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LizardBallou
I can't help but write, for I bleed ink and my heart beats to the rhythm of words needing to escape.
141 Posts • 254 Followers • 306 Following
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LizardBallou
49 reads

Island of the Lost

I awake

On a beach-

The place where

Lost things

Wash ashore.

And I know that,

Despite my

Begging

That he be

My tether

To reality,

He has

Let

Me

Go

And I have

Lost myself.

Somewhere out there

Is a

Shell,

An

Echo

Of me

Imitating life.

But she's empty.

Because I am here

On the beach

With the

Lost keys,

Library books,

And

Bobby pins

Alone.

Watching the

Spray of the

Ocean

Hitting the

Rocks

Hoping that he

Will wash ashore

Because he has become

Lost

Without

Me,

Too.

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Challenge
Life teaches you how to live...If you live long enough. What has life taught you thus far? Any format.
Mass tagging results in disqualification. $5.00 USD prize.
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LizardBallou
46 reads

Do No Harm

Mouth open

Nothing real comes out

Eyes open

Nothing real comes in

Heart open

Disaster lurks

Ears open

Ignore the screams

Hands open

Accusations fall

Brain open

You're broken

Brain closed

Welcome, child

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Challenge
Write a true micro-poem ... see specific details ... this is a think-piece.
According to Wikipedia, the more recent popularity of "micro-poetry" to describe poems of 140 characters in length or shorter appears to stem from a separate coinage, as a portmanteau of "microblogging" and "poetry". Hence this is the challenge, counting spaces, commas, periods and letters. Write a micro-poem no longer than 140 characters. (This does not include the title). It should not be any longer than 30 words maximum (though I have allowed for two additional words if needed.) but it should fall within the range of no more than 140 characters. It can be on any topic/subject. (I will be counting and spaces count as a character). Don’t forget to tag me in the comment section … @Danceinsilence.
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LizardBallou in Micropoetry
68 reads

Reverberation

Words

Vibrated

Through her mind.

A cacophony,

An earthquake

Of syllables,

Crashing against

Her sanity,

Pulling on the

Cloud cover,

Bringing the

Rain.

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LizardBallou
43 reads

Missing

I've been missing for a while.

A long while.

Taken by other passions and whims

To places foreign and unknown.

Taken far from here.

Winds change.

Flight and fancy

Fade.

And we often

Find ourselves

Back where we

Began.

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Challenge
Write anything that has the phrase "You deserve better" somewhere in it.
Any style or genre is acceptable, poetry or prose.
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LizardBallou in Fiction
126 reads

Anomalies

I looked around at the debris scattered across the room. Shards of glass crunched under my feet as I walked through the unconscious bodies to the fiery red hair that splashed across the floor from the still form of Eva. As I crouched down next to her, I could see her chest move slightly as she breathed shallowly, and I exhaled a swift gust of air; at least she was still alive. I picked her up gently and arranged her body on the bed, replacing her gun in her holster and tucking her knife back into her boot. I stroked her cheek gently, then pulled the mirror from my pocket and placed it in her hand. She'd never understand why I couldn't stay, but I couldn't put her at risk again. She was lucky she wasn't already dead, chasing an anomaly whilst oblivious to the fact that the anomaly was her partner. "Well," I thought, backing away, "Former partner." "You deserve better, Eva," I whispered as I walked through the door that barely clung to the door frame and disappeared into the darkness.

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Challenge
Once upon a field of snow
Write a poem or prose or fiction or non-fiction or anything legible that begins with the line "Once upon a field of snow". Dazzle me with your creativity, originality, and mind-boggling brilliance.
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LizardBallou
164 reads

The Light Within

Once upon a field of snow

Where light and cold collide,

There was a girl of summer's warmth

Where truth and good reside.

Darkness fell and yet she stood,

A sentinel of light.

Her glow lit up the frigid sky

And reflected off the white.

Why did she stand in the cold

In an empty field this way?

Did she know something I did not?

If she did, she didn't say.

But her light made me think long and hard

About the light in me;

She was the sun on a summer's day,

I was stars reflecting on the sea.

Why had my fire lost its roar?

What else had I lost inside?

What parts of me were filled with grime

And using excuses to hide?

So I stood beside her in the field

And stoked the fire within

And soon that field of snow was filled

With Summer and her twin.

The cold fell away and the night withdrew

And the field began to bloom

Because I tossed the muck away

And gave my light some room.

