– Definition: adj. Having or displaying a passionate intensity. – Used in a sentence: “Our” cat was a fervent consumer of rats and squirrels. – Why: There are good and bad manifestations of this quality. On the one hand is…
Author: Neal Ross Attinson
Neal Ross Attinson is one of those writing-compulsives who feels naked without a keyboard, or at least a a pad and pencil. He is unafraid of adverbs, and lives with an animal companion and eclectic library in Sonoma, California.
Prosatio Silban and the Lost Foundling
(With much, much help from the indefatigable Ann Clark; five printed pages. If you’re new to these tales, here are the preface and introduction.) WAKING UP TO A BABY’S cry can be a normal thing for some people – but…
Prosatio Silban and the Vanishing Point
(Five printed pages, and a sequel of sorts. If you’re new to these tales, here are the preface and introduction.) IT WAS THE MOST IMPROBABLE of places to meet someone from his past, but Prosatio Silban was accustomed to the…
Elevator Pitch: The Cook For Any Price
“A SELF-DEFROCKED HOLYMAN WANDERS A fantastic landscape, eking out a meager but honest living as a mercenary cook.” (Intrigued?)
365 Names: God-Who-Sees
GOD-WHO-SEES is, in spite of titling a music video, also a fairly accurate descriptor of the non-dual mindstate: “All is seen, but No-thing is seen,” as one seeker-after-the-Divine put it. The Hebrew version, “El Roi” (lit.: “G?d Who sees me“)…
Prosatio Silban and the Double Reflection
(Two printed pages; with posthumous thanks [and apologies] to Idries Shah. If you’re new to these tales, here are the preface and introduction. Enjoy.) IT WASN’T UNTIL THE CHEESE course that Prosatio Silban realized that his clients weren’t silk merchants…
Words To Bring Back:: “Unctuous”
– Definition: adj. (of a person) excessively or ingratiatingly flattering; oily. – Used in a sentence: The current president* (at this writing, anyway: 3/26/20) enjoys and prefers the company of unctuous sycophants. – Why: It’s nice to have words to…
Herd Instinct (A Prosatio Silban Tale)
(Story idea by the redoubtable Ann Clark; two-and-a-half printed pages. If you’re new to these tales, here are the preface and introduction.) IF SOMEONE YOU LOVE BEGINS to act strangely, you could do one of two things: ignore the situation…
Don’t let the plot get in the way of the story.”
— Anon.
Prosatio Silban and the Ignoble Noble
THE THREE CITIES AND THOUSAND Villages of the Uulian Commonwell are home to a more disparate population than you are ever likely to meet. But sometimes, the more disparate are also the more desperate – and likewise, the more pitiable.…
Holy Trap (A Prosatio Silban Tale)
(Five-and-a-half printed pages. If you’re new to these tales, here are the preface and introduction.) THERE IS A SAYING ABOUT the religious life: that it’s only for the broken in spirit, heart, and/or mind. That was one small reason why…
365 Names: The Nameless One
THE NAMELESS ONE was invented by me (unless I unrememberingly wheelered it from somewhere) to express, ironically, that the whole “365 Names of God” project (and similar efforts) is doomed to fail. As Lao-tze said more than a thousand years…