Jonathon thinks about his two mortal children- My Chemical Romance - Welcome To The Black Parade [Official Music Video]

And so what do I do with them, my two innocent human charges... my children? I watch them every night when I awake. We put them to bed at eight thirty, an hour late by mortal standards. They wake up at seven thirty or perhaps an hour more. So they see me for perhaps three and a half hours now, in the winter time. In the summer, when dawn comes so early and dusk so late they might not see me at all. The boy, the five year old, doesn't say much and his three year old sister looks to him for guidance. So far they ask few questions. Why should they. Edith, our mortal housekeeper sees to their meals. A familiar, a man who oversees our financial affairs, arranged for clothes from the best children's shops, toys from the most inviting toy shops. We subscribe to all the popular children's television networks. Edith or Billy, the mortal who curates this blog for us, takes them out on walks all the time. They get treats and story books, but only if the shop has a special window installed in their front door for safe ease of purchase during this time of pestilence. They have an small ten gallon tropical fish aquarium all done up like a cozy undersea fish village. Conrad, another night-folk who lives here, had tropical fish before his transformation and knows all about them, so he takes care of the tank. It's set up in a room downstairs made to look like a pre-school or kindergarten classroom... all the colorful wall charts, a chalk board, bright tables and chairs, digital tablets... everything. A teacher came two and a half hours every morning. Then lunch. In the afternoons Billy took over. Afternoons were easy... a story... a nap... arts and crafts... Zoom time with a few other home schooled children... a kiddie TV movie before dinner. This time of year Sarah (my consort) and I get to join them. Conrad looks in from time to time. Annie the by now maybe ten year old child vampire in a body not much older than the five year old boy's when it happened. I did not do it. None of us did. None of us would. 'Papa' did that. You'll see him. He's around. I don't know where, but he's around. Annie visits with the children... never alone... always supervised. Sometimes she's a mean little kid, besides being a vampire.. The mortal children call her 'that mean girl.' She's skinny. Her hair just hangs there. Likes magazines and coloring books from the CVS. Sneaks out by herself at night. She's a vampire. What's going to happen to her. Sometimes she sneaks into the vast Penn Museum on 34th Street to commune with the spirits of the mummies. That place is mummy central. She steals things for some homeless guys she's friends with... cigarettes... plastic containers of these big wet napkins like baby wipes, but these are made for old people with like arthritis and all. Homeless people love them. Annie has money to pay for these things, but she likes stealing. The mortal children sense she's 'something' they just don't know what.

Jonathon worries about the mortal boy and girl. Only been a few nights, but he thinks about things. They're going to want a normal family. Right now he figures one of his 'familiars' a lawyer with a huge condo and a house down the shore, actually not too far from where Baylah's mortal boyfriend lives. You'll meet her.

Bet you never thought vampires had problems like this, but think about it. Why wouldn't they. People say they're 'not human.' But they are. What they're not is mortal. He doesn't want to see these children grow old. There was a woman, a vampire woman in town years ago who took in two mortal children too. She had money. All vampires have money. I'll explain how later, but it's very obvious. You'll get it right away. You'll figure it out. A flamboyant Auntie Mame character. The children never left her. She lived in The Drake, a legendary Center City pre war apartment building... thirty two stories tall... terra cotta Spanish type towers on top. She lived up there... private elevator. You know how often other people in the building saw her? Hardly ever. Mr. Dawson delivered groceries for 'the children' and Denise, her 'French girl' kept house. Mrs. Hopps came before breakfast and left just before dinner to cook all the meals plus a few snack items. Things were fine, until the 'children' got old. Then she brought in nurses. They never needed doctors. The tiniest drops of her night-folk blood banished every ailment. But as with all humans the clockwork mechanism reaches its end and the tiny drops of vampire blood are useless. They were too old to transform. Aged vampires don't do well. They live like ghouls. The vampire woman stayed with them to the end. We don't know where she went.

Jonathon didn't want that to happen. Neither did Sarah. When it was time the children would go to that 'familiar.'

