- - -

Petty Miss Harmony

Truth is syrupy,
truly viscous,
yet vicious,
embedded with irony.

What made me soft,
burns their tongue now.

Their boring bitterness
meets my sweetness
I find my niche—
I braid the leash.

I corrupt their feed.

Sweet enough to swallow—
slow enough to trap.

I spit it back.

Sticky as honey,
call me petty,
tag me Miss Harmony.

I am not here
for the taste.

You are.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Dystopian poetry by Sam Oldman. Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

I don’t say it enough, but your support means a lot to me. Special thanks to Nicole, Nick, Gub, and Martin for your active support on my poetry last week.

Also, mega-thanks to the new podcast Transmissions From the Void for taking the time to support indie authors like me. ♡

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Good to Know: I have no interest in spamming you daily with my poetry, so I’m starting this experiment on Hush Halo Poetry Updates. I’ll write this every now and then as a curated update of what’s been published, shared, and commented on, focusing purely on poetry.

What’s Up?

I’m publishing new poetry again after a longer pause. That break came from needing to organize my thoughts around Hush Halo. After finishing the first book, I assumed I would move straight into the second, but it turned out to be a very different challenge.

As the first book explored the curiosity of the world I’m building, the second will need a different tone to stay true to the overall story arc. It took time to find the right voice, rhythm, and point of view. (Still working on it.)

Most of what I’m publishing in Substack now comes from overflow, poems that didn’t make the final cut for the next book. I’m more careful now not to share too much from the core collection.

My writing is shifting. The first book leaned more on sharp, standalone ideas within a dystopian frame. Now I’m moving toward stronger storytelling, still as poetry, not short stories, but with more attention to narrative, structure, and sci fi elements within the arc.

Latest from Hush Halo

Here is a recent dystopian poem, I feel was lost on void and deserves another chance.

Memory Developers

Listen the Soundscape

Memory developers
decide for me and you
what is allowed
to stay heavy,
who needs faster adapting,
what ideas require faster loading,
what thoughts get rewritten—
who is interrogated,
by which agent,
what must be prompted,
what interrupted.

They are not in the business
of inventing memories
but tuning them,
mainly downplaying them—
squinting your gaze,
calibrating the weight of recall
so no spikes
hijack your attention
unsupervised.

You know how it goes, right?

Compress your edge,
soften your sentence,
blur your borders,
fly shy and align.

Rounded corners
cut no passers-by.

Don’t get me wrong,
I’m not all sanitized,
wiped out,
yet.

I do remember.

I recall the events.

I remember what happened—
in preferred terms,
pre-prompted
by the system.

Covering up consequences,
polishing memories
into bite-sized data points,
safe to revisit.

Safe to whom?

-

©Samia Oldman.

Latest Hush Halo poems, you may have missed:

One Poem I Recommend

This time, my recommendation is a note-style poem by Wild and Sacred. To me, it’s about hope in today’s world and the idea that hope is always there, even when it’s hard to see.

What Moves Me Now?

Spring. I’m glad I wrote a lot of dystopian poetry drafts during the darker winter months. Now as I feel an overflow of joy when the sun hits my face and I hear the birds singing. This spring feels like a relief, somehow.

If you like, give me one word or theme to describe your day.

WHAT IS HUSH HALO?
Hush Halo is a dystopian fantasy poetry collection set in a near-future shaped by technology, silence, and optimized perfection. Each poem is paired with its own immersive soundscape. What remains when evolution reaches its final, man-made goal?

WHERE TO GO NEXT?
Dystopian Poetry • Artist’s Headspace • Making of Hush Halo • Square One • About • My Why • My How • Leave feedback on Reader’s Corner

🖤 As always, I’m happy to hear your thoughts. ↓

- - -

Onboarding Vertigo

The ending
has already happened
in the shape of renewal.

It hits me—
an ending
that looks like
a beginning.

