←Recommendations of Ghost Vacuum (a (Zoom) monologue)

An incredibly moving and beautifully written monologue to the one you love who isn't there. Excellent.

“Though there are still a few lights here and there. A few steady flickers.”

Wow does Scott Sickles have an incredible way with words. “Ghost Vacuum” is an achingly beautiful piece. Much—so much—can be said about its prose. Sickles’ Christopher has a fascinating brain that moves from noting how the lack of lights in North Korea at night appears as a “missing space” to him to musing about his lover’s jawline. Detail is one of this short piece’s many strong points. Respect, Mr. Sickles. You have a new fan.

An elegy on loneliness, longing, regret and hope. I cried on the first reading, and on the second, too. Lovely! Highly recommended.

Sickles for me is one of those rare monologue writers that make the poetic seem so natural and never contrived bc it comes from a place of truly felt emotion. Another stunning monologue. I am in awe of every monologue he writes.

I should remember that Scott Sickles has the capacity to amaze me, but actually, it's nice to have it happen anew because it makes the experience all the more breathtaking and thrilling. In this monologue his character is relaying a message to an absent friend as they share a view from space, seeing the world from orbit in real time and relating true feelings that are not limited by the distance or the electrons and pixels that come between them. Enrapturing and comforting, yes, but tinged with longing that makes it all the more beautiful.