Author: J Edward Neill

The Window Hours – A Poem

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Here, I sit dreaming

by the quiet glass

through which everything has shined

dark and light

gilded sun and hungry shadow

all of them, gifts

strumming the webs of thought

in my tired mind.

*

At dawn, I search the panes

for signs of yestereve

for changes in the night

for perhaps the world had broken

as I slept.

But none, are there,

none in the glass

though many in me.

*

At dusk, I press my nose

against the highest window

hunting the gloam

for haunts yet to wake

for all things nocturnal

who must surely do the same

and search for me

even as I lie dreaming.

*

And at night, ere the witching

I am most alone

scrawling by candle

inking the world’s walls

with things that never were.

It’s then, just then

I wake from long, black halls,

and see my face, the lights in my eyes

the shadow of my cheek

staring back at me from the place beyond my door.

*

*

*

J Edward Neill

 

All Hallows Art Print Sale!

  By

It’s autumn, which means it’s time for eerie, dark, spooky Halloween art.

I’ve got you covered.

For the next week, 25% off ALL my best art prints. These prints are dark and lustrous. You’ll love ’em.

Go here:

Or…

Enjoy the gallery below…

Atonement
Everything Must Fall
Daybreak
Fell Moon
Charon
Shadow Grove
The Suspense is Killing Me
Absentia
Goblets of the Ether
Infinity Dragon
Necromancia
Pierced
Night Emperor
Nevescape
The Sound of Silence
Season of Shadows
Summoning Tree
Unfathomable

 

Goodreads Giveaway – Darkness Between the Stars

  By , ,
At night, he watches the stars and dreams of flying between them.
And when he sees them begin to disappear, he knows what will happen…
The beginning of the end.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Darkness Between the Stars by J. Edward Neill

Darkness Between the Stars

by J. Edward Neill

Giveaway ends October 01, 2019.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

Chasing Death – a New Poem

  By

I fear you none.

For though you give chase across time, across ages,

through valleys blackened by pain

and pastures greened with hope,

the labor is solely yours.

You know my name, but yours will go unsaid,

indifferent,

unlooked for

until the moment of leaving, at whose gates I will no longer care.

For though I might gaze across years, across oceans,

toward a horizon whose distance I will know only once,

you cannot touch me until then.

And so I fear you none.

Strip away the leaves of others, take them as you must.

Peel dry the orchard in which I live, whether summer sapling or wintered oak,

whether friend or foe, whether loved or despised.

I care not.

For they are mine forever, and yours but once.

And whence they come to you, wordless and unchangeable,

they are immortal to me.

In spirit indomitable.

In memory indestructible.

So take them. I care not.

Once the forest falls and I am the only one left,

you may cast your shadow upon me.

Victory, you may claim, fleshless, arid, and everlasting.

And you may laugh to see me kneel in the dirt, under grey skies,

under columns of black clouds in which no heaven awaits.

But nameless, I will hold you.

And bittersweet, your conquest.

For the dark line, drawn in the sand at the time of your choosing,

is no loss to me, no more than a whisper in the eon of my soul.

And I shall fear you none.

Whether sharp and sudden or a slow carrion crawl,

my burdens will be shed,

my thousand aches mended,

and sleep again I shall until the ending of all ages.

But you, my friend,

you must toil on.

For whether here or there or a in place yet unnamed,

your work is never done.

 

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J Edward Neill

The Muse – A Poem

  By

Were I a stone in a pale river,

the water would teach me

sculpt me

beguile my bones into shapes

I’d never known.

Were I a cliff, lording over the sea,

the wind would, over patient eons

move upon me,

at times a gale, sharp yet sincere,

at others, carrying the mist softly to my face,

that I might feel things

to which I’d never awakened.

Were I grass, short-lived and thirsty,

but always a friend to the sun

the rain would nourish my roots,

and beneath its clouds, it would remind me

that no day is ever-bright,

but nor is the darkness always my foe.

Were I fire, booming in the hot belly

of the earth untamed,

my release would raze the life from all things

yet in the end,

I would gladly perish,

and all else grow anew.

