Articles

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

THE SOLITARY ROSE OF YOUR BREATH

“If a thing loves, it is infinite.” — William Blake

Jul 26, 2026 · 1 min read · 50 claps paywalled #infant-mortality #breath #william-blake

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

The Unsolved

“The work of the eyes is done. Go now and do the heart-work on the images imprisoned within you.” ― Rainer Maria Rilke

Jul 21, 2026 · 1 min read · 60 claps paywalled #ghosts #heart-food #links

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

Pain is what remains

Remembering the life and poetry of Federico García Lorca (1898–1936)

Jul 15, 2026 · 1 min read · 131 claps paywalled #pain #ghosts #feelings

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JO John E Marks · The Mad River

Shut your eyes and see

La plus belle des ruses du diable est de vous persuader qu’il n’existe pas. Baudelaire

Jul 13, 2026 · 1 min read · 50 claps paywalled #the-flowers-of-evil #the-fall #empty

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

Death and the Gardener

To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one’s head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no to-morrow.

Jul 11, 2026 · 1 min read · 55 claps paywalled #death #gardener #soft-brown-earth

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JO John E Marks · The Lark

The Silence and After

Silence is the true friend that never betrays—Confucius

Jul 09, 2026 · 1 min read · 51 claps paywalled #tin #silver #copper

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

People of a lesser vintage

“If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to” ― Dorothy Parker.

Jul 09, 2026 · 1 min read · 50 claps paywalled #hypocrisy #exploitation #catharsis-chronicles

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JO John E Marks · Lit Up

SEEING THINGS

The man who comes back through the Door in the Wall will never be quite the same as the man who went out. Aldous Huxley, The Doors of…

Jul 06, 2026 · 1 min read · 51 claps paywalled #doors #of-perception #seeing-things

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

PASSING STRANGE

I will be king and you, you shall be queen

Jul 04, 2026 · 1 min read · 150 claps paywalled #lightning #london #david-bowie

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

Wildflowers

words born in fond recall

Jul 01, 2026 · 1 min read · 321 claps paywalled #suicide #friendship #seasons

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

The angelus bell

“we’ll soon have the nuns ringing the angelus they’ve nobody coming in to spoil their sleep” James Joyce

Jul 01, 2026 · 1 min read · 101 claps paywalled #angelus #co-meath #generation

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JO John E Marks · The Mad River

PURPLE HAZE

“Intelligence is the ultimate aphrodisiac” ― Timothy Leary

Jun 26, 2026 · 0 min read · 50 claps paywalled #the-mad-river #jimi-hendrix #purplehaze

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JO John E Marks · The Lark

Post-industrial

Lancashire winter

Jun 25, 2026 · 0 min read · 50 claps paywalled #post-industrial #lancashire #winter

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

CHEAP THRILLS

The thrill of creative effort

Jun 23, 2026 · 1 min read · 52 claps paywalled #creativity #forgetfulness #circus

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

LOST SUMMER TIME

Summer winds creep from flower to flower; like moonbeams that behind some piny mountain shower. Shelley

Jun 22, 2026 · 1 min read · 160 claps paywalled #summer #rank #time

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JO John E Marks

A poem for the ages

“The heart has its reasons that reason does not know at all.” Lord Byron.

Jun 21, 2026 · 0 min read · 0 claps paywalled #lord-byron #nature #mankind

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JO John E Marks

BLOOMSDAY: 16 June 1904

“To live, to err, to fall, to triumph, to recreate life out of life!”

Jun 17, 2026 · 2 min read · 50 claps paywalled #james-joyce #bloomsday #nazis

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

The Lorelei

The mythical siren with her ‘immoral eye’

Jun 17, 2026 · 1 min read · 161 claps paywalled #lorelei #mythology #gregory-alan-isakov

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JO John E Marks · The Lark

Witch

The wisdom of the ancients lives in the earth beneath my feet—in the wind that calls my name—in the fire that burns within

Jun 16, 2026 · 1 min read · 150 claps paywalled #sandy-denny #the-witch #druid

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

Sheer Lunacy

Life is a sexually transmitted disease and the mortality rate is one hundred percent. RD Laing

Jun 16, 2026 · 1 min read · 62 claps paywalled #anti-psychiatry #lunacy #bedlam

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

INFECTED

I, too, was potentially everything at birth. I, too, was stunted, narrowed, warped by my environment, my outcroppings of heredity. Sylvia…

Jun 13, 2026 · 1 min read · 282 claps paywalled #genetics #inheritance #wash-us-in-the-blood

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

The Mayflower

The mayflower was the first flower that greeted the pilgrims after their fearful winter

Jun 10, 2026 · 1 min read · 182 claps paywalled #plymouth #jane-austen #pilgrims

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JO John E Marks

Visiting Time

When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.

