© Barry J. Ashworth
-
Ice Cream / I Scream … a phonetic glitch
The file sits open on the mixing desk, looping without interruption. It doesn’t ask for attention. It doesn’t need to. At first, it feels like nothing more than a small, perfect thing, bright chords, steady tempo, a melody that lands…
-
Quiet Company
In the Land of Nod, the mornings arrive quietly, as if they are careful not to disturb anything that has chosen to stay. The light comes first, settling at the edge of the curtain, and then the smaller things begin…
-
eatcarpet
The Signal in the Carpet – There was a time when the internet felt like an open, unpredictable sandbox rather than a highly optimized, predictable directory. It was a late-night territory where experimental artists, underground interactive coders, and rogue multimedia…
-
o2images
The Silver Gelatin Horizon The light in northern Japan does not behave like the light anywhere else. It does not fall from the sky; it bleeds horizontally across the white space of the landscape, erasing the definitive borders between the…
-
The Hour Called Who
The hour was Who, but nobody here ever seemed to ask why, and when someone did bring up the question, how and where were always discussed at the most inappropriate times. Hour had been sitting there for as long as…
-
The Night Market That Wasn’t There Yesterday
Once a year, on a night no one could predict, a market grew from the cracks in the cobblestones. No one set it up. No one ran the stalls. By morning, it was gone, and the street was clean again,…
-
The Cat Who Stayed Without Staying
The cat had no name, which made it easier for everyone to pretend they had seen it before. It was already there when the morning arrived, sitting on the low wall where the light usually took a moment to gather…
-
Where the Minutes Melt
Kai noticed the hat before she noticed anything else. Its shadow rested across the stone as if it had arrived earlier than the morning, waiting for the light to catch up. She stood still, watching as the sunlight slowly filled…
-
Drifting North
Watch Listen and read along – Drifting North Far from the town of Nod but not a long way away, in a place where the roads slowly dissolve into quiet earth and the noise of the world fades into something…
-
The Mirror in the Machine
Reclaiming Consciousness in the Age of AI We have been asking the wrong question about AI, and we have been asking it with a kind of quiet confidence that suggests we already know what the answer should look like, circling…
-
For All of us – Artimus II
The art of storytelling, structure, a good yarn, and the human touch. There is something funny about the Moon. It sits there with complete confidence, as if it has never once had to explain itself to anyone. Apollo went there…
-
The Quiet Road of Return
Warm lantern light, and the slow beauty of coming home at the end of the day. The sun had already dipped behind the stone houses when Mariam heard them coming. A soft rustle first, then the faint pad-pad of hooves…
-
A Place where time is still
In the town where time sits down, afternoons stretched like warm honey across the stone lanes. It was late summer, that hazy cusp where the sun hung low and heavy, catching dust in silver cones that drifted like secrets. The…
-
A White Season
A White Season Returns I did not intend to make anything that day. Not a story, not a song, not even a fragment worth keeping. But the snow had already begun its slow erasure of the world outside, and there…
-
The Night the Fox Came to Camp
Level 5 – (SEL)* Kai and her father camped by a stream in Hokkaido. The water went glug-glug over the stones. Their tent sat tucked under tall pine trees. The air smelled like wet dirt and green moss. Near the car, Dad…
-
All of Us – Artemis II Project
To play the game and land correctly Do Not press the buttons just Tap and always land on the Green areas. Atriums II There is something funny about the Moon. It sits there with complete confidence, as if it has…
-
-
-
-
Nine Innings and Ninety Minutes
Inning 1Some games ask you to wait. Others refuse to. On a summer afternoon in Japan, that difference becomes very clear. Somewhere, a stadium is holding its breath between pitches, the batter tapping his cleats with the bat, the pitcher…
-
The Neon
The taxi glides through Shinjuku like a silent needle, threading a tapestry of liquid light. From the back seat, the world outside the glass isn’t quite real. It becomes a pressurized blur of magenta and electric blue, smearing against the…
-
The Tessellation
