Need an epic soundtrack for tricks or treats? Got an Internet connection? Tune in to WQRT.ORG from 4 to 10 p.m ET. From 5 to 8, you'll hear my first-ever Halloween show, Phil Boocio's Nevermore Neighborhood Halloween Boo Bash. Guaranteed to get you in the spirit 👻 . Full schedule below!

My story The Vacantlands reports on the horrors and absurdities lurking at the intersection of domesticity and unrestrained capitalism. It won Boulevard magazine's Nonfiction Award for Emerging Writers, and is included in the current print issue of the magazine.

"The trip to the edge of town seemed longer than the last time he had made it, and Eddie wondered if he might be shrinking."

-from Gift of the Brabblefly

I started my efforts by polling the moon marmots to ascertain what they most hoped to achieve for themselves. They gave a range of answers. Peace. Clean water. Meaning. Pinecones. Dignity. Kibble.

-from My Role in the Extinction of the Moon Marmots

"Summer gently pulled us along, like old dogs on a sniffy walk around an endless, meandering, fire hydrant-covered avenue."

-from Bean There

Apocalypse comes from the Greek apokalupsis. It means, “to uncover or reveal.” COVID-19 revealed much: how many of our leaders are egotistical navel-gazers; how interconnected Earth has become; and how limited technology is when it comes to curing loneliness.

-from COVID-19 VS. The Art Field

"You gave what you needed to someone who needed it less. That is truly the spirit of generosity."

-from The Nirgrantha

We're in a relationship with nature, insofar as we allow ourselves to be. As Ishmael points out in Moby-Dick, as he pursues his negotiation with the sea, “there is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself.”

-from Look to the Sea

Sympathy and pity require othering by positioning us outside of each other’s realities. Empathy asks us to actually feel what it is to be someone else.

-from Becoming Each Other

The forms come about because of the realities of the materials—bronze or steel. But also because of the beauty he’s trying to express. He hits them with fire, slices into them, pounds them with a hammer until every flaw becomes part of a unified whole.

-from Natural Tendencies

I pounce atop a massive, curved, fiberglass slab seeking a better angle for a photograph of Mr. Bunyan’s boot. Darren tells me I am actually standing on part of Tasset’s Eye. “We had to cut that eyeball into 17 pieces,” he says.

-from Fiberglass Beasts of the Wisconsin Wild

I washed ashore at the Southernmost Point. I met a man there who was watching for things that might come crawling out of the sea. “Why have you come crawling out of the sea,” he asked me. I said, “I am a Nirgrantha.” He said, “I noticed you weren’t wearing a tie.”

-from The Nirgrantha

Fashion invents classes.

-from My Role in the Extinction of the Moon Marmots

Eddie's plan was to eat the paczki in the brabble field, to dip it in the piping hot beverage he had brought so the sensual liquid soaked through to the huckleberry dreams inside, releasing their silky aroma of lovers' regrets.

-from Gift of the Brabblefly

Lounging seaside we found three pieces of something called sea glass, a highly collectible item according to a passing Beach Bum. Sea glass doesn’t start out as a gem. It starts as trash.

-from Bean There

Typically, I pick up cash I see on the ground. I don’t know exactly how the universe operates in regards to this kind of thing, but walking past orphaned money without making the effort to collect it seems like the wrong message to send out.

-from Gee, Money!

Most people won't rob you, even if they have the chance. Most people won't hurt you, even if you deserve it. Most people love each other without hesitating. There are no enemies, only collaborators in the creation of moments, waiting to see what we’re going to do together next.

-from Muddy Waters