Within these pages rest the sordid thoughts of an old soul who finds peace in the darkest corners of the world. You will find few uplifting words in this book and little to inspire, soothe or even help you cope. What you will find within these pages are poems that express the darkness many fear yet others embrace. Some require you to take time to examine this bizarre existence we call life, to gain a glimpse into the mind of those who make these shadows their home. Some paint a vivid picture with words that capture the beauty amid the macabre. Some express a dark sense of humor that causes the little clown in my mind to display his sinister grin. In short this book is for the dark, demented and those just a bit twisted. So find yourself a dimly lit corner, curl up with some hot tea and pastries and enjoy spending time with me in my darkness. J.L. Parsons

A darkly comic, modern parable of exile, belief, belonging and judgment, Footprints on water is about Noel, a religious zealot who is building an ark, so that when God destroys his morally corrupt village, Noel as self-appointed chosen one, will start the world again. When the flood comes, Noel finds himself trapped by his faith.

It was the first night of the Sacrificium, a night of sacrifice and death, a night when the black coins tendered in the Lottery would be tendered back. It was also the Hora Mille Semitis, the Hour of a Thousand paths—for that is the day the Sacrificium had fallen on this year—the hour when best friends might become enemies, when lovers of longstanding might betray oaths, the hour in which anything and everything was possible. And the alignment was felt: from the upper echelons of the capitol to the poorest quarters of the downriver provinces. For the message of Valdus’ rebellion had spread—whether it was a tract nailed to a door before quickly being torn down or a blast in the night that caused the power to fail in entire regions. It was a night for dreaming and for huddled collusions, for the breeze to course through rustling leaves, for long dead hearts to awaken and start pumping blood. The Sacrificium had once more come to Ursathrax, but so had the Hour of a Thousand Paths, and Valdus’ Revolution, and something else, something elusive but impossible to ignore, nebulous, but as real as the River Dire, which seemed to have stolen into the world on the wind itself ...