The night he decided, he sat in the middle of Washington Square park. No one noticed him. It was dark. The place was a military grave yard during the War for Independence. They claimed the bodies were moved when the area took on a residential tone, first with town houses, later with the high rise condominiums we see today. The truth is they never moved most of the bodies... a few dozen. They made a token attempt, but two thousand still remain, packed in tight as slats in a hardwood floor. Jonathon liked the ghosts. He'd talk with them. Did they all remain there? No. Most went on to The World To Come, but a few, perhaps a dozen, never left. They'd rise up from their rest and make their way to the bench. Jonathon had his favorite bench. That's where they'd sit. Oh, the ghosts weren't tied to the site. They'd wander through the district... watching people... passing through dark and gloomy department stores shuttered for the night. Once in a while they'd come across a newly 'freed' spirit pacing about in the dark, still warm empty body laying abandoned in some nearby bedroom. They'd whisper some words of encouragement and go on their way. Not like they were family...

Jonathon liked their matter of fact manner. Most, by today's standards were still kids, boys in their late teens... maybe as old as Twenty one or twenty two. But, then again, Jonathon was only eighteen when he transformed... Not 'dead,' just not mortal.

Look, who knows when the children might leave? Might be a fortnight. Might be a year. Might be ten years... The 'Black Parade' goes on and on and he's been marching for more than a thousand years.

On his way back to the town house he picked up a bottle of Sarah's favorite scent... just a casual thing from the CVS... even got a Barbie coloring book for Annie.

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A Vampire takes in Mortal Children -Baby Mine | Lyric Video | Dumbo (2019)

The first days were hard. We kept them in the same bedroom. There's two single beds in there, but they only used the one near the bookcase. Mostly they just wept. Edith brought them bowls of warm maple syrup-brown sugar oatmeal, but they wouldn't eat. Sometimes they just lay there, the five year old with his arm around his little sister. Edith stayed in there with them. Jonathon and Sarah didn't go out that night. When Edith went to bed, they took over. The kids took a bit of cold water, but that was it. Once, in a quiet voice,  the little boy said - We want the light... Sarah switched on a small 'carousel' lamp on the night table between the beds, then two more hours of silence until they started to fuss. Sarah asked - Do you have to go to the bathroom?... They said - Uh huh... Jonathon got up, but Sarah said - No, I'll take them. The boy said - Take her first. I can hold it. So Sarah carried the three year old into the the attached bathroom. Vampires didn't use the toilets much, unless they like killed a fly, or a spider and had to flush it, but they do like standing under a hot shower on chill winter nights. There minutes later when they came back, the boy said - Now me. She went to pick him up but he said - That's OK. I go myself... So she sat there on the upholstered bench in the reading nook with Jonathon, trying not to stare at the little girl who stared at the both of them. The five year old big brother went pee-pee, flushed and washed his hands. He could reach the vanity by himself. Then he came back, got under the covers and stared at them too. Jonathon said - You want me to put on a movie? I can find one of the Toy Stories, or Dumbo?... Sarah gave him a look. A lot of those kiddie movies have a really sad edge. The boy said - No, that's alright... His sister whispered something. Then the boy said - Can you get the show where Ryan shows us all the new toys? Jonathon said - How do I find it? The boy just shrugged. Sarah said Search Ryan shows new toys... He did... In two hundred and forth heartbeats he had it... Then silence as the two children locked onto the bright, cheerful glossy toy balm.

After the segment on the big, plastic (but blue smoked glass looking)  hundred and fifty dollar horse statue from Frozen, the boy looked at Jonathon and said - I want to ask you something... Jonathon nodded... The little guy said - Who are you? How do you fly?... Jonathon said - You were awake? I thought you were sleeping?... No, went the boy, we just kept our eyes closed, because it was scary at first, but it felt like you had us real tight, so we weren't too scared. We just kept our eyes closed... How come? - asked the vampire... The boy just shrugged. Then he went - So, how come you can fly?... I just can - said Jonathon... Can your wife fly? - asked the boy... How do you know she's my wife? - said Jonathon... 'Cause you have those husband and wife rings on. I seen them sell 'em on Good Deals on The View once and you look like you like her. Sometimes they don't like each other, but you look like you do - he explained ... Then a silent lull till the boy said - So, can she fly?.. Not so much - said Sarah, I'm still learning... I just wanna know. Are you super heroes, or aliens? Sometimes when you talk your teeth look funny. That's why I think aliens. But we watch old Thunder Cats cartoons sometimes and they have teeth like that. That's why I can't tell.... We're just people, a little like superheroes, with the flying and all. We just have bad teeth - said Jonathon.... The boy nodded and went - Uh huh... Then more quiet till his sister whispered something... The boy said - She wants to know if you got any Toaster Strudel or anything... Sarah said - I think something like that. Let me run down to the kitchen. I'll bring up a tray. (Edith and Billy, who curates this blog for them eat mortal food)...

