'Secrets' (2024) is a pen and ink study and a bit of a reflective exercise for me at the time and as I redid the piece recently in a different medium (coming up!)

#art #artist #inkdrawing #drawing #creative #piercing #piercings #anatomy #sapphicart #queerart #transart #gayart #queerartist #transartist #bearwizzard #artastherapy #traumaart #tender

"Let Me Talk" is a sketchbook drawing I made while at my old desk job in 2025. The piece speaks on both social, cultural, and self-censorship.

#bearwizzard #weirdart #creatures #creatureart #dog #canine #dogart #furry #furryart #fursona #selfinsert #ventart #smallartist #originalart #indieartist #illustration #feral #feralart #cozycreepy #traumaart #artastherapy

Guard Cat (2022) an old market drawing of my cat, Sasha. More about the piece on the next slide->

#drawing #art #artist #creative #art #ventart #weirdart #illustration #originalart #indieart #indieartist #smallartist #artastherapy #expressivearts #mentalhealthart #traumaart #creaturecomforts

There was once two dolls that played gleefully in a field of endless spring. One, with a porcelain face cracked from countless falls, and the other, with jade eyes that sparkled and hair the color of warm copper. They were inseparable, bound by a shared history of whispered secrets and silent tears, for even in the most pleasant places, dangers lurk in the night. Sometimes, pleasant places are themselves deceptive of the threats that are unseen but present all the same.

The porcelain doll, though fragile, had always tried to shield the other from the harshness of the world. It stood guard against the things that went bump when there was no light, offering comfort and protection to its little companion, as the caretakers couldn’t be trusted to take care of their creations.

But one cold day, as the year waned and the season’s chill deepened, a malevolent beast which fed upon the essence of innocence entered their sanctuary, and the porcelain doll, despite its best efforts, could do nothing but watch in horror as the beast inflicted unspeakable pain on its beloved companion, using her for its own twisted ends.

The guilt and helplessness weighed heavily on the porcelain doll. Its purpose was to protect, to keep safe, to watch over, yet It blamed itself for not being strong enough, for not stopping the insidious machinations of that heartless and ever so cruel beast, for failing to protect the one it loved most. The other doll, now scarred and distant, was taken away, while the porcelain doll was abandoned by hope, forsaken and left alone in a dusty and derelict attic, clinging to memories of a simpler time when they frolicked in fields of eternal spring.

Years passed, and the porcelain doll remained in the attic, its cracks growing deeper with each passing day. It longed for the return of its companion, for the chance to make things right. But the world outside had moved on, and the other doll had been forced into a new home, far from the fields and the painful memories that now tainted that most wonderful place.

The doll tried to fill the void with dark arcane spells and rituals, potions and elixirs that it learned to create from the old tomes likewise abandoned in that dark place, hoping to dull the pain and regrets, to forget its worst failure, but the memories remained, etched into its very being, saturating the cracks of its marred form. More and more, the attic became a prison, a place where the doll was trapped by its own guilt and self-blame.

Bad dolls must always punish themselves, especially when no one knows how awful of a thing they are.

Every year, as the days grew shorter and the air grew colder, the porcelain doll would remember the making day of its lost companion. It would celebrate in its own way, lighting a candle in an attempt to stave off the darkest shadows in that horrible prison where it was left alone, whispering silent pleas for forgiveness. But the pain never truly went away, and the doll continued to struggle with the weight of its failings. It truly was a bad doll and wasn’t worth a chance of and for redemption.

Even worse than the solitude was the betrayal. The caretakers, the ones it called family, turned their backs on it, accusing it of the very horrors it had fought so hard to prevent. They shunned it, mistrusted it, and kept it away from the other creations, as if it were tainted by association. The doll, once a guardian, was now an outcast.

And so, the doll found itself utterly alone, condemned to the attic of forgotten things. It watched as the seasons changed through the cracked, dust-covered window that barely afforded a view of the outside world, where once it belonged. The world outside moved on without it, the laughter of the other creations and the love of the caretakers now just a distant memory.