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Challenge
Simon & Schuster is one of the world’s leading publishers and we are always looking for fresh new voices. Write a story, chapter, or essay about whatever you like. The 50 best entries will be announced by Prose and read by our editorial staff for consideration.
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LizardBallou in Simon & Schuster
210 reads

In the Dark

The clang of the trapdoor seemed to echo around me for hours as I sat in the darkness trying to ignore the throbbing of where I'd hit my head and the stickiness of the blood on my hands. I had killed her. I had killed Dr. Cisron. It had been self defense, right? But what if her sudden aggression was somehow contagious? I dropped the scalpel still clutched in my hand and desperately tried to wipe the stickiness onto the legs of my jumpsuit, but the coat of dust on it from my recent journey to the planet's surface just made my hands feel grimier. I fell forward onto all fours, vomiting onto the dusty cement floor, the weight of what I had done and the pain in my skull crashing over me. I had enough sense to roll away from the smell of sickness as I collapsed, but then I closed my eyes and wished for the nothingness that accompanies sleep.

It never came. The silence in the tunnel was disturbingly complete and much as I tried to escape from reality, I couldn't. After some time. I sat up and turned to see what lay beyond, hoping to distract myself from the waves of guilt and panic that washed through me, but the darkness stretched on and on like a thick, suffocating velvet blanket.

I'd never known pure, unadulterated darkness before; the burning light from the trio of stars that scarred our planet was nearly inescapable even with the shields surrounding the planet diffusing it and the walls of the compound blocking it. In our windowless quarters where the suns couldn't reach, the lights of the Memo Board never ceased to glow. This darkness was absolutely terrifying. I waved my hand mere inches from my face and could see nothing. Gingerly, I inched to my right with my hand outstretched and felt a ripple of relief when my hand came in contact with a smooth cement wall, but I could feel my knees shaking as I sat in the black..

I stood and began walking slowly through the darkness; I had no other options. I couldn't continue to lay on the cold cement waiting for this nightmare to end because I knew it wouldn't. The world in the compound above was teetering on the edge of chaos, I'd had to kill someone, it was possible that we were the subjects of some cruel experiment, and amid all this, my 79 year old Granddad was attempting to keep the peace as the only Council member that hadn't vanished or been killed. This nightmare was my reality now and I needed answers.

The darkness seemed to go on without end; the walls slid along smoothly under my fingers and I walked with steadily growing confidence in spite of the pitch blackness. The floor was smooth and sloped downward so gradually that I almost didn't notice as I moved deeper into the planet. The tunnel seemed to have no branches; it simply stretched on and on, the lack of light making my ability to judge the progress I'd made nearly impossible. I couldn't help but think of the children that had succumbed to the epidemic that had passed through the compound a few years before. It had struck so suddenly, causing them to go completely blind before their tiny organs failed. Maybe my fall into the tunnel had caused me to go blind.

The thought had scarcely entered my mind when my heart leaped as I saw what seemed to be a small red light glowing through the darkness in front of me. A smile began to spread across my face as I reached out to touch the small gleaming diode, but as I did, a bright blue light suddenly whirred into existence, forcing me to shield my eyes. I peeked through my fingers at the light and my smile quickly faded as I saw its source- it seemed to be some sort of biometric scanner attached to a huge metal door that blocked the entire end of the tunnel. Now what?

I crouched down to examine the scanner more closely and with a swift buzz and flash of light, it scanned my face. After a moment, there was a beep, the red light turned green, and the door began to swing open silently.

My mouth gaped open slightly as I took a few steps back and watched the door swing past me. I could think of no logical reason that that door should've admitted me. My body trembled as I stood looking through the doorway. Something was very wrong here, but even as my body screamed for me to turn back, I knew I couldn't. I was here for answers. I was here to save Granddad.

Whatever was beyond the thick door lay in shadows, but I was relieved to see that it was nothing like the stark black that had surrounded me for so long. I stepped inside carefully and felt along the wall inside the doorway for a light switch. My hand brushed over a raised panel and the room glowed into view.

I was in what appeared to be a laundry room. A large all-in-one clothes care machine covered one wall, humming quietly as it began washing a load of laundry that slid from a chute in the wall into the side of the machine. As I watched, perfectly folded laundry emerged from a door on the opposite end of its gleaming surface and disappeared into one of the cupboards that lined the other wall.

This machine was definitely not washing the gray jumpsuits that almost everyone wore above. I walked to one of the cupboards and pulled it open. Endless stacks of white hospital gowns sat neatly on the shelves along with bins of slippers. Was the journal Granddad had found telling the truth when it said that our planet was nothing more than a research facility? That the three suns blazing in the sky and the barren surface were a mere fabrication to lend credence to the supposed false memories planted in our compound's populous? That this secret lower level was full of researchers watching our every move? It seemed far fetched, and yet as I looked back at the shelves bursting with backless hospital gowns, I shuddered involuntarily.

