Octomeber Day 30 - Ode to the Otherworldly

 Before we get to our final prompt, we circle back to Cryptids. Write an ode to a cryptid of your choice. A good example of the form is Carrie Etter’s “Ode to my Leopard-Print Coat”.

Ode To A Barghest

Here at Auden's folly and hearing your song of mourning in my ears; ominous and sweet like summer wine as a jazz band plays the gathered masses into the church to fill pews like so many wraiths and still I hear the howl and call of your voice. Out of the corner of my eye, I see you; like a shadow passing with embers for eyes burning in the darkness as you move past. I follow behind you - lost in the pack you lead, longing to know what it is to howl. To be the omen people fear when we only come to sing a soul to rest.

Octomeber Day 29 - Werewolf Cinquain

 We focus on werewolves now. Write a Cinquain or series of cinquains that focuses on a snapshot of a Werewolf. A good example of the form is Adelaide Crapsey’s “Snow”

Silver

Howling in witching hour; mournful call to forest. Stalking through trees - bristling fur, sinew held taut facing hunters - blades gleaming in moonlight. Yellow eyes locked on silvered edge; poison warning a stalemate held as the wind whistles by; singing peacefully above the warzone.

Octomeber Day 28 - Trick or Treat

Using a short form, such as the Haiku or Haibun, describe a night of trick or treating. Keep your images as vibrant as possible. You may wish to do a series of these short forms. I went for a modified version of the Rispetto (keeping the syllable count but losing the rhyming scheme)

Candy

Holding hands with my mother as we approach a neighbours house - her vampire teeth falling out of her mouth. Collar of my costume chafing. Standing on tiptoes to reach the brass knocker. A boy, older than me, answers - blue eyes bright as the moon. He offers a bowl of red wrapped sweets. "Chocolate kisses" he says. I smile back. We leave and I think of how his lips might taste.

Octomeber Day 27 - Survivor

Oh we are so tantalisingly close to the end. And as we are drawing to a close, I want you to write from the perspective of the hunted victim while they are trying to escape or survive their tormentor.

Huntress

Her song in the wind - a lullaby like a wolf's howl; a warning sign. Tree branches claw and catch, beast like in this pearlescent lit midnight. The moon watching impassive, as if expecting what is coming. Lulled by the melody. There's a cleaving; steel splitting wood. A pause. Silence. Wind... just wind. I run. I run and run until it feels like fire and bile are going to explode through my chest. Until the blood is so loud in my ears I can't hear her song. I double over, leaning against a tree. That's when I feel it, slick against my palm. That's when I feel the gouge from her axe - the wound in the bark.

That's when I hear her song humming right behind my ear.

Octomeber Day 26 - Forgotten Things

Following on from yesterday, we are going to borrow again from this year’s Napowrimo. In April, we had to list ten items one might find at an auction or a garage sale. This time around, I want you to list ten items that one might find in a cairn or mausoleum. Write in any form including those items.

A Litany In Which Things Are Half Forgotten

Dusk roses, bereft of scent withered petals - confetti of loss around an offering bowl filled with atrophied stalks. A candle, unlit but half-burned; wax dripping like a life towards the ground, towards finality. Urn - burnished brass, scent of sulphur and a bonfire of memories from its plinth. In the alcoves; a fine cosmos of arachnids. Little stars skittering through their webbed galaxy.

Yellowed pages of a rotting notebook. Leather cover sloughing away from pages like skin from skeleton. Shot glass from where I drank your farewell. Rounds of good whiskey from your coffin lid. Last picture of us, smiles in sepia. A memory captured and left here to fade with the rest...

Octomeber Day 25 - Ghost Writer

Write from the perspective of a ghost or spirit haunting the place they most enjoyed being in life. Perhaps this was a library, or a particular café or a church.

