Power Outage
That mid summer night, come what may, when we learnt to survive!
My blind sight brought me to a “spare-me -your -kindness,”plight. It was summer of 2020 and a surge in COVID 🦠 deaths were on the rise.
Little did I premonish nor realize that our family was being launched 🚀 into a darkness with a strange kindov anatomic-caricatural- travesty looming over our heads.
O my gosh! The peculiarities emerged rather stark while we faced blackouts due to power outages.
Put together night fall was equally frightening!
An eerie calm surrounded the neighborhood.
It felt, as if , some random wickedness had been tossed around and ‘twas taking over our home 🏡!
Not to mention, our feelings were equally getting trapped over unending horrors of some odd-old sights and we found ourselves braving thro’ that spooky night! Out of nowhere a barn owl 🦉 perched on our window 🪟 and kept staring at us without a blink of an eye.
All of sudden a fearful stormy rain came with a terrible force. Everything in the garden blew things around . A little bird was too far from its nest to get in. Lightening struck and the bird was blown off in the wind. About a few seconds later it landed half dead on our front porch. Without any delay we took our torches out and headed our to rescue the bird
The fallen bird barely wriggled and its wings hung limp. It had taken a great deal of pain.
For a second, beaming through our flashlights it 👀 looked at us —as though—asking for help. As we lay looking at the little one , trying to nurse it to recovery, another strange thing was witnessed by us. Some five birds as victims of poor weather lay there breathless.
It felt like a mass burial site.
It was more like a ghoulish crematorium tripping beside us in the streets.
Well, so it seemed while my angled vision played peek-a- boo 🫣with strangeness lingering throughout that night .. Unknowingly, our family crept to each other’s fright ! And, onto that pitch darkness , topping it all , was this pin drop silence in the neighborhood. This was all building up to a scene of demonic possession.
To the gross eye 👁 it was a miasma dipping in a mysterious guise !
I literally, for once, thought 💭 that night had come to a halt —somewhere amidst some ice 🧊age, and all the darkness’s were making their doomsday call. All around, the gushing winds started making running screams and it all felt ominous —like a sure guide towards other worldly flight.
Additionally, the nightmarish effects were painting even more sepulchral sights,as if, booking our sacrilege in the quiet.
Sooner or later we were to find ourselves succumbing to such a plight. Apparently the transformer powering our home had tripped. A thunderstorm blew the transformer and short circuiting led to a fire. Safety risks extended beyond immediate vicinity but somehow the rain put off the fire. We decided to stay put through the night —admittedly, not to face any more obscurity in the dark. From dawn to bedtime that mid summer night was like a dreamy homestead nightmare.
Throughput it was—more so, like zombies 👻 heading for their feasts, cursing us to stage war -parties as they followed us around like swathe upon trails. And anywhere—within 2inches to 💯 miles I was practically ready for anything!
With what looked like a pandemic 😷 —full on a strike —we were almost at the verge of being hitch hiked as emissaries while I continued to squint through the corners of my eyes 👀!
Somewhere, In the middle of the night I started sneezing and my heavy head started hurting very badly. Full blown symptoms of COVID were appearing. Then I was horrified to notice every member of my family down with high fever. In just a few moments everything had turned topsy- turvy. True, it would have made no difference to nobody if that night our family had died —working against the hopeless odds— thunderstorms, transformer flares, power outage or exhaustion due to covid conditions.
Further to that, along came, the limitless nervousness as I moved boldly for the creeping hands to get me from behind. It was my pet Caroo 🐈. He was trying to snuggle next to me.
After that, I did not turn my head —this side nor that side.
Instead, I cocked the torch under my arm as the battery in it was about to die.
I know it was a mad sort of thing to do but, what were we to do when strange darkness was horribly keeping us in the quiet !
At the same time, a cold gush of air was trapping us into this mystical cloud-land with the winds blowing their own howly conceits of a very severe kind!
Through and through , the shadows and shapeshifting hues💡 in the flashlight 🔦 were making us draw closer than a tight-knitted tribe. And mostly, as a matter right, we were chanting higher rituals in full spirit—much before the night got visible in the wee bits of light cracking thro’ the dawn. There were courtesy fireflies spangling all around in our backyard. It felt like an occulted delight. Tight pressed, we lay on our pillows as these ceremonial parades melted away from sights. After that, wonder of wonders this log 🪵 wood cutting scene began. Probably that was when I must have drifted, momentarily, into REM sleeps ! It was a dream!
