
Maria Matthias / La Vida De La Dona
Maria & Matthias
“Dando y dando, palomita volando” if you receive you must give,
comparte el amor
I will take flight as I grow with my wings of great integrity to share all I’ve learned with the world…
“Si querida.”
“Que Papi?” Maria, laying on the grass, looked up toward Father…
“What will I learn, Papi?”
“Todo querida. Con Todo el cuerpo…”
For how long?
“Siempre. Por siempre…”
“And who will I share it with?”
She wonders and looks at Matthias.
So often she wondered of him, Matthias and their change…
He stood at the dock and
Wondered at the shore line of the coast that
Looked out into the great sea
Wondering of his home…
“Your greatest love.”
Memories…
And she longed for…
All that she left and was…
All she had known, wanted and who?
Alone…she longed for all she promised herself, those she dreamed of and still dream of…
Maria…Maria was her name, Maria Agatha… the Latin form of Mary taken from the Hebrew Miryām, a name under much debate. Many believe it to mean “sea of bitterness” or “sea of sorrow”, sources cite the alternative definitions of “rebellion,” “wished-for child,” and “mistress or lady of the sea.” The name is borne in the Bible by the mother of Jesus, the son of God. It is not what she imagined and would not imagine the thought for years. Maria was just a young girl and the only male presence in her life was her father who could never entertain any sexual urge or thought to satisfy Maria. She was not even a woman yet but the presence of Matthias would begin to change those thoughts, make her see, make her aware of the woman present and call it to attention, call her to appear and wonder of her needs, desires and questions that would have been answered with the help of a mother who was never in her life.
Matthias… his name was Matthias, “gift from God,” typically given to the much desired first born son of a Christian family. Matthias therefore usually has a healthy sense of self-worth, strong, independent and self-assured. Matthias’ mother had become a Christian while her husband, The King, would lead his people in the war against Portugal, as she became the traitor, embraced Christianity, converting herself and the child and naming him as such to earn and satisfy her weaker religious needs.
Maria, born upon the death of her Mother, Don Lilo’s wife, Agatha ..Maria never had the chance to caress her mothers breast. Suckle a toast to life from her mothers nipples, salute the abundance a child should expect, instead she found her own way. Loving her Father but needing a mother. Agatha died at the violent hands of strangers, pale white men invaders in Africa during the Portuguese occupation of Mombasa. Mombasa, where Matthias’ Father, The King Ruled. It is where they both promised each other to care for the others current child. And it is why Lilo is recognizing Matthias’ arrival. For Matthias would become King after his Father, the King of his home, a just man who was deceived by the Portuguese into giving away his peoples land.
Maria imagined she could see the coast of Africa across the sea from where she lived with her Father in Catania. Their home sat on the edge of a stream that flowed into the Mediterranean.
“Tell me again Father where he will be coming from?”
“Over the horizon, we can’t see their home from here where he will be coming. The land he will be coming from is distraught. The Portuguese have landed and are taking their home from the people. Matthias will stay here until it is safe for him to go back. Until his Father the king and his mother can be found. Until then he will stay here with us.”
All of Maria’s Father’s offerings to her, friendship with Matthias she cherished most though spoke the least about, to whom she would never pledge her love and instead waited too long.
“In a city deep in Africa. along with his people, he battles the Portuguese for control of the land he is king of.”
“But if it’s his land why are the Portuguese fighting for it.”
“Because the Portuguese believe they can manage it better.”
Maria looked back at her Father. “Matthias’ Father must submit or battle for control. I’ve known the king many years.”
“The world would in times of strife, help with the cost of influence whether invasive or persuasive changing your home because the world can and truly believes their way is the right way, and they violently force their way, insisting… out of fear that their way may not be the singular right way, their way enslaves you.”
“It is greed Maria. In a world where people often need help, a much stronger aggressor often becomes invasive in the effort to offer help and instead becomes the aggressor and uses the weaker to feed off.”
“Feed?”
“Yes feed. People who believe and feed off the weakness of others as nourishing…There are those who believe the guidance without question.
“The world angers me, Maria.”
“Why Papi?”