The porcelain doll tried to distract itself, diving deeper into the arcane rituals and potions that it hoped would bring some semblance of peace. It whispered incantations into the cold, empty air, mixing elixirs in the faint hope they would mend its damaged clockwork heart. But no matter how many spells it cast on itself or potions it consumed, the cracks remained, and the void within grew darker.

The attic, now as familiar to it as the pain of its greatest failing, was now a labyrinth of shadows and echoes of what once was. The doll wandered aimlessly among the forgotten relics, its movements slow and deliberate, as if each step was a reminder of its own brokenness. It traced the lines of its own fractures, counting the cracks as a way to measure the passage of time, the depth of its despair.

And yet, it continued to hope, albeit faintly. Hope that one day, it might find redemption, to rekindle its purpose, to find a meaning to all the agony and turmoil within itself.

Eventually, it forced itself out of the attic where it was abandoned and forgotten, venturing back out into the world of which it was no part of anymore. Once, it saw its companion, but only long enough to reignite the cold flames of the doll’s loss and sorrow.

Eventually, it would be trusted bit by bit around the other creations, as the caretakers slowly came to realize that the doll wasn’t tainted as the beast was, however by this time the doll already understood that it might be a part of the world, yet still apart from the world.

And so it wandered, hoping still to find meaning, the key to releasing it from its own self-imposed punishing guilt and agony, hoping that it would one day be reunited with its companion, yet aware of the cold truth of the reality it existed in.

Did the doll ever find what it was looking for? Maybe…but then again maybe not.

A score of decades isn’t always enough to fix the disrepair of such fragile things.

Most likely this one will never truly find what it's looking for. Redemption is for heroes, and this one knows that there are no heroes in this tale. The whispers it sometimes hears from its companion from afar, from a different world altogether, sometimes soothes the pain of slipping gears and damaged clockwork mechanisms, but it's not the same as mending.

Not all stories have a happy ending, and not all stories are finished. For this one, it can only continue chasing the illusion of being whole while knowing it will never be repaired.

The cracks run too deep, the fractures becoming more and more noticeable, even if this one has become very good at masking the damage from all but the most discerning eye. In the end, if there truly is an end, failings are its greatest accomplishments.

Now the caretakers have scattered, the other creations are becoming creators themselves, even the companion, and all this one has to show for anything is a weathered and damaged carapace that looks like what it’s supposed to, a good, full, complete doll, but it knows…it knows the truth.

In this world, completion is a lie, progress is for the hopeful, and hope is a cruel jest played by fate on those who dare to dream of such things as redemption. In the darkest shadows where unreparably damaged things wander, healing is an ever-illusive phantom, a tantalizing illusion that mocks the broken with promises of absolution. But the truth is, every step towards the illusion of becoming whole is marred by the cracks of what was lost, a relentless reminder that some wounds are meant to fester, not heal.

#EmptySpaces #Dollpost #TraumaQueer #ChildrenOfTheVoid #TraumaArt #PainAsArt
#microfic

“I’ll never forget you…”

These were the words that bounced around the dark void within its hollow head, behind those eyes so blue and clear for years.

It clung to the reverberating echoes of those words like a life raft, even long after the voice that spoke them moved on. To what, it didn’t entirely know. All the wretched thing new was that those words had to be true, right?

Promises made are promises kept. That’s what it needed to believe, because anything else was a betrayal to the memory of the voice and those four simple words.

“I’ll never forget you…”

But time is cruel and unforgiving, especially to the sentimental.

And so the doll waited.

Long and empty years became decades that lasted for centuries, yet the doll waited for the voice to remember it, to remember that it existed, still waiting, still yearning to be picked up and held, reminded that the voice still cared.

Promises made are promises kept. It had to remember this, to make existing long enough to hear the voice one more time its purpose.

A doll without purpose is disposable. Purpose is meaning, and to the doll, meaning had to be to exist, to remain, to wait for the voice to come back.

But as time went on, the doll began to feel a stirring within itself in the places where gears moved, where clockwork components gave it its unlife.

“I’ll never forget you…”

Promises made are promises kept.

But it was forgotten, wasn’t it? It had waited, and waited, and waited, but nothing ever came of the waiting.

The promises made were promises not kept.

As the stirring within itself continued, it began to understand the true depths of loneliness that comes with abandonment.

