Tarot: The Star

If you whisper your secrets to the stars, they will hear them, and they will keep them.

Wrapped in darkness and camouflaged with stardust.

They will make them shine brightly so that no one can tell one secret from another.

They will shoot across the sky with them should someone discover your secrets. Half-way across the universe, they will be hidden just as well.

Someone else may reach for your secret and discover it is too far away; the sky is fathomless, bottomless.

Someone may whisper their secret to your secret, thinking it a star, and the secrets will intertwine, but the stars will pull them gently apart when you wish them to return your secret.

Only ask, and they will be returned.

They may be glittery with stardust. Do not worry. It will fade in time.

Art by Woraya Chotikul.

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Tarot: The Sun

Beware the heat of a summer's day. Do not let it lull you to sleep. Do not curl up in it like a cat. Heat will do you grevious harm.

First it is the skin. It reddens it, leaves you feeling restless, with the desire to peel it off.

Then it is in your eyes, blinding you to faults and lies.

Then it is behind your eyelids, bright as a star when you close your eyes, imprinted.

Then it warms you from the inside out. Starlight fills your veins, erupts from your nerve endings.

Then the sun sets. What you thought, in the moment, was eternal and unquestionable, is as delicate as the night time breeze. The brilliance fades, the warm with it. The monsters under your bed, the whisper in your ear at night, the cold when you sleep, all present themselves.

Beware the heat of the sun. It will leave you cold.

Art by Woraya Chotikul

Text by Lucie MacAulay

The Battle Of The Two Wolves

An old Cherokee told his grandson, "My son, there is a battle between two wolves inside us all.

One is Evil. It is anger, jealousy, greed, resentment, inferiority, lies and ego. The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, humility, kindness, empathy, & truth."

The boy thought about it, and asked, "Grandfather, which wolf wins?"

The old man quietly replied, "The one you feed."

Art by Adams Doyle

So Close

Glory-of-the-snow is abundant in the lower altitude regions of Internment, studding the grass like amethysts in aged copper. The wind speaks in whispers.

Meredith can just barely see the edge of Internment, which she had suspected was not real until she relocated from the central cities.

The edge is tantalizing, addictive, pulling. There are legends of a long-ago place thousands of feet below them, and the edge is shrouded in the same dreamlike wonder of the mythologica. Yet Meredith would not dare go near it, there are troubles enough in her household without accusations of being the next Jumper reaching her parents. 

Art by Shel Silverstein

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Where I Come From

When a place is remembered, it is never forgotten. Places of beauty are never forgotten, the smell of morning rain on the grass, sunlight dancing off the waves of the blue green sea. Where each cloud moves to the beat of the drums, the players sit around a warm, contented fire, while the black cosmos hovers over small beautiful villages. Sun-ripened wheat sways gently in the soft breeze.

Where I come from there are courtyards filled with flowers, trees hang limply as their leaves wave sadly in the cool autumn wind. Green afternoon skies fade to purple as the stars twinkle brightly, defying the darkness soon to follow. Tree vines twist and twine as the fog rolls away in the late morning, a flock of birds cast colossal shadows across the noisy, sunny schoolyard. Busy streets criss-cross along the city, a small, grey, stray cat bounds across a long line of cars. Dirty shops, old, abandoned, mud clings to a tree as the storm passes, leaving a faint trail of damp. A long black cat slinks silently, swiftly towards a hidden bush, waiting. This place is where I come from.

Where time passes slowly while the sun descends, giving in to the silver light of the solitary moon, vibrant lights blur, illuminating the city in the otherwise dark night. Evergreens soft needles offer shelter from the rain, an overgrowth of wisteria guards the garden of sunlight, planes imitating the swallows, flying over the clouds, turning villages, cars, and people in to toys. Snow blows through the air, and the only place to hide is under the branches of a shivering maple, pigeons swoop and glide searching for food dropped among crowds of people in the streets. Tall, bleak houses lined up in rows, each bleaker than the last. Farm land, rolling hills, and beyond that are distant purple mountains, hardly standing out against the dull gray sky. This is where I come from.

Text by Lucie MacAulay

Mermaid Thoughts

If I were a mermaid I would travel from sea to sea, stopping in each continent, exploring it like I would explore another world. In the Mediterranean I would enjoy the sun, the smell of exotic fruits and spices. In Australia I would glide over the reef, surprising small colourful fish. I would spend hours underwater enjoying the colours, the pearly iridescent whites, the swirling greens, the soft pink of a seashell and the countless shades of blue as pale or deep as the sky. I would rise out of the water, among the waves that crash like galloping white horses. I would lie still in slow currents, drifting, dragging my fingers in the sand, the currents sliding over my skin like ribbons. I would find a place among the sea turtles and rest on their broad warm shells. I would play with the dolphins, laughing and expelling bubbles from my mouth. I would reach the depths of the ocean and explore the vast grand kingdom of Atlantis, the ruins of majestic spires and towers and overgrown gardens of sea lavender. I would swim to the arctic oceans, circling the icebergs, watching the sun glint off the ice and pass through in hazy canyons that pierce the frozen water. I would turn and find myself face to face with the ice bears, their massive claws and big black eyes. I would climb the underwater volcanoes, run my hands on the dark rock, feeling the red heat flowing and rushing within it. I wonder if, being underwater so long, I would admire the sun? Would I be fascinated by the colours of a fire, watching the flames and sparks that light up dark nights, from afar? Would I begin to become captivated by embers and coals, the smoky ruby prisms? What of the moon, would the silver patterns of light on the water’s surface entrance me? The green grey tint on night clouds and white orb keeping me above the waves long after I’ve gotten tired. If I lived in a world of blue and green and wet, would I want the feel of warm dry sand, trees that grow on mountainsides instead of mangroves? Like a princess who gazes out the window of her tower, daydreaming of running away and tasting new things. Would I close my eyes and imagine the smell of ripe apples by a hot meadow, the blinding pink light of cherry blossoms dappled with sunshine, the nectar yellow of leaves falling as trees bend in an autumn wind? If not, if I did not yearn for a world I was a part of, what would I fill my days with? I could sing tragic, mournful, beautiful songs and lead sailors to their death. I could pick my way through riches and treasure in sunken ships, amid watery graves, skeletons sleeping in caverns too deep for their bones to be bleached by the sun. I could have a sweet face, masking fatal intentions that are the ending of so many. Perhaps I would desire to lure someone or something, without bringing them harm, without being the cause of pain. I would want something else, something different. As everyone does. 

Art by Adams Doyle

Text by Lucie MacAulay