“So few are satisfied with what they have to live the rest of their lives but always want more for the express purpose to oppress others who don’t have and never have had enough.”
Don Lilo was often heard commenting with other statesman about the Portuguese interest in Africa, “we battle the white man to influence and control all of the other black influence.
Their friendship was established quickly, soon after Matthias’ arrival from the near Mediterranean shores of Africa soon after they were introduced. Matthias traveled with his Mother away from what would become Kenya after the colonial period, his father a tribal King fighting the Portuguese.
Don Lilo’s house sat along the river, so quiet a visitor would barely notice that it was occupied.
Old, unkempt, so loved and lived in, the house, a young woman given to laying about in the sun, by the pool waiting for her lover to be free. Maria and Matthias became the best of friends until they aged to include the thoughts of lovers… a matter of time until those thoughts bore fruit, set root and sprout quickly to become lovers.
Maria the love of innocence in sync with the innocence and love of a child in Matthias who would become a King yet the darkness of truth whirled in their heat, a wheel of fortune spinning with choice.
Regret, at so young an age, is regret unto oneself…one looks at how brief life is and regrets the unfortunate choices made as battles lost without ever having fought them…
I will learn so much from you…I will learn so much from you likewise and we both will learn so much from each other…
“Maria, baba yangu amekufa.”
“I’m sorry Matthias? Did you say? Your father – ”
“Yes, my father has died.”
“I’m sorry, Matthias.” She sat up, having laid down on the warm sunlit green grass.
Matthias, the dark haired, handsome Moor child, she’s grown so fond of, who stayed and Don Lilo adopted until he had grown into a young man, Matthias he was called by his family, so fond he was of Maria and knew for so long ago as she matured into a young woman, who amused her in youth, long before Baldo, never could…even though Matthias was looked upon as suspicious by so many. Maria noted his dark skin as others noted and became apparent to others who worried some without cause.
“When did he die?” Said Maria.
“A communique your father handed me, from my mother.”
“Your mother?”
“Yes.”
“Really, your mother? She’s been found?”
“Yes, una carta. A note from my father before going into battle and another from my mother that she came out of hiding and found notes from my father letting my mother to whom he left me with and where. After that I was easy to find, but for the distance she traveled to find me was great. Did you know your father was a warrior, he fought along side my people, alongside my Father, Maasai Warriors for the Portuguese.”
“My mother angered my father by giving me a christian name in addition to a warrior name.”
“Then your father as a Somali Warrior must’ve had a warrior name. What is your warrior name?”
“My father did and I do. My father divulged it to me when I was very young, long before I understood the purpose and it’s meaning. A small piece of paper he entrusted me not to show to anyone, even my mother but I want to show it to you.”
“Yes Matthias I love that you entrust me.” She felt queer but refreshed. For as long as they had known each other, been together as friends, they were on the verge turning of mind to become adults and were sure they never would. They would always only be friends the rest of the way. War, death and family commitment would force them apart.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. Of you? Yes.”
“You will keep my secret.”
“I will.”
“My Father called me Simaloi.”
Maria held the small note written in Swahili on a thin sheet of bark held close and carefully to her breast.
“What does it mean, Simaloi?”
“It means no matter how difficult my challenge is, I am capable of completing it by being exceptional, my quick wits and my tremendous adaptability to various powers. Which is why I am always needed! I have a special talent of coping with all hurdles that make me indispensable.”
“I don’t know much about my Mother, she died soon after I was born. My mother, Consuela was a distant cousin of your Father’s.” The weight of her sadness came washed over her again as it had so often before but knowing of Matthias’ happiness…
“Matthias?” Maria looked up….
She had been laying on her blanket on the grass and looked at Matthias…
“My father has died.” His voice had lowered to a whisper…In the few short years they knew each other, in those few short years.
Don Lilo cared for him, and Maria came to love him.
“My mother traveled far with her aides and she told me the sadness, far from our home, Abiba.”
“It isn’t so but I always imagined this was your home, I feel we came to be as…one.”
“I will miss you Matthias.”“I will miss you too Maria.”