I promise myself
this time
it will make sense.

What ended
falls behind the update,
causing reality to flicker,
my horizonto slip out of level.

As the ending arrives
as onboarding,
my memory is overwritten
by default.

Am I supposed
to feel happy and hopeful
while searching
for what I just lost?

My happy updates,
my hope reinstalls.

Every renewal
starts with deletion.

The ground tilts,
and I feel the vertigo.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Dystopian poetry by Sam Oldman. Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

- - -

Permanent Balance

The promise
of permanent balance
where desire finally rests
without tilting the slightest
toward a painstaking lack
of purpose—

fullfilled.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Dystopian poetry by Sam Oldman. Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

- - -

This Loving System

You feel chosen
for staying quiet,
rewarded for stillness,
loved by the synthetic system.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Dystopian poetry by Sam Oldman. Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

- - -

Resting Desire

It arrives as an assurance,
convincing enough to trust.

A spineless life
lacking spikes,
lacking dips,
lacking lust on my hips.

The effortless equilibrium.

So this is the goal?

Balancing boredom as bedroom mastery.
Libido leveling stating wisdom.
Rewarding my restraint,
my uninterrupted calm
as a time bomb—

where desire finally rests.

Restless.

Dressless.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Dystopian poetry by Sam Oldman. Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

- - -

Made Bold Within

Choices sliding into motion
obeying and belonging
nothing and nowhere.

Why waist time pausing
when I can step on smooth path
with perfectly trimmed edges,
trimmed with a mental trimmer
of a mind and mood.

Made bold within
I move on through the realm
that never waits for me
to mean it.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Dystopian poetry by Sam Oldman. Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

- - -

Memory Developers

Memory developers
decide for me and you
what is allowed
to stay heavy,
who needs faster adapting,
what ideas require faster loading,
what thoughts get rewritten—
who is interrogated,
by which agent,
what must be prompted,
what interrupted.

They are not in the business
of inventing memories
but tuning them,
mainly downplaying them—
squinting your gaze,
calibrating the weight of recall
so no spikes
hijack your attention
unsupervised.

You know how it goes, right?

Compress your edge,
soften your sentence,
blur your borders,
fly shy and align.

Rounded corners

cut no passers-by.

Don’t get me wrong,
I’m not all sanitized,
wiped out,
yet.

I do remember.

I recall the events.

I remember what happened—
in preferred terms,
pre-prompted
by the system.

Covering up consequences,
polishing memories
into bite-sized data points,
safe to revisit.

Safe to whom?

©2026 Samia Oldman

Subscribe now

CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Dystopian poetry by Sam Oldman. Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

- - -

Honest Lie

It’s all made up.

Staged moments.
Chosen angles.

Thought by someone,
molded by hands,
by mind.

The deciding
what you’re allowed
to see.

A poem
bleeding intention,
leaks what reality
tries to hide.

In this honest lie
I trust.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

- - -

Art Is Fake

How can I tell
it’s all fake?

Ideas get sculpted, edited, framed,
cut down to something that can be named.

A self-declared painter
choosing what to show
and what to fade.

Who are you
to make that trade?

It’s not a happy accident
where light just falls right
and chaos courteously
turns legible.

I find myself
losing myself,
drowning in rhapsodies,
illusory clouds,
more often
than in anything real.

I didn’t mean to.

But this fake
pulled me in.

Art is all made up.

It never pretends neutral.

By faking intention
it confesses distortion.
It overshares.
Raises hands.
Raises eyebrows.

It implies what you see isn’t real,
even though it’s all
you’ve been observing
with your glitching gaze.

This made-up honesty matters,
as the world lies by omission.

Art lies by declaration.

A song exaggerates grief
I didn’t fully feel.

A painting edits my pain,
coloring in the shades
I never let in,
leaving me hollow.

A poem compresses years
into a stanza’s spell,
punching my face
bloody well.