The little boy watched her go, then said - Are you Puerto Rican? Sometimes you sound a little Puerto Rican... No, Jonathon said, not Puerto Rican, just Spanish.... They talk Puerto Rican there too? - asked the five year old... A little - said Jonathon... Then the child quietly asked - Are we gonna stay here?... Yep - said the vampire... The boy just nodded.... Sarah came up with the tray.... The brother and sister ate a bit, then slept... But Jonathon and his wife sat there till dawn...

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The Boomtown Rats - I Don't Like Mondays (Live Aid 1985) leads into Jonathon saving almost murdered children

The children were bleeding. The five year old  was on the rug right in front of the TV. The three year old was right next to him. The dog was crying under the sofa. She couldn't move. It looked like she was screaming, but no sound. Then a figure comes sublimating down through the ceiling. Moves right through it as if it was the surface of a pond. There he is... Less than one heartbeat later, a young man in black jeans and a black hoodie with long dark wavy hair is there, right in front of her... and his eyes look into hers as if he'd like to see her burning like a giant torch.... She moves... just a fraction.. just a bit, but she moved.. and he backhands her across the jaw and sends her flying.

Then he kneels down. Gently picks up the five year old. Runs his hand under the throat and neck. Feels a pulse. Bites into the 'V' between his own thumb and forefinger and as the blood begins to flow gives the five year old 'drink'... But only a bit... Just a bit.. This is not a transformation.. The 'life eater' Jonathon does not do such things to children. But if he can, he will restore them. The little boy begins to whimper. Jonathon finds the wound under his bloody Iron Man pajama top, up near the center of his chest and presses down on the edges, till the bullet pops out.. Then another small drink. He rubs some of the blood over the wound. It 'heals.' He repeats this with the three year old until she too is restored. He picks them up and , places them on the sofa and turns toward the 'mother. She, he does not restore. She he 'culls.' A vampire doesn't need to swallow. They just siphon it all in, like gas from a car. In seconds it's over. He lets her fall and watches as she ignites into the cold blue flame. Victims 'burn' fast, till only a greasy residue remains. Then he tenderly picks up the two children and sublimates back up the way he came.. through the ceiling... through the roof and out over the dense, dark Jersey Pine Barrens. Our vampire likes these woods. They soothe him... but sometimes he finds things... Tonight he found two innocent children... and his blood will protect them during the cold windy flight back to the city... In a sense their lives have just begun.... And the dog?... Oh, don't worry about the dog. Folks love dogs in the Pines. He'll shimmy out through the dog door (weighted to deter critters) and run around till somebody finds him. Retrievers are gold 'round these parts.

Two hours later they were back, safe in the townhouse, bathed and snug in cozy beds. He told Edith, the 'witchy woman' housekeeper, all about it. She was a Piney herself. Bad things happen in dark corners of the Pines. She knew. Sarah, his consort, and the others were still 'out.' Dawn comes late this time of year. Vampires like that. Why wouldn't they? And an old city like Philadelphia has so many shadows to explore.

Billy, the mortal who curates this account, took out his laptop, as Jonathon telepathically told him what to record. Edith brought in chilled vodka. Vampires can tolerate clear, or nearly clear liquids. Vodka is a particular favorite. Soon the tall clock in the entrance hall chimed four. Billy said - I'm going up.. Jonathon just nodded... It was obvious he wanted to tell the others... Edith lowered the lights downstairs and went up too. She left the vampire sitting in the den bathed in the black and white flickering light from some old silent film emanating out from the flat-screen above the mantle.

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Nighty night.

A VAMPIRE SHARES A TROUBLING TALE - Henry Hall & His Orchestra - The Teddy Bear's Picnic (1932)