Poltergeist

    My hands pass across pages as winter winds that sneak through unseen cracks in crumbling Georgian walls. A creak in the floor as my translucent form presses the scant weight, as if a half-remembered detail was smeared across paper in an attempt to erase it - the ghost of it still taints the page of this world. A lone shopkeeper shivers as I read over their shoulder, leaning a little too close but still they stare right through my hand as I attempt to flick the page. The spider in the corner salutes every time I drift by - lonely companions in the twilight.

Octomeber Day 24 - Nightmare

A fairly straightforward one. Oftentimes, we are asked to write about dreams we have, or at least with the surrealist quality of dreams. On this occasion, I want you to write a nightmare but rather than the surrealist qualities of dreams, try and imbed it in some gritty, concrete realism.

Nightmare

Rain sluicing off drenched skin. Metal sting of blood on the tongue - ribs grazing against coarse brick wall.

Hand at my throat; calloused fingers rough as a noose. His breath - cheap whiskey and cigarettes as he

reaches for the waist of my jeans... a moment passes. Knee drives up. Knuckles uproot teeth.

I wake shaking, bloodied fists and broken drywall.

Octomeber Day 23 - Word List 5

So close to the end but still a little ways to go. You know the deal by now. Write in any form but include the following words; feral, howl, cicadas, shoreline, prey, serrations.

Hunter's Moon

    Somewhere in the middle distance - a howl from the lake shoreline. Breaking through the verdancy to see the cliffs serrations; an arrow tip directed at the heart of god. Silhouetted in moonlight - feral claws cleave at the throat of their prey. Death rattle as a crescendo with the susurrus of cicadas played behind them. Viscera dissolves into the thirsting earth. A rush and crackle of wind and branch and they are gone, leaving only the rubied bones as evidence.

Octomeber Day 22 - Acrostic

So... I pretty much gave up with yesterday's prompt. It was to write a villanelle with a villain in mind. I was toying with doing one based on Maleficent... but I just wasn't jiving with it. But anyway, its a new day and a new prompt:

Using the words Vampire Bat, make an acrostic poem. Feel free to manipulate the form. Maybe, instead of starting the sentence with each letter, you end each one with it instead!

Velveteen touch, hand against chest -

a double bass pedal beating its way out. losing

myself in the rhythm of us as your breath 

passes across the skin of my throat.

I snake my hands through your hair;

rush of blood between us at 

every shared kiss - you moan, into the 

back of my throat;

a secret to keep locked in the vault of 

this mouth - the song of two hearts.

Octomeber Day 20 - Apocalypse

 Let's write about the apocalypse today. Specifically, a zombie apocalypse. But I want you to write from the perspective of something inanimate, like an abandoned house or a tree, perhaps.

Lighthouse

I still call out to the sea every night - as if some solitary sailor may need warning away from the rocks. It is quiet now. Not that it was ever that busy but now its truly the definition of quiet. At first, they came and roamed through expecting to find a feast because I kept shining through the night. Very rude, the undead. Not even a courtesy knock before barrelling through the door. That was some... six, seven years ago? Time doesn't exactly mean much anymore. 

Now I have a new nest at my base. Two people, making a home in hell. but I know its warm. The hordes avoid me now they know the light will keep shining night after night regardless. Steadfastness is a sanctuary - the lonely sentinel, become a the only safety these two may ever know. If only I could promise it would last... but they can rest, if only for a moment. That much I can give them. Occasionally, they sing quietly in the night. My two little sirens, calling out to ships that never sail. 

Octomeber Day 19 - Twittering

This one is an old favourite of mine. Try to write in the vein of a horror or supernatural thriller but keep it to the character limit of a tweet!

The Mine

Cold drip echoing through the tunnels. My own breath loud in my ears. Crouched low, crammed into an alcove... heavy footfalls, slow but growing closer. The piercing scrape of metal dragging against rock. I cover my mouth as I hear him pause, searching. A hand appears above me...