…she longed for…
Her father, Don Lilo…the day before his death upon which he left her a trinket and a thought of defiance, “Dando y dando, palomita volando”…he sang as she danced roundabout his guidance…once he was everything to her but she never really knew him. And now there was only darkness…then Lilo gave way Matthias and they danced about in looming desire…
Matthias was already gone and age distanced them more. The world had changed and she sought more and looked where never expected.
They are a couple in love they became older and their love became real though unsure. She was fascinated by his physique and him with hers. Time limited, his mother coming get him.
From afar she could see him talked at a distance she could see him talking to his mother.
This is something both expected and dread.
Maria, she watched Matthias walk away, a kiss unkissed, a touch untouched, a desire or undesired…Matthias looked back as mother tugged…
Matthias was raised in the house of a Spaniard, in the arms of their love, he walked away from her, feeling her release she watched him as he walked, along the river bank away from the bridge and… as if he missed the crossing then walked up to the foot of the bridge, looked the length then looked back at Maria. She was going to be different, grow different, become important and it was time and though they didn’t hear a call, it seemed they were, as if they were.
“Matthias, do you believe in God,” she asked.
I dream of God and yearn to sleep when awake to open the caverns of God when I sleep. I know God is there but I can never find God. I love to talk about God. The mystery of God is that there is so much to know because there is so much mystery. Simply put, God has created us and yet we really don’t know why.
Caverns?
Yes, God’s presence is deep, almost unknowable, deep, but look often, look often and the walls will open, you will become aware.
Have you been there, to God’s Caverns?
Not yet, but I dreamed that I had dreamed of them, one day, I will find my way there.
Tell me about the Caverns of God.
God is not a person, a being that you can categorize.
But the Cavern’s?
God lives no where but is all over, to behold, to have a presence
For a moment she tried to imagine his thoughts.
I have been there Maria. Gods Caverns. How? But you say it can not be categorize, God has no home. But I have seen it. Not in a dream but not asleep but and expanse of being I don’t understand but that I don’t clearly.
Matthias, I didn’t know that you were so aware of God.
He looked confused by her query.
True, you and I have never spoke of this but I have thought of God often. I spent many years as a child. I don’t know when I started. One day I was aware of these thoughts. I talked to the Catholic priests and the Priests and wise men of our Tribe not so much to follow but to learn why. To know the purpose.
Come Matthias his mother called. It is time to go.
Maria watched from a distance, the child with his mother, they talked and she felt their loneliness invade, a darkness from without felt clouding her sight of him.
Don Lilo watched from an upper floor window as Matthias walked away. When they were gone Don Lilo walked to Maria seated by the pool.
“I will miss him father.”
“I will miss him also, Maria.”
“Why does he have to go.”
“His mother needs a man for the house. For Matthias it is that time. He has become a man, that man needed to assume the duties of a man, a King, to carry on his father’s wishes at which his mother will be come disappointed when he becomes a man and that King he must and not son she can’t have.”
“And why do you not need a woman?”
“Yes. Your mother. Your mother died, you know that. I decided that after your mother I would prefer to be without a woman. Maybe one day long from now, in a different place as different people and in a different way, you and Matthias will meet again.”
“What way will that be, Father.”
“Ese es el futuro, mi Palomita, no puedo decírtelo.”
Maria relates her yearn her sadness for Matthias silently telling her father nothing about her feelings, her concern for Matthias.
Conversation among soldiers about the growing world… Not enough of the world no matter the shape for every animal, man, woman or child…
Viejo Mundo / La Vida De La Dona
Viejo Mundo
Part 1
“Hurakan…”spoke El Cacique. “I can smell the water of the great sea burning”… said El Cacique…
“The dead…”
“To speak of the dead is wrong…”
“Men of no color?”
“Men of any color?”
Canimao and his men gathered the remains of the men of no color, the men of no color, who suffered the storm…
“They are dead and deserve rituals of their dead…”
“They are dead, Cacique,” said Canimao… “We do not know their ways…
“Nor do we know their intent… They consume without the intent of nourishment…
Canimao…since you will explore where they come from… It is your choice…
We will…gather their remains from the beach and ready them for transport…It is a long journey and I fear we will know what we fear to know…
The fear of where these men come from…
Return them to rest…
I fear they will come back…”Cacique shooed them away….and to himself he spoke.