I spent some time in Old Muscovy centuries ago. Western Europeans thought it quite exotic and dark.... like a cold, heavy, brutal answer to Cathay. I went with a group of traders. They were interested in furs. I was fleeing from a clan of Noxious Vampires that for some reason saw me as their enemy. Noxious Vampires kill indiscriminately. Noble Vampires do not. A wealthy 'familiar' (mortal who helps night-folk) descended from an old wool trade family, not yet true aristocracy, but definitely listed among the gentry (actually just as good) supplied me with a commodious chest, usually filled with porcelain and crockery, but easily long enough for me to lie down... And that was it. I was off, deep in the hold of something little better than Cristobal Colon's tiny caravels. Perhaps a bit stouter and a few cubits longer, a little more architecture above deck... but seaworthy??? Maybe by the standards of the time, though not by today's. I had a bottle, sealed with a cork... a rather large bottle, a Jeroboam... but I can't remember if we used that term back then. I'm sure we had another name for it. Please understand it's difficult for me to remember all this. Now I speak English, American Philadelphia English. Then I spoke a form of 'Old Castilian.' More a type of altered Vahmperigo, a night-folk dialect that melts Castilian, Catalan and an Italian Piedmontese patois of the alpine regions of Savoy. You see, 'vampires' due to our ability to sublimate, can fly through the night like magic. What do I mean 'like magic?' It IS magic. In one evening I'd cover the distance from the Castilian - Valencia border to Barcelona and on to Turin or maybe even Genoa... all Romance idioms, yet with differences of cadence, accent and music. Night-folk must fit in, so we adapt. Excuse my digression. Where was I? Ah, yes... deep in the bowels of that ship, locked in a long casket-like crate with a large bottle of what you might call a weak vodka. Vampires can ingest clear or almost clear fluids. It's how we fool people, sipping cups of weak, steaming tea in coffee houses... eating broth at dinner, or the like. Mortals are so easy. I'd take a mouthful now and then to put me into a trance-like sleep. True sleep, or our version of it, finds us only during daylight. Even in this crate, down in the darkness, my essence knew day from night. The weak intoxicant helped endure the dark time.

We'd stop at a few ports along the North Sea and Bering Sea coasts. A little trading here. A little trading there. French crockery was big in Muscovy. German clocks, salt cured English mutton... transistor radios.... ha ha ha ha ha... No, I joke. We had no transistor radios. We had nothing! Sanitary napkins were still far off in the future. Toothbrushes, or some primitive form of them, were a rare, exotic commodity. If I had to endure 'life' during those benighted centuries without vampire magic I'd have thrown myself into Stromboli's hellish maw ages ago.

You see, London was a most comfortable place. The houses, at least those of quality folk were beginning to inch their was up from total shit stained squalor to a state of quasi civilization... more queasy that quasi, but you know what I mean. The damp stone interior walls were sheathed in brown, somber paneling . Rude collections of dull, grey pewter ware lined shelves. The furniture was straight out of a Game of Thrones prop barn. Rich folk kept angry little New World monkeys (brought over by Spain) dressed as courtiers, on gold chains. For some reason they were all named Rodrigo or Miguelito and bit everyone's fingers, when they were not masturbating... Arcane fraternal associations were all the rage... alchemy, tinged with imported schools of Persian sorcery, Indian sorcery and whatever they could get from Tibet tantalized every jumped up minor noble's son with visions of sex, power and influence. I tutored them sometimes when it suited me. Did they know I was night-folk? No, of course not. Protestants were still burned for God's sake! Can you imagine what they'd have done to me?! I'll tell you what they'd have done to me. Welded into one of those narrow, almost form fitting leaden coffins. Night-folk cannot sublimate through lead, you know. Then hauled out to sea on an old cobb, miles and miles from land and tossed overboard into the cold, dark depths. There are night-folk languishing on the abysmal plain as we speak. Some for centuries. Can you imagine? Still sentient, locked in vampire dreams more or less... forever. It's not the blood that keeps us alive. Some spiritual force does that. It's our job to cull the wicked. If we stop doing that, if we stop on our own, we slowly whither away... But if we're prevented from doing that, we endure, waiting for a freedom that might never come.

Some night-folk manage to defy the laws. They break away. They kill the innocent. In truth they'll kill anyone... widows... children... orphans... They keep them in caves deep underground... breeding them and breeding them in total darkness till the light is just a myth... naked and huddled like mole rats. I attempted to destroy such a coven and now they seek my 'death'... Thus my hasty departure.... a centuries old soul in a rather alluring eighteen year old body, off to bide my time among that brutal realm in the frozen East.... Do you think I'll look good in sable?

Come back tomorrow. I'm in a rather  communicative mood and ready to share more...