Day 18 - Poe Pretenders

Time to look at one of the godfathers of dark, supernatural thrillers in Edgar Allen Poe. I'm always struck by the ominous mystic quality of his works. Looking at something like The Tell-Tale Heart or The Raven, write your own short piece and try to capture that same air of ominous threat and supernatural happenings.

Come and See

I heard it first in something like a dream,
where neither beast nor spell held its sway 
but somewhere in that veiled state it's voice 
came up like thunder 'crost the bay;
"Come and see"

Unwilling yet interest piqued at the urging,
I followed fast into a narrowed staircase 
and down it twisted into the shadowed space 
beyond, perturbed yet still it beckoned;
"Come and see"

Following now, I stumbled still into that 
encompassing dark and struck a match for light, 
until the scene bent away to dawn and blinded 
I fell out into a river and somewhere beyond sight:
"Come and see"

it called among the trees above the roaring and the
foam - urging me out of the silted riverbed and
onto the bank of thorns and hogweed stems that 
threatened to tear and break and bend but still commanding,
"Come and see"

and at the back of neck, all hairs on end alerted 
as a cold wind blew out the candle of the sun, all turning 
dusk and blue and night once more with occluded moon 
beyond the clouds and somewhere still, incense burning - 
"Come and see"

I followed that unseen censor, perfumed air through
to the clearing and there - four white trees marked 
as if the pillars of the earth and in their clearing, a 
lamb, slathering its blood upon their bark;
"Come and see"

It beckoned with a voice like prophecy and so I 
stumbled closer. A clarion in the deep - some ways beyond
as it uttered words that tongues forgot many moons ago 
and the deafening roar of hooves, the rumble through the ground.
"Come and see"

And I watched as the first appeared on crimson tide,
sword singing as it unsheathed in flickering flame - as 
lightning split the sky and once again the lamb had turned 
to mark me with its blood - to now bear witness
"Come and see"

Octomeber Day 17 - Word List 4

 Time for another word list! Write in any form but including the following words; lantern, spirits, dance, billowing, susurrus, smoke.

The Lovers

In curlicues of smoke you move
to snake a hand around my throat - 
to turn my face to yours so that 
our lips brush against each other; 
soft satin of your skin, susurrus of 
your voice - an aria only we know 
the steps to. 

Dancing through the empty hallways 
of us - this body is an abandoned house
that you've haunted for so long 
its forgotten how to be without you.
Gentle lantern light in the window; 
radiance of your body next to mine - our 
glow in the sapphire dark.

We step through into the bedroom,
our bodies intertwined - shedding the skin 
of our disguises until it is just spirit; 
what is the body but a barrier to 
be broken by your touch? Leave that 
shift of a silk shirt billowing behind 
as we kiss - lost in the music 
of what happens next.

Octomeber Day 16 - Myths & Monsters

Now to look in your own backyard so to speak. Pick a creature or figure from the folklore of where you live and write a short piece either to honour them or write from their perspective. Try and keep it to 500 words or less.

Beast of Exmoor

    Find me in the obsidian dark. Among the rolling fields and open wounds of copper mines. Come find me in the depths beside the Barle. Among the bones and broken promises of daylight. Come alone. Come at night. Hear the warning in my voice. See the white dagger painted in my skin - mark you as an amusebouche. Hear the last whimpering bleat of sheep, strung from the buttresses and stalagmites; trophies. Come find me in the twilight, traveller. Come and see.

Octomeber Day 15 - Recipe For Death

Just about halfway through. Time for you to plan out your Modus Operandi in the form of recipe instructions. Step-by-step guide to your murder and remember - show, don't tell.

Mixology

Step one - Measure 2oz into a tall glass, filled with ice. Step two - Pour tonic. Hear the crack and hiss bubble up. Step three - Cut a swath from a lemon, express the oils then add. Step four - Add essence of bitter almonds and stir. Step five - Serve with a smile like a knife you would twist in their spine.

Octomeber Day 14 - Discovery

Time for something different - write an exchange between two or more characters and how they would deal with finding a dead body.