“We arrived to this world too late and the world will return us too soon…
They’re hunger is like the heat of an angry fire…
The fear is they are seekers of desires, of lonely people who never stop looking for they know not what they seek…
Their desire, their urge is insurmountable… a mountain never to be looked upon or climbed upon…”
Canimao and his men gathered the bodies…
They had been laying dead for days after the storm and Canimao and his men found their bodies while gathering supplies for their own expected journey across the great sea…
The great sea was tormented…inundating them with a great wash…
Canimao climbed out of the boat and let the cold of the great water wash over his legs. Looking back across the sea where so much of their lives had been spent in the recent months of their voyage. Here they arrived to find and explore the land of men with no color that would bring them to the land of the men they sought, the men who died in a terrible storm that lashed the shores of Canimao’s home land. Saddened by the lost men and their failed quest…Cinimao’s quest succeeded with his warriors quest to bring them home.
Canimao gathered his warrior’s and searched for the items of the lost men. They were pale men challenging what is known by the people’s bohiques, surmising the dead man’s origin and considered adding the found men to return them to their people and their land…
Canimao’s spear, tethered to his waist, a shield held in his arm, six warrior’s, all exhausted from there long trip, still healthy and fit but thinking of rest and hunger. They found a place to camp among in the tree, hidden from view of any natives. Finding their bodies laid about the beach, Canimao asked his people for volunteers, to help gather their bodies and things then try and transport them all back to their homes, a dangerous and great distance away…The dead men were sailors from a land over the horizon. A consult with the chiefs and bohiques led them to understand where the pale men were from.
Canimao once heard of people like them who’s color was pale compared to him and his people. Their home, a journey long and far away on the great water and much preparation would be involved.
Canimao, I have heard of these men but have never seen them, they are explorers of riches and only riches, they seek wealth from others to add to their wealth as their own. Your quest is your own but know their lust stains them as blood. But know the consequences of your journey.
In the year 1491, inhabitants of a land far across the Atlantic, arrived on the shores of Portugal. Canimao and his crew arrived in a large seaworthy vessel with the personal belongings of the men they found after having succumbed to a terrible storm off the shore of Canimao’s land. Each, equipped with survival pouches, and information describing the men whose lives they tried to save; men who arrived across the ocean in a land they believed was in Portugal
“Canimao, how will we find those who knew those men?”
Shaking his head side to side, “I don’t know yet, we don’t know the language, who the men were, I don’t know how but we shall try with their goods of trade.”
Canimao and his crew disembark from their sailing ships and scan the forests perimeter, looking for signs of life while dragging their boats up from the waves onto the shore. They quickly unloaded the boats of their goods and packed the remains of the men of no color, the items that were theirs and lay them beside the their own and the lay down to relax and rest and ponder their journey. They had After some thought they will walk along the edge of the forest without delving too far from shore prowl along the forests in search of someone who might help them find the origins of the men they helped. They do this without calling attention to themselves. Skirting along the edge of villages they judge who they will try and communicate with… They watch the daily lives of the inhabitants of this new land and they wonder…
His name was Lilo, by age, young but much older in spirit so much so they all noticed… Canimao especially took not of his will and his demeanor though and they didn’t know each other’s language and seemed to talk easily..
Canimao knew to show Lilo the items he brought to represent the men who he returned across with them…
Lilo one of them and understood them to be the men testing the waters for a great voyage…
They meet a boy during the effort to find food, a boy Lilo from Portugal was curious and very helpful helping..Lilo is able to help the men escape from near capture of the colonialists who were gathering funds and supplies for the Kings mission to find more of the world and it’s riches…
Lilo helped gather the few goods needed by the visitors to start their return journey across the waters to their lands.
What is left is still to be had… To be taken and will be the claim of the northern European over the original black men
Six other able men and six able men who died as a terrible storm lashed the shores of Canimao’s home.