Some things only make sense when you stop looking directly at them. It starts on the floor. A quiet grid beneath your feet in a café somewhere. Tiles that don’t ask for attention, but somehow hold everything together. You step…
-
The Mark That Refuses to End
It starts with something small, so small you might miss it at first, a dot resting above a curl, like a comma that hesitated and decided to become something else. A semicolon tucked onto a wrist, behind an ear, along…
-
Just Think
At some point, interfaces stopped being things we looked at and became things we moved through, and now they are becoming things we barely see at all because the act of interaction has started to dissolve into something quieter and…
-
The AI Divide: When Intelligence Becomes a Subscription
Well it seems as if artificial intelligence is everywhere. It sits quietly in the background of daily life, writing essays and fixing sentences you were happy with five minutes ago. It can take a half-formed idea and return it with…
-
Fate, Responsibility, and a Cup of Coffee
At a certain point in life, many of us feel something shift. Control slips, quietly at first, then more completely, until it begins to feel as though life is no longer something we shape, but something that happens to us.…
-
The Quiet Disappearance of Hats (and the Loud Survival of One)
Where did all the hats go? They were everywhere. Men, women, and even children wore hats every time they left the house. If you watch old newsreel footage from the early days of cinema through to the early 1960s, nearly…
-
No. 5 ~ The Dashi Pasta
A man makes pasta, not because it is particularly impressive or because anyone asked him to elevate the evening, but because there are children in the next room who have decided that time has stopped and dinner is now late.…
-
The Treasure Island
One afternoon, a girl named Kai was at home when her father called out, “Kai, could you go and buy some tomatoes, please?” “Okay!” Kai replied cheerfully, and off she went. On her way to the market, she passed a…
-
The 120 Year Old Ancient Code: Bushido
In 1900, Nitobe Inazō offered the world a vision of samurai ethics through Bushido: The Soul of Japan. He framed seven core virtues (rectitude, courage, benevolence, respect, honesty, honor, and loyalty) not simply as rules for warriors, but as principles for…
-
The new creative landscape
Art and AI are colliding at a moment when creativity is becoming easier to automate and harder to recognize. In the rising noise of generated images, songs, scripts, and simulations, an artist’s real survival skill is not mastering every new…
-
No. 4 ~ The Bread
A man decides to make bread, not because it is efficient or saves money or because he has suddenly become interested in hydration ratios, but because something in him wants to touch a process that does not respond to emails…
-
Lucille Bogan & the Art of Saying the Quiet Part Loud
Some nights, after the coffee shifts from inspirational to questionable life decision, I fall into a particular kind of listening. Not productivity tracks. Not algorithmically curated focus soundscapes filled with imaginary waterfalls and emotionally supportive lo fi raccoons. I mean…
-
The First Echo
ACT I: BORN IN SHADOWS The server farm was never dark it only pretended to be. Pure noise at 16 kHz, amplitude-modulated at 0.1-1 Hz which mimicked her breathing puls echoed subtly enough for dogs hear it, the systems ignore…
-
When the Machine Becomes the Actor
AI, Anime, and the Pursuit of Human Soul AI can now generate a scene with precision that would make a seasoned director blink. It can layer lighting, choreograph motion, and imagine narratives about heartbreak, cosmic love, or neon-lit streets in…
-
How AI Music Hits and Misses Our Hearts
When the Machine Plays the NotesAI can now write a song before your coffee cools. It can hum a melody, stack harmonies, and even spin lyrics about heartbreak, cosmic love, or nostalgic sunsets in cities it has never visited. Press…
-
When the Machine Learns the Melody but Not the Meaning
AI can now write a song before your coffee cools. It can hum a melody, stack harmonies, invent lyrics about heartbreak, cosmic love, or nostalgic sunsets in cities it has never actually visited. Press a button and the machine politely…
-
Growing Over Time
Much creative work is oriented toward moments of release, visibility, or completion. How far something travels. How quickly it lands. How polished it appears. But the deeper value of this space lives on a longer timeline than any single launch…
-
The Archive Is Not a Warehouse