A time or two, visibly, a form in shadow suddenly appeared, as though, a spirited beam of light was shattering my brain 🧠, giving me a sense of what I could have be missing in that situation : a delusion !
Out there, in those wild dreams now came in a foresty feel , an act of me unbecomingly empty in the mind —so much so, out of nowhere, I found a 🪚 chainsaw stitched unto my frays, a growing 🎃 jack-o-lanterns glowing with a foot in form , through the night.
And thusly, with my imaginations on overdrive, 9 times out of 10, we knocked each other out, thinking something mysterious was lurking within sight!
So it was a total Fright Night ! And then , in the morn , it was all about the sun 🌞 rise, coming duly in order for such strangeness to subside!
Still living gently and spreading this earnest wish ... never say die!
Then when Covid ruins had spread unchecked for several days we finally got ourselves cured.
“May the devil 👿 prowl and whoop up its hymns out of sight .. O! that act of wading through the dark, uninformed, a pretty blindly random act , for something of which we did not realize, should be kept socially distanced for miles.”
I tell you, those daunting bearings, not much visible, yet one learns to understand only when one lives in the wild only to be shut in groves away from life. Away you go, stealthy Covid🥷 coming at us in a disguise 🥸 . You weren’t much in terms of reassurance, even when you tried to work out theories on our minds. To do well ,now, means , to cut the chilling gloom you tried creating on our insides ..
O ! waverly Covid hitting us on all sides, we WILL survive !
#genuflexingtothegroundinreverenceandworshiptoallthegodlinessinreach
P.S : May those growls with howls and prowls menacing life remain destroyed !
© ✍️ Madhu Goteti, July 31st, 2025
About the Creator
Madhu Goteti
The thrums in the strums and the delights in the humdrum of life have always fascinated me.
It’s that feast of reason and flow of soul; in all that I see and all that I shall behold!
I am an avid lover of art and philosophy!
Keep reading
More stories from Madhu Goteti and writers in Fiction and other communities.
Resignation
Of lately, I have been touched (suggestively,) by this growing AI movement. And, one among the many acts that I choose to do is: Resign to it! Whether I resign to it or resign from it —the truth remains —it has touched me —deeply. Got it! This is my hand 🤚🏼 to notice. At any rate, a type of “awakening,” is instituting itself on all fronts and it is claiming its obnoxious presence all over the realities that we have come to believe! A sort of make belief ( I suppose,) outside the realm of “space -time,” continuum. And quite honestly, as I try to conceive or rather perceive these upcoming realities, I see divinity in people bridled over synthetic tendencies. Also, the eminence of science coursing through our minds ( as if, with infinite fortitude,)sensitizes me towards the regenerative powers of AI. And so, the possible vision when indulged—reveals a metamorphosis—wherein, humanity might not remain as it once was. The irony of being brought up to that point signifies either a triumph or a defeat of whatever shall be left of “us,” in the true sense of our “individualities,”remaining intact. However, that might not be the total truth. Hence, I insist to express my final adieus to life while standing up—in defense against the anguish of living amidst such a revised version of me that shall —no longer harbor “me” as “me” in the future. Yes, this does sound like the “hard problem of consciousness,”tangled in different parameters. Like an illusive impulse entangling humanity everybody might be brought to a point of following an unprecedented condition, wherein—I might also turn into a floating apparition. For example .. monkey say, money do and the rest must follow to pay 💰their dues 🙈 🙉 🙊 And among such perceived realities—the theory of consciousness shall transcend new beginnings,as though, restructuring itself at minuscule levels so as to skew the truth behind mind, life and thereby living. Think of an automata anime avatar coming into existence and ruling your presence in the digital world. Still further just imagine your mind mirroring it all as though you are neuro-linked. All this might seem like an abstraction but we are not far from it. If not already! Beware! Just imagine —Turning into some superlative existent phenomena wherein reality loses its way. You and I might perish or disappear into “nothingness.” No matter what, my imagination gives up claiming to achieve any specific kind of Supra understanding that might belie such a transformative era. I refuse to give into that. And so on and so forth, there could be more to imagine when you care to listen. What if —a scientifically programmed pill is handed over to us 💊 to overcome ourselves from our own original selves; be like abilities and capabilities put together for refinement. In that moment of knowing and not knowing exactly —what and why —where would you go? Where do you think your essence shall reside. Have you ever wondered— Where will your entity exist in such a state of existence. Will such a petrification rapidly cease our creative intuition as well as the critical mind? Will life become a relic, losing its spirit and real sense?! Those are the questions literally haunting me nowadays. So with that said, I am keeping this first person “resignation,” handy. I mean just in case everything becomes preposterous to handle by me. Yes, that would feel like a dispersion from the formerly and to that effect, I would have overstayed on this planet. Certainly, that would be like breaking the habit of being me, and emancipating “self,” to the point of no originality. And to realize that authenticity c’d be misled into such a false of “self view,” seems nothing short of an eradication. It’s a prospective that might emerge from somewhere else, but certainly, not from the roots of my own being. To any such probable (impending ,) apocalyptic doom , I resign in advance ! What haunting harmonies shall ascend or descend our nerves, and pendulously oscillate around many vagaries—only time can tell ! Furthermore, after slogging hard at my desk, here’s what I choose to pen 🖊️ as a parting dribble of drab. Snag, if you can ! Henceforward in the AI world, I wonder : What splendors of day and night shall specter me—I do not know. Will the future hold —one to many and many to one in an encapsulated mystery of unity to uphold common intelligence, and then, artificially applaud the myriad gods, much beyond and much above, the splendors of spiritual realms. What sort of rounded creativity w’d come of me in a muse when such a grace befalls via artificial intelligence (AI era.) To me, that all seems like an alien flippancy. Pardon me , I insist upon attaching self to my stubborn individuality and resist whatever transmutes through me in the name of artificial intelligence AI. And I know such a rationale might seem baffling to a spiritual vedantist but these are not ideas coming to any conclusion. Nobody knows about future in all surety. These are just probabilistic thoughts uncovering futuristic living —wherein—I am being precocious enough to seek permission from self to free myself from those exposed irrelevancies because such a situation might strike at my original-prolific-creativity and stop its natural flow. For in all that, my identity shall find itself artificially upended; trapped, swingling to tow and row endlessly in an amalgam of a meaningless void. At any rate this AI age makes me feel sussed 🙄. I feel staged over a contraption—much like an inflicted erasure of my original identity. The doctrine of being “differently seen,”sooner or later, will vanishing into a state of “oneness.” A loss of identity amidst promising changes flourishing over flooded mentalities. A Hegemonic-mechanized creed could emerge gradually, and thereby cast its elaborate forms to rule life in an ordered fashion. The notion of —oneness of☝️ spirit will transmute. A futuristic world where all of life c’d amass intelligence to extraordinary proportions—with the supple legacy of “individualities,” lain extinct. The genus of “homo,” itself might dissolve into what was once known of it to existence. Extinction! Yeah! Soon I will be there as well 😅And much before that sunset savage arrives fully, I am seeking my resignation from such a randomized functioning. Living to that point, as I fantasize might be like digging a hole with my own hands and sleeping in it fully circumcised. 😂 It shall be preposterous to witness the primal part of my “nature” gone and potentially, living in it,with no reason, might seem like an overstay. Such an opulence with no better end to cause, would tear me apart. I wouldn’t be me because AI would be stealing me from me. Imagine spooning your own mouth to allow AI to feed you to successfully arrive at some staged calamity. Such demonic power c’d be an offshoot of artificially contrived intelligence. What if, by any chance, it chooses to have a run away reaction. I might be half killed and find myself seeking fruition amid those confusing realities. Much like put amid the directive principles of faked falsities. And in all this, I shall miss my own original creative ingenuity.Nah baba nah 🙅! What I mean by that is : whatever value that cognition holds in retaining originality, that will be all gone. This AI era with its inventive edges, —undoubtedly, pretends to be more virtuous in form. Such new norming realities of “make beliefs,” could coax humanity into extinction. It may be noted that mankind in its journey of discovery and delight is approaching the plausibility of being unbeknownst to itself. Herein, admittedly, Darwin or Darwinian thought lies beyond the scope of this writing. As a tangent to the thought —that theory would claim none by assuming that nothing of its original course shall —finally remain. For example, the emergence of Artificial intelligence and