The world is finite despite the belief of many…
Siva

Love & Acceptance
Magic
A dance among love and gratitude that
achieve a result of acceptance of all
that is good without expectation…
Comfort In Strength
I’m always being watched not being consumed
but to be followed to be literally watched at what I am doing,
if I look over my shoulder and there is physically
nothing there but I’m always being watched…
From all over not from a direction but from all over I could never
catch the watcher who is from within and throughout…
Comfort in strength…
Buddha Purge
And he cried the purge of…Buddha
And of his morning walk…
The smell of molten iron awakened the morning air…
A taste…
And she turned…
Broken Slate

ABUELA
“Bring me more.”
“Quickly!” Abuela roared!
Lilliana scurried out of Abuela’s room and off into the hall, down the stairs and doubling back into the kitchen, where a large iron stock pot filled with meaty gruel boiled violently, spilling it’s slop over the top and onto a filthy black iron stove. She placed abuela’s giant clay soup bowl on the wooden table opposite the stove, then dipped the big wooden ladle in the soup and stirred.
Lilliana looked at her reflection in the worn and stained metal tile finish of the wall behind the stove.
She wasn’t pretty anymore. Not since Abuela took Lilliana from her parents. Her hair matted now, when once she was young her hair draped gracefully over her shoulders, black and shimmering. Her black eyes had once drawn stares but were now ringed with black circles. Her face wrinkled and worn, pasty white, lips parched, mostly hidden by her matted hair. She wore a stained blue house dress that clung to her bones; bones that poked through her skin like trash filled Hefty garbage bags. It seemed to her that her breasts would grow no larger than the pimples they were.
Puberty would never be the same for her as it would be for so many other girls
The gruel continued to pour over the side. It was the only way to make this gruel right, abuela said. Bring it to a boil and keep it there. Simmering won’t stop the demons, boiling them will. To kill them though, you had to eat them, and abuela did. Everyday she ate demons, as she called them. Everyday. Always as a soup. She hated the soup, but it had to be done. The demons were out there and as long as she was alive and still had her powers, she would eat them
The soup boiled but wasn’t filled with enough meat. “Anton!” Lilliana turned to the stairs and called down the basement. “Anton! I need some more meat for the soup.”
Lilliana turned back to the pot on the stove, leaving the door to the basement open for Anton to drag up some more meat from the freezer.
Anton was a tall lanky black guy, with a big head and black happy Einstein hair, wearing a long black t-shirt, faded blue jeans and pink Keds sneakers.
Anton was abuela’s manservant. He did all the repair and heavy work around the house. As well as dragging bags full of demons up from the freezer when Lilliana needed them. He did all the gruesome work on them too. He found them at night, brought them home and kept them in cages, then killed them and chopped them up. Though Anton was mostly silent, Lilliana could occasionally hear him whisper something to them. “Anton? What do you say to them, can I come down and listen to what you say to them and hear their response.” “What they say isn’t so important and your Abuela may not allow that…”
“Then why do you talk to them?”
“Oh, just something to do before I kill them I guess. It calms them. I like them calm. They thrash around less when I’m cutting them up.”
On this day, though, Anton agreed to take her down later to speak with the last one before he killed it
Lilliana returns to Abuela with her soup.
“Abuela! I have your soup. Abuela gave Lilliana a start… she seemed dead at first but Abuela raised her head, she had fallen asleep. She stared….”Abuela, are you ok?”
“Tired and hungry.”
“I brought up another helping of the gruel.”
“Good…”
And she raised the bowl closer to her mouth… as using her arm like a mechanical shovel and crane, she shoveled the putrid gruel from the bowl to her mouth, the contents of which was hot murky liquid and chunks of fresh bloodied meat that danced in kind that almost seemed to be alive as abuela shoveled… Lilliana watched the madness in abuelas motions Like a child’s legs crossed and playing with it’s toys, consuming her favorite food in an effort to rid the world of demons, she imagined…
Abuela paused in exhaustion.
“Abuela, can you tell me more about the demons?”
“I tell you this because you must know, you will eventually do the same and will need to know…. They hide in the bodies of young human children to cast spells which is when you bring them out into the light. Once they become visible you must eat them quickly, seasoned appropriately and why they hide in little bodies is to fool everyone but the most knowledgeable and aware.”