I shut the cupboard and peered out the door into the hallway beyond. It was empty. Quietly, I began to walk down the hall that looked eerily similar to the corridors I had grown up in. Each door had a small plaque in its center with a number on it, but this seemed to be each room's only form of identification. I pushed one open at random and found a storage room full of what appeared to be some sort of medical imaging equipment similar to what could be found in the medical office that I had entered the trap door through.

Every door I happened to glance into held rooms along these lines. There were numerous storage rooms, a medical tool sterilization lab, yet another laundry room washing what appeared to be turquoise surgical scrubs- everything to indicate that this was some sort of medical facility, nothing to indicate that unethical experiments were being preformed on the unwitting inhabitants of the compound above. And yet, I hadn't found any people, and that, more than being in a secret facility, more than just having slashed the throat of someone, more than the thought of my grandfather trying to keep the peace in a community on the verge of panic-induced anarchy, is what made me nervous. It was obvious that whatever this place was, it was very much in use. But where were the people?

I turned a corner to find that the doors had changed. These were all nearly identical to the heavy metal door through which I had entered this facility, complete with the biometric scanner in the center. I approached the closest door, the palms of my hands sweaty, which further emphasized the fact that they were still covered in dried blood. Would this scanner recognize me, too? I bent forward slightly and gazed into the blue light. To my surprise, I yet again heard the beep and the door swung slowly outward. I took a few steps backward and let it swing past revealing a sight that filled my veins with ice.

All I could see were bodies. Large cylindrical tanks filled with bodies. I entered the room slowly, horror swelling in my chest and constricting my airway. Who were these people? I glanced at one of the tanks nearest me and felt a jolt of shock as I realized that I recognized the girl floating within the blue liquid inside. She had worked in the fields during the same shift as me until a week ago when she announced that her family was being transferred to a different sector so her brother could start a new job. I remembered thinking how stupid she had been to be excited about a different sector when it was undoubtedly nearly identical to the one she was leaving, but now I couldn't help but wish that she really had gone to a new sector. I wondered if the young man in the tank next to her was her brother.

I tore my eyes from her expressionless face and examined the tanks more closely. Each had a small black panel on the front and was attached to some sort of computer in the middle of the floor with long hoses and wires. I touched the panel which lit up, revealing the girls' vitals- somehow she was alive in that liquid, though I couldn't see a breathing apparatus or any monitors on her.

“Miranda! You're finally back!”

I jumped at the sound of the woman's voice and twirled around, my heart racing. Standing in the doorway was a dark-haired, pleasant looking young woman wearing a lab coat over a pale blue dress and lipstick that reminded me of the blood on my hands.

“Who are you?” I asked, my voice trembling.

“Oh, of course, your memory chip is still active. I'm Jane and I'm here to help you get reacquainted with all of this. Come on,” she said, smirking before disappearing into the hallway.

I stood frozen among the suspension tanks, staring at where the woman had been. She had acted as though I'd been here before, but I never had been, right? The turbulence of my thoughts made the dull ache in my skull return as I remembered how Granddad had found the journal entry about memory manipulation.

“Are you coming?” she asked, having reappeared in the doorway.

“No,” I replied, frowning at her. I had strong, emotion-filled, detailed memories. Surely those couldn't be faked. My life was not a lie.

“Come now, Miranda, you've always been suspicious, but this is ridiculous.”

“I don't know who you are, and I've never been here before.”

She laughed, the sound tumbling from her bloody lips and bouncing off the suspension tanks. “You've spent more time here than I have! You just don't remember because of the chip. Let's get it deactivated and everything will start making sense.”

“No,” I replied, my certainty growing. “I can't have been down here before. There's no way I would have let these people continue to be experimented on. You're not touching me.”

The woman walked back toward me slowly with her eyebrows furrowed. “Wow, that chip did a number on you alright, Miranda. Don't you remember? You're the reason they're down here. All these experiments were designed by you.”

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Profile avatar image for LizardBallou
LizardBallou
134 reads

Unseen Angel

Blurred in the

Periphery of my

Sight

Was a deliverer;

Hidden in the

Crowds of my

Mind

Was a hero;

Praying in the

Shadows of my

Heart

Was a savior

That would

Tame

The panicked pacing

In my soul

And

Give me a

Soft pillow to

Rest

My

Head.

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Challenge
"Comfort food for the soul." I'm quite down, fellow prosers. Times like these, only poetry soothes me. Please write a lovely poem about comfort or comforting somebody. Make it at least 50 words. Tag me because I want (need) to read.
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LizardBallou in Poetry & Free Verse
124 reads

Home

Let me wrap my heart around yours

And shield you from the world.

Let me pull you from the shadows

Where your broken soul lays curled.

Let me bring you to the light

And set your worries free.

Let me be a home for you

As you have been to me.

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LizardBallou
110 reads

New Mexico Weather

Today it's winter.

Just last week, it was summer.

Tomorrow? Who knows?

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