2025 has turned out to be among the most consequential—and best—years of my life. When looking back at it now, as it approaches its end, I see it as the year that I—at last—set aside the ambiguity of my writing aspirations, and finally did the damn thing. I wrote a book, A Vantage of Darkness , without knowing what the hell I was doing. And let me tell you without sarcasm, what a joy it is do things in such a way—to learn by failing. I’m sure there’s a more elegant term for s

In every enlisted barracks across the Marine Corps, there exists a weekly holiday called Field Day, an event that consists of each Marine...

In late April of this year, I wrote an article for Veterans Life Magazine  in which I explored volunteerism as a means of recreation...

The sun had long retired by the time we pulled into the sequestered parking lot and stepped inside [insert name of local haunt] to see...

I couldn’t tell you exactly when it hit me, but it hasn’t left me since. I guess its fitting that the exactness here is amiss, as clocks...

Painting by Tyler Shrake https://www.instagram.com/p/BaFzkULFmsm/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link The bricks about me have taken to becoming...

The rain, at first a delicate honey trickle illuminated by the suns descending gaze, grew in its boldness and soon became a steady and...

You know the movie “One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest”? Yea, the one with Jack Nicholson in the nut house. Well, the movie was actually...

A man lies on his deathbed, and in his existential agony, longs desperately for the days when he was young, full of vitality, energy, and...

In 2011, a funny little idea popped into my head, burrowed deep into the same grey matter that writes these very words, grabbed the yoke,...

"What's the most beautiful place that you've ever visited?" It's a somewhat cliche question without much ribbon. It's also a question...

“A Long Way Past the Past” by Fleet Foxes played upon the speakers and leaked out the open windows as Tacitus found himself cruising out...

"Darla pulled the back door open and was smacked by a wall of noise and the unmistakable scent of weed and sweat. “The tell-tale smell of...

“She keeps staring at ya, pal,’ said Shaemus in a cautionary tone.  Max awoke from the daydream of the now departed silence. He looked up...

The following is an excerpt from my upcoming novel, "A Vantage of Darkness". To read more, contact Nathaniel at ShrakeWrites@gmail.com ...

Plants that we take responsibility for. Dictionaries. Road rage. Grade school valentines. The wind rustling the hair of a street cat. The...

Chapter 1: Knight of Pentacles ( Studying / No sleep / stress ) 1 - Floating 18 - 55mm Night [Fade in from black] [White noise is all...

What you come to love in others is what you know to be good in you. And what you see and enjoy in nature is what you know to be you as...

Chapters of life peak out like missing teeth When I was a tortured youth I began collecting a journal of (mostly) terrible poems, songs,...