Back in the basement, Anton takes Lilliana down to meet a demon, a little girl of about ten who calls herself Trisha.
“You know Anton is really a sweet guy, he treats you nice until the end.”
“No he doesn’t then why am I here?”
“Because of Grannie and what you are and what she has to do…”
“What are your parents like? Do they know about what you are?”
“What do you mean?
“A demon? That you are a demon.”
“But I’m not a demon.”
“Everything will be easier if you’re honest.”
“But I am being honest.”
Lilliana talks with Trisha, asking her questions about her life at home. What her parents are like. Her home. Her friends. Her toys. School. Does she like boys? Trisha often whimpers, afraid of Anton. Lilliana tells her that Anton is really a sweet guy. He just has a job to do
As they talk, Anton paces by, after chopping at meat in the back room, putting it in the freezer, then returning, bending down to Lilliana who sits outside the cage on the soot covered floor with Trisha, and reminding her . . .
“Trisha is a demon, don’t let her fool you.”
Anton walks away up the steps.
Lilliana asked her outright . . . “Are you a demon?”
“What’s a demon,” Trisha asked her pouting innocent lips…
“Well, you…”
Trisha sobbed uncontrollably.
“I’ve done nothing wrong, I don’t understand. Why was I taken? What is he going to do to me?” Lilliana looks back as he works..
Anton watches from the open door of the cutting room
Trisha asks about the locked door.
“What’s in there?”
Lilliana motions to the door down the hall from the cutting room…
“Abuelas secrets, all the scary things that make her who and what she is…”
“What about you? Let’s play some games, what games can you or want to play?”
“Hide and seek!” Trisha spoke with some elation distracted by the current terror…
“I’ll hide, you seek…”
“Ok… I’ll look for you…”
Lilliana lets her out to play, closing the basement door. They play awhile but Lilliana doesn’t recognize her own strength and so Trisha finds the play to rough. Together they press their ears to the secret closet door. They can only imagine. Lilliana tells what she knows about Abuela’s past. That she was a Bruja, and she made clothes for a living, clothes that some said had magical powers. To wear her clothing could be either good or bad luck, no one ever knew. And so the people of her small town in PR exiled her. What happened to all the clothes she made? Perhaps that is her secret.
The bell from Abuela rings out, deafening them. Lilliana runs, dragging Trisha into the cage and leaving her crying. Anton calls down from the top of the stairs to the kitchen. Lilliana fills another bowl from the seething pot on the stove then hurries back up the stairs to tend to Abuela, as Anton unloads another bag of demon meat into the pot While Lilliana sits with Abuela on her bed, feeding her, she looks out of the window to the empty streets.
Their home was a condemned tenement in Brooklyn, the only one on the block left standing. The building was surrounded on all sides by a debris ridden one-acre lot. In the distance she could see children playing in the schoolyard, from which Anton had found and taken two demons in the last year Lilliana turns to Abuela and asks.
“Do you ever wonder if you’ve chosen the wrong child, Abuela?”
She looked up from her soup bowl? Her eyes glistened when opened so wide. Suddenly her head grew twice its size and thrust forward to meet Lilliana’s. Abuelas exposed monster teeth, the ones she needed to chew the demons well but hid in her gums behind her mortal set, and sneered at Lilliana.
Saliva and blood dripped down from her stained fangs, a horrible stench from her breath warmed her face and made Lilliana turn away, sick and afraid Abuela relaxed, sitting back. Her head shrunk back to normal size, her teeth slowly retracted, allowing her to speak again. “Lilliana. Your mother and father wondered the same thing when I went to them with the truth. I told them what some children had become in the wombs of their unsuspecting mother. That two of their own children might be demons. And when I found them to be so, they fought me, until I killed them all. Except you, Lilliana. You were born free of demons. They had not found you because you were supposed to die in your mother’s womb. But you survived.
Don’t doubt my powers, Lilliana. Don’t doubt my knowledge, wisdom and awareness. I know that it may all seem amazing and fantastic, and terribly cruel and morbid, but the horror’s we live with must be found and our world cleansed. Trust me, Lilliana.
