The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

The Spirit of Absinthe   
by Alex Grehy

Artistes lost in dusky dreams came to know

there is a price to pay for everything – every

sweep of the pen, every brushstroke. The

chanteuse sings, delirious in ecstasy. Her 

sultry voice dances in veils of smoke that

waft from black cigarillos and water pipes. 

.

A bacchanal of sensations, writhing, 

while I, the green fairy, light their 

synapses with visions, bright, dark,

fantastical. 

.

They know there is no price too high

for my inspiration. The aproned bartender

pulls the cork, releases me, aromatic, from

the bottle, like a genie. They try to dilute me

with water poured from small, brown-glazed jugs 

that shine in the soft gaslight. But I cannot

be quenched – they wave their hands; attempting

to weave meaning from the intangible; they 

chatter excitedly about love, death and the

nature of being, while I steal their senses,

my intoxication so easily masquerading as an

aura of the metaphysical.

.

That was then, before unsmiling lawmen banned

everything – the smoke, the drink – all stoppered

in propriety, daubed with pastel pigments, as if

the past could be painted over. 

.

The past cannot be erased.

But memory? 

Ah memory is ephemeral, a phantom 

unseen in the sunlight of the present.

.

Soon I fly again, my green wings eager

to present my bill – my sweet fantasies

in exchange for your sanity, your life;

everything for everything

I regret nothing.

.

Fiction © Copyright Alex Grehy
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More from author Alex Grehy:

Alex Grehy’s (she/her) work has been published in a range of zines worldwide including Luna Station Quarterly, Aphotic Realm and The Sirens Call as well as anthologies published by Water Dragon Publishing and Red Penguin. Her essays on being a “Lady of Horror” have featured in the Horror Writers Association Newsletter and The Horror Tree blog. Her words are also available via a global network of prose & poetry dispensers run by French publisher Short Edition.  She is recognised for her original view of the world, expressed in vivid prose and thought-provoking poetry.

Please click here to discover more!