Keep It Secret

"What happened?"

"What do you mean?"

Osiris gives Maddox a withering look that, for once, doesn't seem to land. Either Maddox was that far gone that he'd done this and genuinely had no contrition or... 

"You're telling me you had nothing to do with this?"

"Why would I have had anything to do with this? How do I know it wasn't you?"

"You can't be serious... I found you standing over this and you are going to accuse me?"

"I got here seconds before you did so fuck you for thinking I did this!"

"Well it's not like you haven't got form."

The hurt in Maddox's eye was easily read. Maybe Osiris had misjudged this. Neither of them spoke a word as they stood over the flayed body at their feet which was already attracting a menagerie of flies. The trees around them seemed to whisper secrets to each other on the sharp winter wind that gusted through the edges of the forest. Osiris pulled his coat tighter around him. Maddox began to shiver, his plaid shirt offering little comfort against the weather. Osiris let out a sigh.

"I apologise. I shouldn't have stooped to that."

"I'm not surprised. You always were an asshole."

"Oh for-"

Osiris cussed under his breath before he took a moment to steady himself.

"You know for someone who was so desperate to work with me, you have been nothing but a constant problem. Tell me why exactly you came here?"

"Because someone, or something, is killing people like us."

"You might have to be more specific as to which part you mean. People who work for the palace? People with magic? People who happen to not be straight? People with mental health issues?"

"In this case, three out of four."

"What?"

Maddox knelt and reached his hand into the remains, plucking out a heart. With a few words muttered, low and guttural in his throat, purple smoke began to billow from its chambers which Maddox inhaled. Osiris grimaced.

"I will never get used to your abilities. They are repulsive."

"Judge all you want, asshole, they're pretty damn useful right now. I have a name and yes, they were a mage."

"Shit. And the fact that the organs were pretty much all left there, I'm going to make a wild assumption and say this wasn't anything to do with blood magic or necromancy."

"That's a good assumption. No, this wasn't a harvesting or a sacrifice or anything like that. If anything, it's a warning."

"Right... do what you need to and get rid of the body. We'll meet up later and go over things. I need to check in on Theodore."

"Just... go careful, okay? I'll do some searching and see what I can dig up."

Osiris nods before turning on his heels and heading back towards the Sandringham estate.

Octomeber Day 13 - Triskaidekaphobia

Today's  prompt is quite simple. You have no more than 13 lines to write about something you fear without ever mentioning its name. See if we can guess it by the end of the piece.

Deathrattle

Coil muscle around the throat. 

Feel heat of blood beneath the scale 

flexing slither across skin. 

Hear it hiss in the darkness - head 

raised and taut. Poised to strike,

to break the earth of this body. 

Cold sweat drip from lank hair as 

it moves across and into shadow.

Lurking beyond - rattling its requiem.

Octomeber Day 12 - Summoning Circle

Here's a little idea. We've seen the memes of "What 5 things would you put in a summoning circle to summon you?" Well you can now get to show your 5 choices. Spend a little time exploring each one and explaining why in your own words.

Ritual

1) Tea cup, filled. Malty assam scent. Fragile handle desperate to relieve itself of its foundations. Reminder of late nights in front of soft screen glow.

2) Dog-eared notebook. Moleskine. Ink staining its innards with corrections and alterations. Constant companion.

3) Needlepoint Pilot pens - scratching across and down pages. A fondness adopted from university professor.

4) Triquetra charm, held loosely at the end of twine. Gift from a loving heart some thousands miles westward.

5) Sparrowhawk feather. Token from wilderness left after interaction - strange kinship felt.

Octomeber Day 11 - Word List 3

Day 11. Another word list for you. Write in any form but including the following words: candle, nutmeg, glass, switch, incumbent, formula.

Pumpkin Spiced Latte

Glass to warm the hands. Scents of season 

perfuming the air - clove, nutmeg, ginger; 

taste of all things winter. 