Lilliana bolted from the room crying
Lilliana sat in the kitchen with Anton, who had made them both some hot tea. Lilliana asked Anton if he ate the soup too. No! Only her grandmother could, because if a mortal drank demon remains, they would be possessed themselves, and she would have to kill and eat them also. Demon infested adults were much more difficult to deal with. Younger mystics could deal with them better than an old ugly fart like Abuela. Perhaps Lilliana would one day be groomed to carry on Abuela’s mission.
Lilliana asked Anton if he was ever afraid they were making a mistake. That they might be killing innocent children
I used to, Lilliana. For a very long time I was doubtful of what I was doing for your Grandmother.
Did you ever say anything to her?
No! Oh no! I’m sure she knew everything I thought, as she knows all that you have in your mind, and anyone else’s that she cares to invade. But I never said anything to her
Then you’re no longer doubtful?
Those doubts are all gone. I trust your grandmother, as you should too. And you will. . . eventually.
Lilliana went back down to the basement without Anton’s permission to speak with Trisha in whispers, hiding behind a column beside the cage, while Anton hammered away at the meat in the cutting room down the hall. Trisha asked all the questions. Asking about Lilliana’s own past. Her own childhood. Lilliana becomes sad and feels strongly for Trisha.
Trisha asks what a demon is.
“You are, you lie…”
“Everybody lies, all children lie. How do you know the children from the demons?”
“The wings.”
“If I’ve got wings, show me or show yourself the wings I have.”
“I’ve never seen them.”
“Never? Then how do you know? I’m scared of you, not a demon like you imagine that I am. I just go to school, play with my friends and toys…”
Anton pokes his head out to listen, believing he hears voices, but then goes back to work…
“Go ahead go down and look… All you have to lose is your innocence…”
Lilliana walked quietly down the hall to the cutting room, never having seen inside the room before never having seen a demon dismembered. She stepped in and watched in horror, as Anton chopped his away at the body of a small child. She looked away, sickened, and saw a sledgehammer leaning against the wall in the corner of the room.
Trisha reached passed Liliana for the sledge hammer and lifted it over Anton’s head. Anton turned and saw her, as Lilliana brought the hammer crashing down on Anton’s big head, smashing it to pieces like a ripe pumpkin at Thanksgiving. He fell to the ground. She knelt down to check if he was breathing, leaning close to him. Not a breath seemed to come from him. His eyes opened wide and she pulled back Lilliana, whispered Anton.
Lilliana. You should’ve listened to your Grandmother.
His eyes closed and he was dead.
Lilliana ran down the hall to the cage, keys in hand that she had taken off the hook in the cutting room.
She unlocked the cage as Trisha’s face brightened. Trisha scurried from the cage, holding Lilliana’s hand as they hurried up the stairs to the kitchen. The kitchen door to the backyard wouldn’t open. Lilliana wasn’t allowed out and she never saw how Anton left the house. All the doors were bolted Abuela’s bell went off Abuela knew.
A great roar rattled the plaster walls. Cracks like lightning opened up to shine their light. The house shook. And like thunder, there was a constant slow pounding that came from above, causing the whole house to quiver. Abuela became the monster, a slithering giant snake like beast.
Abuela was stalking them. My God! “What is that!” asked Trisha.
“My grandmother”… said Lilliana.
Lilliana and the girl ran down further in the basement, to the locked door that keeps Abuela’s secrets. Lilliana smashes the lock with a chain kept nearby and enters the room filled with Abuelas mementos of magic. The girls rummage about noting the overwhelming magic that comes to life to… Abuela slithers in after them, confronting herself, she is quickly immersed in herself. Lilliana battles her Grandmother. Lilliana wins and frees the girl Trisha thanks Lilliana, sprouts a demons reptilian wings and flies away, laughing… Lilliana finishes her story… related to the children from the neighborhood, pointing out how she had taken on her demon hunting chores…
The Astronaut
My father…
Yes, I recall your father… He was the last human I saw when I left, he seemed disappointed…
He would’ve been the last man to travel in space…you took his place when the agency discovered the truth about long distance space travel, that he wouldn’t be able to go…
Yes, the fear that human anatomy could not handle the journey…
Humankind couldn’t it turns out Androids are our heroes now… They cost less to maintain as heroes… strange, you do look like my father…
Do I?