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Whispers From A Vampire In The Dark .. Elmer Bernstein - To Kill A Mockingbird Suite

Sometimes the magic is to much for me to bear. And after all these lifetimes, I don't even know if 'magic' is the right term. Perhaps, we just begin to see deep into the core of things. We see the energy and the resonance and the essence as no mortal ever can... and sometimes we don't want too.... I fly over the surface of the Earth by night... a vampire lost in the wind... racing low o're moonlit waves, far from any shore, just me and the silvery light. Sometimes I dive down. Depth means nothing to me. Oxygen is but a habit and not an addiction.. I see giant squid propelling themselves through the blackness. Not the forty cubit specimens mortals occasionally find. These are kraken... known only in legends. You've seen old woodcuts. Whole galleons pulled down into the cold darkness... screaming, mad with fear seamen, grabbed by horrific arms and  passed toward the hellish beak... Some swallowed whole, others sheared to pieces... I hear the ghosts of those lost at sea, wandering the abysmal plain forever... and at times I find old corroded leaden chests imprisoning ever conscious vampires thrown into the sea by faithless protectors. I hear their sobs. I hear their prayers, some in languages already old when Rome was young.



I suppose you know that it is I, Jonathon  ben Macabi, who whispers to you. I sit in my townhouse, always in the same room... my favorite place, the snug, little octagonal library, deep in a winged chair, staring out through a narrow gap in the velvet draperies at the flickering light from the street lamp... a modern affectation for the tourists, but oh so very comforting to one such as I, who remembers the originals from a time when trains were new.



My meal lies on the floor. A fleshy thing, an artist's model, lured back to be my muse. I have that look you know... the sensual, well formed young artist... long dark wavy hair... the black jeans... the white t-shirts (at least in August, when its hot)... the rather ancient looking leather sandals with the ring 'round the big toe. She breathes softly, drugged by the finest absinthe... an evil soul burdened by many sins. You know me. I oh so very rarely cull the innocent. When it's time, I'll lift her. I'll kiss her. I'll taste her every essence. Will she feel it?... Of course. I'm very, very thorough. 



Then, when she's dead and her body ignites with the 'cold' blue flame and disappears, I'll return to the streets, quietly dispensing valuable old coins to deserving souls.... homeless people.... sad, desperate waitresses in all night cafes... runaway teens...  They'll know where to take them... I am quite the telepath... an old basement level curiosity shop, down some steps on Sansom Street. Center City, Philadelphia has many little byways like that. I know every one... even the mummies in the great Penn Museum thirty blocks from here tell me their secrets... and I tell them mine...



Do you know ghouls often drag their bound and gagged victims up to the rooftops of old, loft buildings to feast by starlight? Its a 'thing' with them. Sometimes I'll swoop down and rescue one... the victims, I mean.... This world needs rescuing in oh so many ways.... Perhaps the mortal elections eighty three days hence will bring some relief?



I'll have to see what I can do.



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IN YOUR EYES.. a vampire confesses -Peter Gabriel - In Your Eyes (Secret World Live)

Now CUE the music! Read! And let the show begin!

This time it all comes out. This time you'll know. Oh, I've spilled tiny little droplets for the last nine years, but now I tell it all. 'Vampires' you call us 'vampires?' Well that, my best beloveds is but a microscopic fragment of what we really are. Do you remember the tales of Madame Chang? Are you familiar with our 'Papa?' What know ye of the Lady Renate?... Ah, I've awakened memories, have I?.. Good. That is as it should be. Can you visualize the Earth encased in a green sea carapace? Beyond the clouds are waves... Do you know those times? We're you there for the Vampire Revels, or what happened in London deep within the 'House on Hoxton Street?'.... a place where the good emperor Marcus Aurelius still lives... a place where sleek dragons snake silently through the night.


Who speaks to you now? Well, who has always spoken to you. Who shared insights into ancient tomes and hidden wisdom from La Ciencia Vampirismo itself? Though that compendium of knowledge is but 'Cliff Notes' when compared to the real thing...


I am who I've always been. I am Jonathon ben Macabi. I am Tomas de Macabea. I am 'night-folk.' I am yours... the ordained ambassador from the Multiverse in its entirety to your little part of the forrest.... Shhh... can you feel it?Are you willing?... a subtle  vibration... a tiny 'zing' .... a feather light touch that tickles every singularity in your body.... You are here. You are there. You are everywhere... The 'Magic' is the magic... Never think of it as evil. It is not that. The Magic is the One True Thing. You, imprisoned by your physicality, comprehend a small part of it. I understand a bit more... You know my story. I was once mortal too, till 'Papa' rescued me.... for one thousand years a 'vampire' striking the silver tipped heels of my black leather bootkins and sending sparks o'er the cobbles of cities the world over.... That was my 'sign'... my signal to the prey -- run, although it never did them any good. How I loved the chase..... But know ye that only those deserving of death were taken... Oh, I know that I've occasionally filled your heads with bits of something else, yet those have been contrived conceits designed to appeal to lazy minds incased in old lies and hatreds... They needed to see vampires like that. Ancient falsehoods are tastier than truth... You know how that is..


