery and everything. And even if my unlife was dangerous, the flames of hope rekindled in my chest.

I now had a chance.

A chance - a chance for both of us, broken as we are - to be together forever.

Forever is a long time. And with magic, not even bringing those whose life was cut short was out of my reach.

And as I jumped from rooftop to rooftop, on a tiny, insignificant blue planet orbiting a small yellow star in a minuscule galaxy amongst billions, I started laughing again. And the universe trembled.

By Zero (@MalfunctioningTranshumanist)
[Read More: https://telegram.me/WritersClub/5752]

Dance beneath
Dance beneath the starsas you drink in the night.Let the thunder overtake youas lightening fills the sky.Feel the force of naturepenetrate your skin,spin with the worldas the magic sinks in.

~ Christy Ann Martine

Tags: #pensivepost
January 22, 2017 at 08:58PM

Cheat
The cheat always lies at the feet of the cheated.

~Italian Proverb

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January 22, 2017 at 09:30PM

The Vandalized Soul

Remember? Do you?
The verses of the Mahabharata,
Where Draupati begged to let her go,
Where being a wife of the Pandavas made her no different from the unmarried women.
Remember? Do you?
When inside 1 in 10 houses,
A little girl complains to her mum,
It hurts me in there Maa.
Remember? Do you?
The night,
When a girl lay all naked and battered on the road,
When a friend of her's was as helpless as the lost kid at the course.
Remember? do you?
The nights when people marched with candles in their hands,
The days when we witnessed protests.
Days after days,
Months after months,
Years after years,
Didn't you,
All of you, tried to build us?
The ones who were too small to understand,
The ones who were capable enough to understand,
And the ones who understood what all this actually meant.
From the cheap comments passed
To the guidelines to dress-up,
You filled our heads,
With the thoughts which were never meant to be there.
From all those sad old lines to the new generation trends,
You made us cautious yet scared.
While there were dreams to be accomplished,
And words that were unsaid,
Your efforts to build us,
Made us question our own existence.
With every tantrum and argument we throw,
We have something for you to know, you know,
Caging us won't do us any good,
While letting us live without the not so needed guidelines will do.
Set us free and cage the ones who needs so,
For the day you would realise,Is merely a hypothetical concept you would know.

by Anshula Nema

Tags: #post, #pensivepost
January 22, 2017 at 09:53PM

Chickens
Media

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January 23, 2017 at 12:34AM

When Day Is Done

If the day is done,
if birds sing no more,
if the wind has flagged tired,
then draw the veil of darkness thick upon me,
even as thou hast wrapt the earth with the coverlet of sleepand tenderly closed the petals of the drooping lotus at dusk.

by Rabindranath Tagore

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January 23, 2017 at 01:15PM

A New Leaf
 new leaf Shooting a smile tender and sweet,Shy of dust, dipped in mist,She waves and sways in morning breeze,I love to watch her graceful twist.
She grows swift with guts and grits,In burning sun and chilly wind,Bitten by insects and chewed by pests,Heedless to pain she coolly grinned.
Spreading wide behind the flower,Adding beauty to its charming mien.As the flower is plucked and smelt,She turns gray, no sap in vein.
She frills and falls near the root,Under the plant never to shoot,Consoling herself on dry heap below,As food for leaves smiling above.

Written By: Mohanchand

Tags: #post, #pensivepost
January 23, 2017 at 01:37PM

Poetry


 A poet fights for noble endsBefore the unjust he never bendsPoetry is rhythmic flow of intense feelings. Prosody and rhetoric provide tools for practicing poetry writing; but very fine feelings, emotions and sentiments can make a good poet. A person with noble heart can easily become a poet. The great poets are noble at heart, love humanity and nature. They try to evolve beauty in all beautiful and ugly looking things, through their language.Traditionalist, Modernist and Post-modernist are just classifications in Time. The stream of poetry is continuous.Indian poetry is enriched by great seers, saints, sages, devotees, thinkers and scholars from various walks of life. From Pre-Vedic, Upanishadic periods till the modern periods, forms have changed but soul of poetry remains the same, uniting the Indian Culture with Universal Culture, preaching Universal Love –“All those living on the earth are one family”“Vasudeva kutumbakam”

‘Poets are unacknowledged legislators of the world’ – P.B. Shelly In a mind filled with filth and quagmire good thoughts  bloom like lotus flowerand make it beautiful to the beholder                                           -   Mohanchand PatilHad one not taken birth on the earth,The life in universe should have been short of one’s experience.                                          -  Mohanchand PatilPoems fall in heart and mindwafting in air up and downLike maple leaves land on ground
                                            - Mohanchand Patil

Written By: Mohanchand

Tags: #post, #pensivepost, #WritersClub
January 23, 2017 at 01:42PM

You went from being my drug to the reason I need them. January 24, 2017 at 05:44PM

Sonnet: I Thank You
I thank you, kind and best beloved friend,
With the same thanks one murmurs to a sister,
When, for some gentle favor, he hath kissed her,
Less for the gifts than for the love you send,Less for the flowers, than what the flowers convey;
If I, indeed, divine their meaning truly,
And not unto myself ascribe, unduly,
Things which you neither meant nor wished to say,
Oh! tell me, is the hope then all misplaced?
And am I flattered by my own affection?
But in your beauteous gift, methought I traced
Something above a short-lived predilection,
And which, for that I know no dearer name,
I designate as love, without love’s flame.

By Henry Timrod (1965)

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January 28, 2017 at 12:46PM