Yes… Existing humans were used as the models for many early Androids and eventually great Android artists appeared and the whole concept fully developed until we ended up with sentient beings replacing human beings and only the rich and elite could afford Androids of themselves… The poor lived but soon died off leaving me, a legacy human, a real human…
I must be so different from everybody, everything…
Quite…
I dare say I might feel like you, a legacy…
Your closer to human than Android, but unlike me, you can be eliminated…
I’m a legacy being, a living museum piece for many to see…
I as well perhaps?
Doubtful actually, many like have existed and changed the way existence developed…
And children?
There are none…
The world, humanity, existence has changed since, I am an immortal legacy being but eventually that will end soon I would expect…
I’m sorry Dave, they’re waiting for you…
Strange Tug: Threshold


The Screaming Closet

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unknown
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unknown

Canto


Tuning Papi’s Chrome Blue Nova with A Warm Glass of Rum


El Viejo / La Vida de La Dona y El Cuerpo del Cacique


Persistence of Vision
A Persistence of Vision….
Silent Retreat
Post Stroke Trauma
There are also migrants who manage to jump over what is now a six-metre-high triple fence aimed at containing Europe and keeping Africa out.
“There is no other way,” said Osama, a 20-year old Yemeni who arrived from Sana’a, and said he succeeded on his second attempt to enter Melilla. “I was told the easiest way was over the fence.”
‘It’s a disgrace’
Osama isn’t alone. More than 4,700 in Ceuta and Melilla have jumped the fence from Morocco so far this year, most of them arriving in Melilla. In both enclaves, but more recently in Ceuta, there have been mass jumps, believed to have been co-ordinated by smugglers. In Melilla, 130 from sub-Saharan Africa jumped over in January.
Netflix Challenge
freedom_faction
The online media giant #Netflix may move out of #Georgia if the state succeeds in protecting unborn babies from abortions.
On Tuesday, Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos said the company supports a legal challenge against Georgia’s new heartbeat law, WTHR News 13 reports. If the courts allow Georgia to enforce the law, however, Netflix may stop its protections there, Sarandos said. “We have many women working on productions in Georgia, whose rights, along with millions of others, will be severely restricted by this law,” Sarandos in a statement to CNBC.
He said the company is working with the ACLU and other #abortion advocacy groups to fight the law. “Given the legislation has not yet been implemented, we’ll continue to film there — while also supporting partners and artists who choose not to. Should it ever come into effect, we’d rethink our entire investment in Georgia,” he said.
Netflix would be the first major filming group to boycott the pro-life state, Fox Business reports. Actress #AlyssaMilano has been pushing for a boycott for months, but, until now, only a few small film and TV projects have stopped working there.
Here’s more from the report:
The streaming service is the first major studio to take a stand on the controversial abortion bill that prompted several #Hollywood stars to threaten to boycott the state. Netflix has filmed several projects in Georgia, including “The #HauntingofHillHouse,” “#StrangerThings,” the first two seasons of “#QueerEye” and “#Ozark.” … At least two projects have already reconsidered filming in Georgia since Gov. Brian Kemp signed #HouseBill481 into law earlier this month, according to the Hollywood Reporter. “Handmaid’s Tale” director Reed Morano immediately stopped scouting locations in the #PeachState for her #Amazon series “#ThePower” following the May 7 signing of the bill.
The upcoming comedy, “Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar,” by Kirsten Wiig and Annie Mumolo, also pulled out of filming in Georgia.
Georgia is a popular filming location for TV and movies because of tax breaks. 🖐🏾More in comments👇🏾#BirthStrike#SexStrike
This is my birthday…
Happy Birthday to me…
She’s A Mystery
She’s a mystery. .
But let me uncomplicate her for you. .
She isn’t impressed by material things. .
She’s a romantic; all she wants is love, conversation, and wine. ✨