And were I a maker of words,

quill in hand, burning hearth in place of ordinary heart,

she would smile at me,

and whisper thoughts undreamed into my ear,

that I might wake the next morn beside her,

with always another page,

another tale,

and never a dry spell

for the garden in which we live.

*

*

*

*

J Edward Neill

Lords of the Black Sands – Digital Giveaway!

  By , ,

Want a free digital copy of dark, dystopian thriller, Lords of the Black Sands?

Review it on the ‘Zon when you’re finished reading, and I’ll send your copy today!

Click here (or click the book cover below.)

The Riot – A Poem

  By

She lives in the wind

or so the riot tells me.

A golden flame, a pale rapture, an elemental catastrophe,

all of this, and more, the riot will say.

An invisible trail, she leaves,

on the streets we have walked, in our rumbled bed.

But she is never lesser.

Her hours of toil beget mere moments of calm,

for there is no taming her, only the lie thereof.

She walks never straight, but in tangles, in weaves,

and on wild paths only the trees can name.

She lives in the wind

or so I’ll say

from now until the end of everything.

Many will try, and many will dream of her at peace,

only for a moment’s breeze to unravel her.

to take her skyward.

to unleash her.

The riot, she is.

In body, in spirit.

And those who would tame her,

had best beware.

*

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J Edward Neill

Photographing Art – Easy or Hard?

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In the world of making a living with art, 25% of an artist’s power lies in their talent.

25% lies in their dedication.

And 50% lies in their ability to take pretty photos of their work.

Today I share my efforts.

Please enjoy.

See more at

 

Let’s All Have Sex – 101 Sex Questions

  By , , ,

A deeper, sweatier take on philosophy.

Meant for hot nights with your partner, candid conversations with a lover, and parties during which (almost) everything goes.

Includes questions on relationships, love, and of course, TONS of smoldering sex.

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101 Sex Questions

*

 

Horror of Horrors – The Circle Macabre

  By , ,

Erisa Stavrou, hunter of hunters, stalks her final prey into the sprawling city of Valai.

She brings nothing but her shirt, her sandals, and her unbreakable blade.

She is the only one who can end the cycle of one dead, every night, forever.

She is the last hope to break…

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The Circle Macabre

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Beautiful, Deadly, Immortal – Nadya the Deathless

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Having survived the Night of Knives, beautiful Nadya rises to power as the baroness of Tolem.

There’s just one problem. The Emperor of Vhur has just dispatched his largest army to retake Tolem and burn Nadya at the stake.

She’s left with only two choices: Run for her life…or kill every last man in the Emperor’s army.

She has no intention of running…

*

Nadya the Deathless

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The Hecatomb – A great loss of life

  By , ,

In a drowned village, on a dark shore, in a city of white stones, an ancient evil stalks.
It has no name, no face, and no desire but to see the death of everything…
…and everyone.

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The Hecatomb

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A Dark Poem – Leaving in the Rain

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It began the moment I left.

The clouds, black and burgeoned with dark water,

caught me, contained me.

Drums in the sky pounded the only message

my body needed to know.

For all their thunder, my bones shook.

For all their streaming rivers

falling down my fractured panes,

I should have turned back.

Brief, I expected them,

and easily swatted aside.

But the sky told no mistruth,

and the serpentine road, swallowed by the rain,

scrawled into my tired eyes

the lie of leaving.

 A wager, I made with the advancing night.

‘You’ll break with the sun when I return.’

‘And go black again with every retreat.’

And impatient, I threatened.

And railed.

And made war against everything.

Even knowing the deed was mine.

But the rain only laughed.

And the night shrugged at the hidden moon.

Daring that I should do it again.

That I should return, and stride the storm

a thousand times over.

*

*

For more words, go here. 

 

A Poem at Midnight – Black River

  By

On a black river, I race toward the waning light.

Westward, burning, the smoky clouds breathing their last.

My carriage vibrates on the shallow water,

the wheels wanting to break, but lacking the will.

There are others besides me, but there are none.

I am alone here, but for one.

A dusk-born bat, I see nothing, and feel everything.

Flying, wings biting at the dark, nothing slows me.

Save death.

At the witching hour, to a theme which shakes the world,

I ride.

Sweating. Aching. Hellbent.

At the black river’s end, everything.

More here.