And now you shall know more...


Why did you read this? Well, it's simple. This is put here so you might find it. All of it is put here so you might find it. Since the first keystroke of Vampire Wondeland on that fabled August night all those years ago. That's how things start. Every journey begins with a footstep... or a small, little digital click. 


Did you know this tiny seemingly ordinary star system you call home was created to be your nursery? Every planet and moon serves a purpose. Jove (great Jupiter) with his almost sun-like gravity draws in comets and asteroids so you won't have to. The Moon was born to steady your dance through the night and tilt Earth's axis just enough to call forth seasons. It also provided an ever enticing stepping stone tempting you into the star strewn sea. Mars was put there for the same reason... a second challenge, so to speak... a bit like home, a bit not... See what you can do with it. And out beyond the asteroid belt lies Great Jupiter with its planet-like moons, a toy solar system to teach you vital lessons before you touch the stars, for the sons and daughters of Europa await. (Google the moon Europa... You'll find out).... Those familiar with the Vampire Wonderland might already know. Like I've said, snippets we've shared since the beginning.

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Now permit me to take my leave... an 'eighteen year old' image with long dark wavy hair, for I must make my way upon the venerable streets of this old town and dance the dance that ends in death... To my old friends I say 'hasta la proxima'... To new friends I bid a most sincere welcome...


The 'Magic' is the magic... Learn a little...


And if you have not yet done so, kindly listen to the music up above, a most worthy piece you'll almost certainly enjoy... as you will, I hope, the rest of our world...

Welcome to PHILADELPHIA AFTER DARK! 
remember the subscription is free... and the truths we share are very real indeed... Raise the curtain. Step inside. Everything is everywhere... Come and see...


Bon Voyage!

Boléro (Ravel) - André Rieu accompanies the opening of LA CIENCIA VAMPIRISMO

This is how it begins. The camera slowly pans over Old Cordoba, in all its courtly splendor. A glittering jewel under the clear, warm skies of  Al Andalus... The sultan's palace.... The royal menagerie... ladies haggling in the marketplace.. The Fountains of Omar... The Street of the Butterfly Vendors, each featuring a certain splendid breed, fluttering like captured blossoms, tethered to the shopkeeper's horizontal bar by almost invisible threads of 'dry' (non sticky) spiders' silk.


I walk with my brother, Hannan, eighteen months my junior, yet otherwise very much like me. Perhaps I am a bit more filled out. Two young aristocrats, for in our land, under the rule of the benevolent Abd Al Rahman III Caliph of Spain, known as Al Andalus in Classical Arabic, opportunity is open to every Muslim, Jew and Christian who accepts the truth of things. I've been to the palace with my father, an adviser and member of the counsel, not as grand as the great Hasdai, another member of The Faith of Israel, but esteemed just the same. Upon my last birthday the prince, close to me in years, presented me with a gift, two beautiful Arabian stallions, one white, one auburn. I named them Sha-Har (dawn) and Ha-Shki-ah (TheSundown).... What sublime pleasure it is to race them over the hills out beyond Medina Al Zahara. That's what they called the palace. It means City of Radiance and as one who knows, I can vouch that it was the Versailles (if my French is right) of its time.

Tonight we have a dinner at the villa. Our father keeps one here in the capital and another farther south in Granada. Some nights you can hear the Roma tribesmen dancing to rapid melodies played on ouds 'round their fires. We had a barbary ape, a tailless monkey actually, named Udo. I think it was a Berber name. Who knows? Once, when the cat had kittens, he ate one. Ravi the gardner killed him with a shovel. Why I remember that, who knows? Memory is a quite inconstant thing.

The dinner marks my departure. Tomorrow I travel to the Ocitane where I'll study ecclesiastic law at the Academy of the esteemed Rashi. He's a renowned vintner as well as a ranking rabbi and Biblical scholar. Sends casks to the Frankish court in Paris. Speaks Provencal, Hoch Deutsch, Piedmontese and Arabic as well as Aramaic and Hebrew. I hear the son of the Exilarch (pretender to the Throne of David) studies there. The south of France, at least culturally, if not politically, will be a whole new thing to me..