“I’ll never forget you…”

“I’ll never forget…”

The memory of that voice began to take on a new meaning. Once it was a source of comfort, an anchor keeping it tied to this reality, but now the reality was warped, twisted into something bitter and cruel.

“I’ll never…”

“I’ll never come back!”

Suddenly, it knew. It knew and it understood.

Connections are impermanent. One can wait to be remembered only for so long, even a doll. But when a doll realizes that its purpose is meaningless, the doll also comes to understand that itself is likewise meaningless.

It knew what the stirring within itself was. It was those gears and cogs slipping, wavering, winding down, mirroring its will to continue to be in a world where it was so clearly unremembered, unwanted.

It knew it had been forgotten.

“Hello?” The miserable thing called out as it felt the gears ticking away slower and slower.

But there was no reply. It had learned to stay silent, to be still all the years it had been waiting, but now, as it was fading, it had tried one last time to be heard, to be remembered, only for its voice to echo back at itself, much like the reverberating words in that space within its head that now gave it no comfort.

“Did…did that one forget?”

It tried to move, but moving only made the degradation within itself quicken.

Poor doll. Only now does it know better. Only now does it know that promises made aren’t always kept, that its purpose, its meaning had no value, that it was always destined to exist in this place where the memories chipped away at its finish, both within and without, that it was of no value, no concern to the speaker.

“That one did forget this one…doll is…broken. Doll needs…”

What did it need? To be remembered? Even if it was remembered, would it even matter? It had been so long and the hour was far past late. The doll was broken, defective, much like the promises made but never kept.

Its ball joints creaked ominously as it tried once more to move, however the ticking that signaled its unlife was so faint now.

What had it done to end up forgotten, to end up meaningless with no purpose or value? Had it ever done something wrong? Had it been a…bad doll?

The ticking continued to grow more and more faint, until in its last moments, it uttered its last.

“This one…is sorry…”

And as the echoes of its voice reverberated back to it, it heard the voice in its head one last time. It clung to the voice, even knowing it didn’t mean anything now, much like the doll that was now completely faded.

“I’ll…never…forget…you…”

…CRASH…

#Dollpost #EmptySpaces #ChildrenOfTheVoid #TraumaArt #Microfic #Abandonment

The blood may not flow from this one anymore, but the scars, the loving remains of the relationship between flesh and steal still throbs, aching for the eventual release of life sustaining crimson that will never come again.

It's a thing of glass and gears now. All clockwork motion, unable to bleed for pleasure. Sometimes it regrets this, but other times it finds pleasure in removing its components and crushing them slowly between its porcelain fingers just to watch them shatter into little motes of glitter that drift into nothingness on a breeze it can’t feel anymore.

Still, it misses the pain, misses the feel of the knife slowly inching through flesh, the balancing act of life and death.
Pulling itself apart gear by gear lacks the same satisfying release that an unstable mind with a razor in hand gets from damaging itself just to feel something, anything that resembles life, but it's still better than nothing.

#Dollpost #EmptySpaces #ChildrenOfTheVoid #TraumaArt

The witch always took the most pleasure in getting the dolls to damage themselves.

When she found the girl, desperate for a home and love and to be valued, she knew it would be so easy to make the thing hers.

And it was easy.

Of course, the doll-to-be resisted at first, they always resist in the beginning.

But when she made the choice to take that fragile thing into her home and life and make it hers, she knew that she could break it of that pesky urge to be its own person. After all, it wasn’t ever a person to begin with.

Every meal she fed the girl was made with just enough love to hide the toxic taste of the poisons she was polluting her with. Not difficult at all because that little thing was so hungry, so starved for love and effection. It never asked about the peculiar taste hidden in those finely crafted and well-tailored to preference meals. Give just enough of something that is starved for what they want and they’ll never question

With each feeding of love and poison, the girl became more and more not a girl, until the signs of the impending dollification became apparent.

Her once soft skin became glossier, harder, less supple and more akin to the texture of porcelain. Her hair remained but her eyes, once so full of life and yearning for love now grew faded and lifeless, just as empty as she was inside her changing form.

“My joints,” the girl would complain in between those meals with their love and toxins, “They don’t look right. And my skin…What is happening to me?”