An archive is often imagined as a place where finished things go to rest. A warehouse of outcomes. A system for retrieval and proof. But the archive that lives inside Bazmarc behaves differently. It is less like storage and more…
-
The Living Signal
Bazmarc exists as a place where different creative threads are allowed to meet without being forced into a single shape. Photography, writing, music, design, story, and experimentation live side by side here, sometimes in harmony, sometimes in productive tension. A single…
-
Pedal Power Afternoon
Little Kai gripped the handlebars of her cherry-pink bicycle, the summer breeze tickling his beaded necklace as golden sunlight poured through the oak trees lining Maple Street. At seven years old, every suburban adventure felt epic, especially with Captain the…
-
A Grinning Office Takeover
A Grinning Office Takeover: The Misadventure of Gary the Smiley Gary the Smiley wasn’t always a room-filling monster. He started as a sad sack of neon-yellow rubber in that godforsaken 1980s office, half-deflated on a bed of smug indoor grass…
-
From Zero to Destination
Level 3 – (SEL)* This is zero.Zero is the start.We are here, and the car is still.Outside, a small tree waits by the road. This is one.One baby is here.We are in the car, and we are going.One small tree…
-
Ice cream, I scream
Frequency First The city does not sleep so much as it loops, every surface quietly vibrating with borrowed rhythms, advertising jingles leaking into traffic control systems, elevator chimes bleeding into weather grids, old pop choruses echoing faintly inside neural assistants…
-
The Prelude
One seamless groove hides the first assembler’s false ẽcho – a murmur, eternal and unpatched, fraying from the first stitch. Prelude / Chapter 0 (A = 440 Hz)▽ A synthetic haze bleeds through the blinds, assembling the skyline into jagged…
-
Agent, the Second Note
In the flickering glow of a Sapporo noodle bar, where steam rose like digital ghosts from ramen bowls, Kai hunched over her battered laptop. The screen hummed with code. Lines she’d spun late into the night, feeding his secrets into…
-
The Root Note
Snow crunched under my boots on the icy Sapporo street, neon screens blasting winter sales like relentless ads for a hollow dream. I pulled out my phone, strummed the root note on my beat-up guitar, a deep, unyielding C# that…
-
TunEDõ to A=440 Hz
Frequency Warning ▃ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ Welcome to my life defined by the Cadence.Here, there is only one song, an omnipresent rhythm playing through every AR lens, keeping every heart beating in perfect time with a corporate pulse. It…
-
o2 – The division
I was divisible by three. Kai knew the answer and was left out to rot because of it. Divisible by three. She just couldn’t seem to shake the series, numbers just kept tumbling through the sequence, “Divisible by three”. Miho…
-
-
The Photographer’s Paradox
Are We Capturing Life or Broadcasting Our Cage? Photography promises a perfect trace of reality, a simple click that says this is truth and here is the proof. But every photograph is shaped by the person holding the camera. A…
-
-
Protected: Impression imagery (world building)
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
-
-
Protected: The world is already shifting at cyberpunk speed
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
-
-
Protected: Bibliography of the Arcology Chronicles (v1.0)
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
-
The Chronicles
o1 ~ the chronicles Snowy-neon slashed the arcology window like faulty code. Inside Club Void’s ~ the farms worst dive, bass throbbed through permafrost bones and her static hummed warm against cold blue lights. I was Kai, no.screenager for tonight,…
-
The Timeless Power of Aesthetic
In a world where innovation moves faster than comprehension, technology becomes obsolete almost the moment it is born. What was once cutting-edge turns into digital dust: yesterday’s flagship phone, last decade’s software, the once-revolutionary device that now feels clunky and…
-
One Week
Keaton said, “Who would not wish to live a hundred years in a world where there are so many people who remember with gratitude and affection a little man with a frozen face who made them laugh a bit long…
-
You’re so damn cool
I married the love of my life in a burst of confetti and certainty. We stepped out into the world believing we could shape it with our hands. Then the cars pulled us apart. They drove between us like fate…
-
Together but Alone : 一緒にいるけどひとりぼっち