the simultaneous rise of applied “consciousness,” staged over quantum levels of varying schemes might turn highly superlative. Subsequently, the acme of thought c’d awaken the following deep question: Could we be meeting gobbledygook systematicity, entailing us to confirm to unoriginal falsities. Where w’d a spiritualist exist in all this? With precision pushing philosophies —that far —where will divine entities or divinity reside?! The whole divinity will be pushed beyond its divine nature, formulating “Supra beings,” hovering over quantum levels of obscurities. To that point, I am reminded Schrödinger’s cat —one moment here , one moment there. Will empiricism sustain over such saber edges and pretend to have survived virtuously🙄 or will we all connect and become a generic property of some other zoned realities. Big question 🙋🏻♀️: Accordingly, will AI make centaurs of us all. I mean aren’t we reaching a point where a new era of order is contending to redefine, refine and reuse humanity and turn it into a sort of “machine bolted,” species with no reasoning of its own or perhaps, better said, our very own existence( in itself,) is being defined by varied simulations. I don’t approve of this. After the first incredulous shock given by social media age, I have awakened to many artificially contrived analogies in the name of experiential learning. Terrifying deliberations, I must say. And so, much before a meta-sized AI version of me arrives loathing in contempt over those pitiful sorrows —divinely mounted over AI platforms, I choose to pause , contemplate and resign! As a matter of fact over mind, just imagine this: our appearance and disappearance distinctively controlled, and in all that, our very own individualities—judiciously—made unreliable. That would be infernal 🔥 fire, which is likely to be worse than Russian torture. Will I be made unreal over contrived grounds of adequacies and inadequacies. This perhaps may sound like an astonishing reality to face but its not far off from not being exposed totally. Quiet enough, I won’t hiss with it, quivering to harvest such fiery pits of hell and effectively be thrilled to whisper : “O! Yea! That’s so fine! How wickedly attractive it is. There’s more to imagine in this AI world. It’s a matrix in which multifarious and multi dimensional approaches c’d reveal themselves as an intuitive enigma. This then, would illuminate or presuppose a lateral questioning about our true originality—identities. Such a stance in itself would assume a rigorous questioning. Particularly, might I say—where will be the “origins of our species?!” Everything would seem to be at the verge of emerging into a new doctrine of being “differently-alike,” or rather “seen-unseen.” A state of oneness ☝️ newly formed over a unified platforms of virtuous schemes. And consider all this as a rationale behind realistic behavior especially with respect of the preserved individuality and divine entities. That would be like cadence drawn towards a sacred shrill. All that ☝️ distinctively entangles a disturbing loss of individuality! I don’t contend to that very well. Origin of our species when taken as naturalistic is at the cusp of existential crisis! What counts to be human in all this?! Have you ever questioned that? I mean how can artificial be used for real —and for that matter of fact—affect consciousness. Conclusive 💭thoughts: Will AI control minds of humanity? Something about it feels troubling and terribly misleading. Never going cautious in the way I word it , it all seems like a Titanic Troy—legitimately tinkering our lives amid the livestreams of ironies already brought out by everyday realities. All that is surfacing for me to express in such a way that I feel like resigning from this AI world. At birth, I had signed up for a life that I w’d feel passionate about. What is this grace of artificial intelligence turning me into an automata. A contraption that’s breaking the habit of being the real me. Believe you me I have meditated 🧘♂️ 🧘🏽 🧘♀️ to that point in disbelief. There’s more to imagine — if YOU 👂 listen No assurances and insurances in such a staged life. So officially, I am stepping down. Today, however, I aspire to move towards a “new normal,” that I must scrutinize; a must for that change to come over my (age-old,) spirit. Call me a consciousness revolutionary ! The following justifies both a triumph and a defeat of whatever is left of the “real me,” in this world of make beliefs. After all, who am I to believe —this or that, with 💯 % surety ?! Influencer : a turning point stitched to the essence of my being. Incorporating the preceding experience —in words—it w’d be like casting self into a momentary conservancy! I know —some monks might call this : a point of “nothingness.” A point of mesmerizing mortuary ( seeking the eternal calm,) and arriving in such a manner as to express this : the final rapprochement of life is a make belief. Once again I stand in defense against such a