Bring a switch of wood to start a fire,  

Scented candle for a reading light. 

Incumbent season beats against 

window pane - sleet and wind roaring 

as if determined to offend. 

But here, as element of formula for 

the quiet and the calm, it becomes 

soft drumbeat behind the soft 

crack of wood and flame, rustle of 

pages turning and a soft whisper 

of jazz saxophone echoing 

somewhere nearby.

Octomeber Day 10 - Il Inferno

It is day 10 and I feel like trying something a little different. Today, we are going to hark back to Dante Alighieri's trilogy, specifically "Il Inferno" which depicts the circles of hell. For this one, roll a d10. Write a short piece in any form depicting that circle of hell in your own words. On a roll of 10, write about Purgatory instead. For an extra challenge, try writing this in a similar fashion to Charles Simic's "The Church of Insomnia".

Octavus

Here, encircling like spokes on a wheel - stone bridges strain under the weight of bodies, heads wrenched backwards and mouths contorted. Fetid clouds hang low beneath the pathways, groans of the half-drowning; throats filling with sewage. Men march asleep - in gilded cloaks, lined with lead. Walking the banks of rivers filled with pitch and tar, hissing and caustic in which thieves boil. Venom drip from fangs of serpents and reptiles that strike and pierce the skin.

From somewhere below, an anguished howl echoes on a frigid wind.

Octomeber Day 9 - Tritina

Today, I've been thinking about  the "rule of 3" as a power number and something that shows up a lot in rituals and in pagan belief form for you to sink your death into so gear up your poetry brains for this. I want you to write a tritina but keep it situated in a graveyard. An example of a tritina can be found here.

Requiem

Feel the coarseness of the churches old stones as you wander among the bullgrass, quiet breath of wind - whispers of the outcast dead.

And here, stood above the numbered dead, names eroded by Time from grey headstones and nothing around save the eerie quiet.

Hymn echoes from the eaves, breaks the quiet reverie - sonorous clang bells to wake the dead form their graves, call them up through dirt and stone... But stone remains undisturbed in the dead quiet of dawn.

Octomeber Day 8 - Eau Du Mort

Welcome to week two and it is time to play with senses again! This time we are focusing heavily on scent - specifically those scents associated with death. This can be taken very literally or it could be fuelled by your own memories of a death.

Hospital

Thick, cloying cloud of ammonia - falsity of flowers, of citrus. Heavy as a world collapsing between your shoulders. Damask roses withering on a windowsill - water near fetid, verdant and muddied. Somewhere behind the veil of

brutal cleanliness; delicate note of earl grey, normalcy. All of this - a bouquet of hope extinguished.

Octomeber Day 7 - Word List 2

 We've reached the end of the first week! Hope you have been getting something out of the prompts and that you've enjoyed what I've written! Today we are going to do a second word list. Just like before, write in any form but include the following words: blade, lamb, stump, veil, harvest, bones.

Sacrifice

Your hands; cold, callused - 
veil of risk wrapped delicately 
around my throat. Hold me like 
I'm dangerous; a blade to wield 
in this secret night we keep 
for ourselves - greedy little fingers 
trace my skin... my lips... 
across collar and down 
the length of these arms.

Take the bones of this body 
and remake it into something 
loveable; a willing lamb to 
your butcher's block - sitting here,
hands at your hips, unzipping. 
"No one's going to know"
Ragged stump of old Oak; this 
moment's altar... another memory 
labelled 'the rituals of us'.

Octomeber Day 6 - Shakespearian Spellcraft

 Time to go back in time slightly to one of the most classic representations of witches - Macbeth. Yes, ready your cauldron and your ingredients because today I want you to write your own witch's chant, using the same meter and rhyming pattern as the one from the infamous scene in Macbeth, as can be found here.

I'll make it a little easier on you by saying you don't have to do the full scale chant but I do want at least one verse and one refrain or chorus and for you to have a go at using the Bard's preferred iambic pentameter. Good luck!