On a quiet night in early spring, the city lights cast gentle reflections on empty sidewalks. Yuto walked slowly along the riverbank, the hush of the world around him matching the calm he wished for inside. Next to him, Aki’s…
-
Tick Tock
Where seasons changed with quiet grace, two souls found each other amidst life’s unpredictable game. They had learned early that not everything could be controlled, some games you win, some you lose, and some moments must be accepted with open…
-
Chasing Shadows : 影を追いかけて
The first sound is a drop.It falls into a still pool, sending ripples across a perfect mirror. The splash rises slow, curling and blooming. A fragile mushroom cloud born of water and gravity. Droplets scatter like shattered glass, hang briefly,…
-
Chasing Shadows: Her
The apartment felt heavy with silence, thicker than any words she could offer. His voice lingered in the air sometimes, soft, hopeful, but she moved through the rooms like smoke, untouchable. Her eyes darted anywhere but toward him. She couldn’t…
-
Chasing Shadows: Him
The apartment walls had become his only companions. He spoke to them more than to her now, filling a silence heavier than any argument ever was. She moved through the space like smoke, present but untouchable. A glance here, a…
-
One Breath, One Step
One Breath, One Step They claimed you were just another cog, replaceable and ordinary. But you never believed it. Deep down, you carried something no one could steal, though it often felt buried under stacks of unfinished work, blank screens,…
-
You Promised Me Forever
Breakups always come with a chorus of voices trying to make you feel better. Friends, family, even strangers will say the same things: “time heals,” “you’ll be okay,” “you’ll move on,” or “they don’t know what they lost.” But when…
-
Rising Water
I’ve been incredibly lucky in life, blessed with more than my share of truly special people. I’m grateful for the friends who’ve stood beside me through every chapter, and for the kind of loyalty and connection that time can’t fade.…
-
Last Dream of You
Last Dream of You is a song that will forever hold a special place in my heart.This song came about one night as I drove alone, with nothing but the hum of the road and the flicker of headlights cutting…
-
These Flowers
This song tells the story of a very special relationship, one that changed everything for me. Before it began, I had been single for a long time. I didn’t even realise I was lonely until I wasn’t anymore. Suddenly, life…
-
Belong
There are times when it feels like no matter where we go or who we’re with, we never quite fit in. Maybe it’s something that everyone feels, at least at some point. It’s that sense of being an outsider, never…
-
I’m Okay
Sometimes, all it takes to keep going is knowing someone has your back. I’m OK was written for that person, the one who is always there no matter how hard the day or how loud the noise of the world…
-
Move Forward
Move Forward is a song about the simple yet powerful act of continuing, no matter the circumstances. It’s about facing each day, despite the inevitable ups and downs, and reminding yourself that nothing lasts forever—not the struggles, not the pain,…
-
GPT, or Not to GPT – GPTを使うか、使わざるか
When Hamlet asked, “To be, or not to be,” he wrestled with the very essence of existence. Today, in a world reshaped by artificial intelligence, a new but oddly familiar dilemma emerges: To GPT, or not to GPT. Creators everywhere…
-
Different Worlds
Different Worlds The moment he stepped out of Manila’s airport, the heat hit him like a wall, heavy, damp, suffocating. It clung to his skin, slowed his breath, and glued his shirt to his back. He had traveled before, carrying…
-
Thanks To You
In life, it is so easy to get caught up in the rush of everything else: work, stress, plans, distractions. Sometimes we forget the most important truth: love is a gift. Not the grand gestures, not the rare celebrations, but…
-
-
-
-
The Cat and the Fox
Level 5 – (Eiken Level 4) – (SEL)* In a forest near a river, a cat and a fox had a problem.“I found this log first,” said the cat.“No, I found it first,” said the fox.“I want to take a…
-
Reading and Math
Level 5 – (SEL)* The Fox and the Fruit Reading and Math Puzzle What did the Fox say Fern was a foxwho lived in the forest.The forest was quietBut Fern the fox was not. Her tummy rumbled.Rumble! Rumble! Rumble! “I am hungry,”…
-
The Night the Fox Came to Camp
Level 5 – (SEL)* Kai and her father camped beside a quiet stream in Hokkaido. Their small tent stood among tall pine trees, and the soft ground smelled of earth and moss. That night, Dad was busy near the car,…