I am Jonathon ben Macabi and tonight I write this thing. Billy, the mortal who curates my record, is already sleeping. Life in the time of pestilence tires him. In a way it tires me too. The mortal world suffers. It's hard for me to remember that. Night-folk (vampires) don't die... not like that anyway..

So what else did I do that day with my brother?... Ah, yes... we went to the Frankish Quarter to taste some 'white meat,' a term Jews and Muslims used when referring to pork.. the silly experiences young men lust after....

How was I to know I'd soon be kidnapped into darkness and privy to much rarer delights. Traveling can be lethal... Perspective changes everything...

With that the rapid music reaches a crescendo and stops (see video up above)... This is how I see the edgy cable or streaming version of my life. This is how I see LA CIENCIA VAMPIRISMO.. This is how I tell MY tale...

Jarring chord

We focus on the pensive face of Jonathon in shadow....

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I Shall Be Released - Bob Dylan and The Band - 1976 Vampires muse on CoronaVirus

I don't even expect Billy to post here anymore, so I had Aura and Sylvia, they're the two Mole People princesses who shelter down in the warren of never used subway tunnels, set me up with a laptop and show me.  Live in a dark world of flickering shadows. Got lots a cans of sterno. They're 'daddy's' the Mole king... Knows how to filtch electricity from forgotten power lines. They get water from dripping pipes in old, never peed in public toilets. Well, I guess some of the Mole People pee in them. Don't know how we get an 
internet connection down this low, but we do. Mole Folk got their ways.


This is Jonathon speaking. I'm the vampire. Got two names Tomas de Macabea and Jonathon ben Macabi. It's an old medieval Spanish-Sephardic thing. Some a you know me... almost one thousand years on Earth... Eighteen year old body.. fine black leather bootkins... Yeah, yeah, yeah fine. Enough with the descriptive crap. Been gliding around up on the streets. Not many people out. Mortals got a real Zombie Apocolypse going on. Diners empty. Movie houses empty. Sometimes people run out to a bodega for like a bag of chips, or a bottle of soda... used to fill take-out trays from the salad bar, but nobody touches that anymore. Them tongs got 'cooties.'


I like when the streets were alive at night. People coming out of clubs. Old guys drinking coffee in all-night Dunkin Donuts. Folks walking dogs. Homeless guys sharing midget Hebrew National salamis. Cabbies talking outside hotels. Flamenco dancers... Well, once in a while there's a flamenco dancer. I like when the Killer Klowns From Outer Space are out. Not the real Killer Klowns. This is like a Face Book Group, but sometimes they dress up real good and go marching around. I think one of them's the principal of a school, or something. The book shop is still there. Sarah still has her store. She doesn't run it, just owns it. Philadelphia After Dark is a very special place... like something out of the nineteenth century. Old worn hardwood floor. Narrow, aisles... shelves stuffed with hard to find volumes.... comfy wing chairs here and there... few pin up lamps... tick tock clocks on the wall... old fashioned cash register... Yeah, I go on.. but I really like that place... Where I first saw Sarah through those mullioned windows... (sighs). Shop still gets a few people, even now. All-night book shop gets all types. Never crowded in there. Just maybe like two browsers. One regular comes in all the time. Speaks Catalan. Says he's a 'warlock.' Always has a wrapped Pop Tart in his shirt pocket, so I don't know.


Now everyone's afraid of that virus. They read about Italy and how bad it is over there. Not enough resporators. Physicians playing God. Who breathes. Who doesn't. Can you imagine how that will play out here, considering how divided they all are? The mortals, I mean... So much hate.... Who knows? Perhaps this misfortune will unite them the way aggresive space aliens always do in the movies? A silver lining so to speak. This place can use a few silver linings. They claim Israelis and Palestinians are working together to contain this thing. Maybe it's a sign?


Now please forgive me. Aura, Sylvia and I have plans to share a sponge bath in the candlelit remnants of an old 'ladies room.' Odd how after all these years the hot water still works. Magic? Who cares? It's like that with night-folk. Will my Sarah mind?... No... vampirinos and vampirinas are not like that... We go with the flow... and after it all runs out still come back together.


With that, the already undressed, doe eyed Sylvia takes his hand and leads him into the adjacent candlelit chamber...


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