Hex

Three coins purloined from stranger's purse  
blood let by blade to pen the verse 
a tiger's eye to strengthen will 
dragon's claw, nightshade distil'd 
then seven strands of lover's hair 
plus tears from jilted party's prayer
tail of lizard, snake's venom gland 
ring stolen from a dead man's hand
bind in hate and boil with flame
to lay this curse upon his name.

Hecate, mother, hear our plight!
grant us power to enact this rite.
Hecate, mother, with my hand 
bring sorrow to this fickle man.

Octomeber Day 5 - Saw

Day 5 is upon us and today we are taking our inspiration from one of the more recent icons of horror. Jigsaw does get some fairly iconic lines throughout the Saw saga. For today's piece I want you to start off with perhaps his most classic line - "I want to play a game". Bonus points to you if you manage to include some of the other well-known lines from the series.

Puzzle Box

I want to play a game 
of shadows and rituals. 
I want you to know God in 
these moments - when faced 
with death, who should live 
versus who will live becomes

two very separate things.

Turn. Twist. Separate.

Study. Death comes quickly.

Death is a surprise party;

a whisper in deep dark of 
night that lulls you to 
sleep suddenly. Like a lullaby
in your mother's voice.

Break in if you can. If you 
can anticipate the human mind 
it leaves nothing to chance; 
watch them dance desperately 
around the skeletons of failure 
at their feet. Watch it dawn on 
them that this is over.

Octomeber Day 4 - Cryptid Triptych

 Time to start playing with poetry form! For today's prompt, I would like you to use the form of a Triptych to write an exchange between a human and a cryptid. It can be any cryptid you like. If you need a quick little intro to the form of a Triptych, that can be found here.

Barghest

Venture to the horrid gill of the limestone hill 
to see the burning eyes in the bosom
of the earth. Find him creeping here among 
the creeping calcified stones - the bones 
of those who weren't to know you nest here 
scattered about the steps as you emerge 
from the shadows. Eyes burning dark and 
smouldering as coals; hell born - 

bringing prey to the dead man's pass. 
Smell the blood in his veins as he enters 
the gorge. Viscera drip from the crag of 
nature's walls. Guttural growl from the throat;
warning shot. He stands firm, with book 
and blade, sorcery swirling through his 
fingers - a challenge for supremacy; 
feel ground beneath tense claws 

gouging tracks into the wild path. 
Rush of wind through the valley as moon 
rises to cast us in blood-light, circling 
each other; danse macabre - set intentions 
for this meeting. Skin branded with 
scars, fur aflame and filling the air with 
acrid smoke - dead silent in the aftermath 
up the horrid gill of the limestone hill.

Octomeber Day 3 - Songs For Harvest

 Welcome to day three! I hope you are all finding the prompts fun to work with. I quite like this one so let's see how you all find it: 

October isn’t just the season of spookiness and horror movies. It is also the time of Harvest before winter. And, to me at least, it feels like the loss of a lot of things - a loss of light and warmth as summer fades, for example. In this vein, write something that focuses on the ideas of harvest and the approach of Winter.

Harvest Moon

Scythe song - Reap the fields; iron sweep through cane and grass. Soft light of summer's last sun fading into the horizon. Bring a switch of wood to start a fire to warm us both beneath this burnt umber sky - hear the last call of songbird as they fly south.

Octomeber Day 2 - Word List

 Time for the second prompt in our month of spooky inspired writings and time for one of my favourite prompts - word lists. So without further ado, here is the prompt:

Write in any form but include the following words; ritual, incense, waning, direction, awestruck, exultation.

Ritual

Burn of incense from unseen censor - hear the drone of baritone voices; calling out their exultations to God. The waning moon looks down as the censor swings, hither and thither among this congregation. They gather, awestruck, in this enclave of fragile souls. Longing for direction, for desire; for anything to distract them from the clawing inside the cavity of their chests.