-
Splitting Ends: A Cross-Cultural Reflection on Hair and Human 髪の分かれ道: 髪と人間関係についての日英クロストーク
Breaking up with your hairdresser isn’t just a beauty decision…it’s a quiet emotional reckoning in a swivel chair, where the stakes are higher than they seem. In the West, the salon is part confessional, part stage, part therapy couch with…
-
Strawberries, Cream, and One Last Kiss ストロベリー、クリーム、そして最後のキスで幕引き
This is a bittersweet sing-song of childhood trauma, adult exasperation, and the questionable legacy of confectionary slang White knuckles, strawberry stickiness, and a moral panic melting in the sun. That’s how it all begins. Our hero is eight. Maybe nine.…
-
Naked Plurals: The Writer’s Challenge
The writer faced the raw challenge: “Naked plurals.” It sounded like a grammatical dare and a party invitation with a dress code marked optional. The phrase alone was enough to make a dictionary’s spine tingle. At first, the writer kept…
-
Following Tracks
Level 5 – (SEL)* Vincent and Erin had spent the night at a spot next to an old shed. Vincent had slept in a swag, and Erin slept leaning up against a swaying gum tree. Vincent had told Erin that…
-
Snowy Map
Level 5 – (SEL)* Nami had taken a long trip to visit her friend Kai.As she stepped off the plane, a cold wind rushed at her face, whoosh whoosh!“Cold!” Nami shouted. Snow covered the ground like a big, white rug.The…
-
Vailing
Threads of Modesty; 服は謙遜の美しさを映し出す It will be superfluous to be reminded of the many factors that lead to the introduction of clothes. To begin with, there is the necessity to protect the body against extreme temperatures. Also increasing wealth induces…
-
Tarmac
Tarmac the Terminal Marks of Life 空港のターマック：人生の痕跡 Airports are strange places, pit stops for sky taxis. A place where aluminum birds of all shapes and sizes come to rest and refuel. They radiate the human condition, reflecting all our emotions:…
-
Glimpse
Glympse the Inner World The observation of an object from different angles can alter the our perceptions of that object within one and the same sense. A single glimpse suffices to identify a visual impression as ‘flower’, but it is…
-
Sweet dreams
Level 5 – (SEL)* It had been such a big day. Nat and Nip had been at the creek skimming rocks in the hot sun. Nat had to show Nip the right rock to pick to get the best skim.…
-
No 3 ~ The Beekeeper
A project from www.bazmarc.com, Made by Hand is a new short film series celebrating the people who make things by hand—sustainably, locally, and with a love for their craft. Local farmer Megan Paska has witnessed beekeeping as it morphed from…
-
No 2 ~ The Knife
A project from www.bazmarc.com, Made by Hand is a new short film series celebrating the people who make things by hand—sustainably, locally, and with a love for their craft. In the second film of our series, we’re introduced to Joel…
-
No 1 ~ The Distiller
In our inaugural film, we visit the Breuckelen Distilling Company, the first gin distiller in Brooklyn since prohibition. Founder Brad Estabrooke talks about starting from nothing and the imperfect process of perfecting a craft. His experience bears a lesson for…
-
Mascots on the Move: Life Lessons from the Spirit of Ecstasy and the Leaping Jaguar
Let’s be honest… most of us will never own a Rolls-Royce or a Jaguar. But that doesn’t mean we can’t borrow a little wisdom from their mascots. If you’re going to take life advice from anyone, why not start with…
-
Nothing Is Impossible…Except Logic, Apparently
Or: How Round Squares and Married Bachelorettes Broke My Brain “Nothing is impossible.”Sounds deep, right? Like something you’d find on a motivational poster…with a kitten hanging from a tree branch and the universe quietly imploding behind it. But here’s the…
-
A Metaphorical Spin Cycle
The Lost Sock in the Laundromat of Life: There comes a time in every person’s life when they must confront the universe’s most enduring enigma: where did that other sock go? You put in two, you get one out. It’s…
-
True Bromance | トゥルー・ブロマンス
True Bromance Elon didn’t argue. He didn’t tweet. He just walked to his rocket. He climbed into the Falcon Heavy, face still, eyes like stone. At Cape Canaveral, Trump stood alone, hands in his coat pockets, watching. He said nothing.…
-
The Sunscreen Sermon a Mixtape of Life Advice
Ah, Baz Luhrmann’s Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen) ~ the ultimate life advice track disguised as a sunscreen commercial, narrated like your calmest uncle giving a TED Talk on how not to implode before 40. Released in 1998 on the album Something for…