Jun 07, 2026 · 1 min read · 50 claps paywalled #old-age #kindness #mum

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

FORGET-ME-NOT

Flower forget-me-nots between the stones Paving this grave ground. Plath

Jun 03, 2026 · 1 min read · 184 claps paywalled #forget-me-not #changeling #indomitable

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

SUMMER THUNDER

“I imagine him / Impotent as distant thunder / In whose shadow I have eaten my ghost ration.” Plath

Jun 03, 2026 · 1 min read · 200 claps paywalled #thunder #lightning #sweat

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

HEREDITY

I am the family face; Flesh perishes, I live on — Hardy

Jun 02, 2026 · 1 min read · 0 claps paywalled #heredity #traits #family-face

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JO John E Marks · Poetry Palace

Broken edges

The good work is done by people with jagged, broken edges, because those edges cut things and leave an imprint, a design.

Jun 01, 2026 · 1 min read · 0 claps paywalled #two-thousand-years #fractured #nico

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

Linger

Inside every adult there’s still a child that lingers.

May 27, 2026 · 1 min read · 17 claps paywalled #linger #leaves #crispy

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

Malice Aforethought

Monsters exist; much worse are those who just do as they’re told

May 23, 2026 · 2 min read · 183 claps paywalled #malice #waste #violence

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

John Keats: 31 October 1795–23 February 1821

“Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard, are sweeter” ― John Keats

May 16, 2026 · 1 min read · 181 claps paywalled #john-keats #alchemist #writ-in-water

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

Water tree

Let the rhythm of the water set your soul free

May 12, 2026 · 1 min read · 260 claps paywalled #water-trees #swamp #alligators

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JO John E Marks · The Lark

Second Sight

The foggy dew

May 04, 2026 · 1 min read · 98 claps paywalled #maya-brennan #gaelic #second-sight

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

A Whole Civilisation Will Die

Good Thoughts, Good Words, Good Deeds —the motto of Zoroastrianism*

May 03, 2026 · 1 min read · 348 claps paywalled #zoroastrianism #civilization #sufi

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

AWAY TO THE CRAGS, WHERE EAGLES SOAR

Eagles commonly fly alone

Apr 22, 2026 · 1 min read · 143 claps paywalled #eagles #crag #soar

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

Heart Murmurs

After poisoning him with words

Apr 17, 2026 · 1 min read · 315 claps paywalled #heart #murmur #full-pink-moon

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JO John E Marks

High rise flats

So, heavenly

Apr 16, 2026 · 1 min read · 100 claps paywalled #high-rise-flats #malice #seagulls

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

In defence of the sentimental

Charles Dickens’ readings on his 1867–1868 tour of America

Apr 09, 2026 · 1 min read · 100 claps paywalled #sentiment #charlie-dickens #a-christmas-carol

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JO John E Marks · The Mad River

Inner city news

“People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.” ― George Orwell

Apr 07, 2026 · 1 min read · 52 claps paywalled #robbery #inner-city #shotgun

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JO John E Marks · Poetry Palace

Gypsy soul

clocking off time

Mar 28, 2026 · 1 min read · 105 claps paywalled #gypsy #clock #edgar-allan-poe

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

Run for your life

Light up, light up As if you have a choice

Mar 26, 2026 · 1 min read · 355 claps paywalled #run #winter #exculpate

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JO John E Marks · Scrittura

Chiaroscuro

First thought is best in Art, second in other matters. William Blake

Mar 21, 2026 · 1 min read · 190 claps paywalled #infant-mortality #london #rookery

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

The End

And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. Revelations 20:4

Mar 20, 2026 · 1 min read · 226 claps paywalled #mosul #assyrian #christian

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JO John E Marks · The Mad River

Lifting the Veil

life is short

Mar 18, 2026 · 1 min read · 106 claps paywalled #butterfly #flutter #soul

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JO John E Marks · The Lark

Empty

There is only the moon embalmed in phosphorus — there is only a crow in a tree — make notes — Sylvia Plath

Mar 15, 2026 · 1 min read · 151 claps paywalled #nest #empty #poetry

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JO John E Marks · Literally Literary

Bloomsday

On the 16th June 1904

Mar 13, 2026 · 1 min read · 50 claps paywalled #dublin #james-joyce #the-galway-shawl

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

Ring of Bright Water

I am — yet what I am none cares or knows; My friends forsake me like a memory lost: John Clare

Mar 04, 2026 · 1 min read · 60 claps paywalled #chiaroscuro #swirl #sky

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JO John E Marks · The Mad River

A psychiatric disorder

would you love me till I’m dead?

Mar 04, 2026 · 1 min read · 214 claps paywalled #psychiatric-disorders #gleaned #disorders

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JO John E Marks · Catharsis Chronicles

Rain

Rainy day, dream away

Mar 04, 2026 · 1 min read · 250 claps paywalled #raun #mild #persistent

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JO John E Marks · The Lark

Fabled

In fairy tales monsters exist to be a manifestation of something that we need to understand

Feb 23, 2026 · 1 min read · 315 claps paywalled #fable #myths #magik

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JO John E Marks · The Howling Owl

Hedd Wyn

“Gwae fi fy myw mewn oes mor ddreng / A Duw ar drai ar orwel pell” (Bitter to live in times like these / While God declines beyond the…

Feb 18, 2026 · 1 min read · 62 claps paywalled #hedd-wyn #world-war-1 #cymru