living. Yes, I come from a land where think-tanks seep in the fields where microscopes 🔬 go far beyond observers keen. Imbued to me is this : to know thyself, and to see what you choose to see—out there, far beyond! Herein, the AI jury dismisses all phases of life in an hour of awakening, and apocalyptically holds a nadir of torpor over me. And hence —barely squeaked out—I wish to resign from such a living. It’s not a suicide. So please 🙏 don’t send in a squad in the name of a rescuing alibi. I promise boldly that I shall slowly perish in this composition and my soul shall ascend to vitality. And I know —no real money nor compensation c’d account for such a grace casted over me in this form of reprieve. Whatever it is, I vehemently seek reprieve. Yes! It’s an imperative to understand what a new life or a new beginning truly means—especially, in this context of the human race undergoing a major transformative change. This is an AI era, a sort of a complex form of construct, threateningly proposing to eradicate the basic luminous point of our origins. We are living at the edge of conscious revolution —heavily proposing to press- compress people on the basis of unique classifications of belongingness. The springing geopolitical crisis is silent reminder of similar grace and analogies. Just imagine —facts fixed to the gross and the opposite. A cosmic resizing —in the name of elevation. A cheering spirit that goes past and holds all in the glorification of all; a type which goes on in the name of unification and then, potentially everything shall seem STILL in sameness. Then again , just imagine —all this living —reshaping and redesigning bent over varied cultural scapes. Here is where a formless chaos can emerge. Wants and needs might take a different tilt-skew, meeting submissive over the debris of emotions. An alien environment shackling our souls amidst grossly trivialized bonds, automatically woven or superimposed from outside to make us proclaim resurrection automatically. Also imagine an outsourced spirit sealed in DNA 🧬 strands in the name of freely formed species. Therein, something shall linger. Potentially, something of living when living in it has completely GONE. The goodness gained would simulate something like: running 🏃♀️ 🏃♂️ 🏃 in streets —much like the the way life gets represented by everyone naturally —playing their own game of survival. Can we say each to his own or will it magnify towards “each to that unknown.” What legacies will stand in defense against such a anguished living. More likely, with it —the question of legitimacy of life might emerge? Something like: Who am I truly?! AI could reshape us to that extent. I wonder whether this could be a spiritual force of unification or something of anything appearing to make mankind more and more deficient. Here’s why I sign this Declaration of Independence from all directive shackles of eclipsing philosophies which is taking a pronounced turn into varied political outbursts all over the world. The above 👆 analogy points towards the formless chaos running 🏃♂️ thro’ the streets of graceful living with all quarters of gracious living gone. Here and there, a false-proof and not the “whole truth,” seemingly governs our day to day living. Hitherto, I am drawn to a different outlook, and I am preparing to rethink or redesign myself, naturally. An impulse or a force to resign from such a resurrection. Consider this more like a re-awakening overturned into a reversal. And I am not shy 🙈 to be remembered lovingly as yours truly while I end ✍️ this ☝️passage purporting me to RESIGN. Post Script : Don’t copy me. I just opened my soul to you, not my book 📖🤣 © Madhu Goteti , May 26th 2025
By Madhu Goteti Exclusive • 8 months ago
The steps to losing a child
Step One: Lose a child. Not what anyone wants to happen and nothing you can do to change it, but you can go through steps to becoming happy again. You can go through steps to loving again. You can go through steps to become a new you because after losing a child you will never be the same person you once were.
By Tabitha Hinkley4 days ago in Fiction
Where's the Glory?
In breaking news, rehabilitated Republican Senator Johnnie Johnson (Pronouns: HE, HIM, HIS) called a press conference from the Men’s room of the New Orleans Louis Armstrong International Airport, Concourse B, across from the Ignatius Reilly’s Lucky Dog stand. The Senator had just returned from a sexual reorientation rehabilitation program in Memphis, TN after being publically disgraced at a Buckee’s Truckstop restroom soliciting sex from an undercover cop three months ago. He is a founding member of the Reformed Christians for Christ, a conservative, pro-family and ex-gay advocacy group. In the spirit of being reborn, Senator Johnson invited reporters to marvel at his plans for a major remodeling of airport bathrooms.
By Cathy Schieffelin5 days ago in Humor
Comments
There are no comments for this story
Be the first to respond and start the conversation.