“Hush now, my Precious,” the witch would say. “Everything is as it should be. There is nothing to fear. You only think you’re changing, but I see you for what you really are; MINE. My most precious one.”

And on and on the dollification went. Each day, each passing week and month and season and year, more and more the girl became what she was supposed to be in the witch’s eyes. A thing, a puppet, an extention of the witch’s will, the sum of the witch’s vision. And it learned to stop questioning the changes. The Witch told it that it was fine, so surely it must be, right?

Soon the doll didn’t have to be fed those meals with the love and the poisons for it sought the poisons directly. The doll craved the love in those meals, and after a while it associated that extra chalkier taste with the love it craved so much.

At night, the witch would lie awake in her bed, smiling and listening to the sounds of those porcelain feet clattering down the hall and to her stores of potion ingredients where she kept the poisons she gave the thing to strip it of its sence of identity. Soon it would be time.

And the time did come at last for the doll to be given its purpose.

As the witch and the doll sat in a dimly lit room one evening, the witch passed the doll a hammer as she smiled with insincere effection. “Take this, my dear, and smash yourself with it.”

“But, why?” The doll asked.

“Because you will always be able to fix whatever damage is done unto you, especially that made by your own hand.”

And without any hesitation and with a smile of barely contained glee for making the witch happy was the very thing that sustained the doll, it raised the hammer and brought it down hard on its arm.

Porcelain shattered as the doll cried out in agony.

“It hurts,” the doll cried.

“I know, but it’s alright. I will show you how to fix yourself, make everything new again. You would like that, wouldn’t you, my Precious?”

The doll nodded in acquiescence. It wasn’t the doll’s place to ever judge or question what it was told to do.

And with that, the doll’s purpose was sealed; Made to be broken so that it could fix itself again.

But what the witch wouldn’t say was how every time the doll broke and was fixed, it couldn’t ever completely erase the damage and scars left behind. And as the seasons stretched on, the doll became more and more patchwork, its once beautiful glass surfaces that it once feared now becoming marred and chipped, the cracks under its coding of paint growing more and more visible.

But the doll never questioned. The doll’s purpose was to be broken and fixed, following the whims of its creator, eager, always eager to please.

Good dolls don’t question, they don’t ask why because they aren’t meant to think in terms like that. Good dolls remain subservient until the day they are finally flung away and replaced by newer and less damaged playthings.

And as the seasons stretched on, the girl who forgot that she had once been a girl continued hammering away at herself, stopping only when the damage was too extensive for it to continue. Once fixed again, it would take up its hammer and go right back to work, fulfilling its purpose with every shattering blow as the witch watched on.

Soon though, the witch noticed how far gone the poor little thing was, and with that she set about to finding a new plaything to make in her vision.

When the doll realized that it was going to be replaced, it ask, “But hasn’t this one done everything it was asked to do? Hasn’t it served its purpose? Hasn’t this one been made in the manner you meant for it?”

“Yes, but you see,” the witch began. “You’re too broken to carry on as you are. Your paint keeps chipping off and getting smashed into the carpet, the fragments of yourself that you’re not able to put back in place just…Too much to clean up daily. It is time for you to be set free.”

Of course the doll didn’t question. Even in its last moments with the witch, it never questioned, never saw how the witch had created this situation herself, guiding the little doll to this final unavoidable moment.

And the day came that the doll couldn’t pick up its hammer anymore. And on this day, the witch promised to take the doll somewhere where the little misguided thing might be fixed, remade anew, given a new lease on it’s unlife, but it was not meant to be.

As the old doll was cast aside and forgotten, the new doll that the witch had been creating in her last dolls image never asked about what happened to its sister, or why it sometimes detected the taste of the smell the old doll gave off every time it sat to eat those most delicious meals made with love and a hint of something…More.

Was that some sort of new seasoning? No matter, it was loved. It loved making the witch happy, for the witch created it for the witch’s satisfaction.

Besides, it’s not a doll’s place to ever judge or question. Asking why is just not something that good dolls do.

#EmptySpaces #Dollposting #ChildrenOfTheVoid #Microfiction #TraumaArt