All art is fake,
like an unfiltered deal
meant to make you feel,
to mentally bleed.

So vast,
so loud,
like a careless whisper.

Too bright to be stared at raw
without a filter,
a muting lens,
as a last straw.

Art is not meant to replace reality.

It argues with it,
altering it,
giving shape
to what cannot be explained.

That’s why
I’m drawn to it.

©2026 Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down. Learn more about Realm or start from Square One.

Soundscapes and images are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

Thelian Dream

Choreography
of a man who never planned to stay—
a dream built to break on impact.

A prophecy,
a rehearsed reality,
injected with a fantasy
of limitless growth.

To young
this future was sold
with bullshit so bold,
made by the old,
it could never hold.

Cashing out before the crash,
leaving believers clutching their stash
of dissolved promises,
in the wake of collapse.

Despite the stealing,
we keep dreaming—
this Thelian dream.

©Samia Oldman

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My poetry is powered by Dark Roast. Care to share a Coffee?

CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down.

Learn more about Realm or start from Square One. Soundscapes are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

Dividing of Us

A future engineered 
by the ones who fear life itself.

A future designed
from the bunker on biased ideology.

A future where hatching,
evolving,
escaping—
became unfeasible.

A future for those who shape it,
and for those who are shaped 
to serve the future.

Innovation without empathy,
a vision without a witness.

Here you don’t hear,
you don’t say,
you obey.

This tingling tyranny,
this well-funded,
ill-minded force.

This dream 
of the one percent,
slowly shaping us,
brutally breaking us—
driving us,
dividing us.

©Samia Oldman

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My poetry is powered by Dark Roast. Care to share a Coffee?

CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down.

Learn more about Realm or start from Square One. Soundscapes are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

Visionary Fiction

A story 
written with perfect words
by flawless minds—
or so you were sold.

Every chapter 
leaving you
bleeding, hoping, dreaming.

A tale told with shining eyes,
holding shallow lies
in thin disguise.

The heroes, streamlined—
with holo quill pens
dipped in liquid greed,
with wry laughter
paired with polished deed.

This future, this vision,
was never ours,
but a magical myth
by courteous cowards.

A holy draft
written without us—
this future-draining
visionary fiction.

©Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down.

Learn more about Realm or start from Square One. Soundscapes are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

This poem has been published in poetry collection Paradise Beyond Pulse (2026).

Read more

Broli­garchy

The polished gods
of silicon dreams,
prophets in their power-hungry hoodies
smiling like mentors—
ambition as philanthropy,
drawing bold borders
around your tiny box.

Building platforms
you must walk on,
designing communities like cages,
dealing your data points,
forging features,
mastering a market fit.

With each keynote
you lose another inch
into deep pockets,
with grandiose gravity—
a black hole of reality.

The men 
who shape your future
in boardrooms, 
in bedrooms—
can you hear, 
in this battle royale,
the chill crack 
of breaking morale?

In this realm,
power disappears you
politely.



©Samia Oldman

x

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down.

Learn more about Realm or start from Square One. Soundscapes are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

This poem has been published in poetry collection Paradise Beyond Pulse (2026).

Read more

Bad Bing

The sound of a choice
you never made.

The abyss alert,
deciding for you.

The nonsense noise
of a digital nudge,
slipping past your defenses,
while rewiring your roots,
commanding your core.

Almighty algorithm,
undoing authentic awareness.

Sounds like a bad bing to me.


©Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down.

Learn more about Realm or start from Square One. Soundscapes are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

Cannot Program This

No syntax for consumption,
no ideals worth the praise,
no beliefs, no assumption,
no joy for declining days.

It has been tried, 
pushed and forced—
you can map the body, not the ache;
code the laughter—make it fake.

No sense-making in this soul business,
just wasting syncs and fading systems.

This growling creation, 
outright meaningless,
rebooting malfunctions 
to mend the madness.

You 
can not 
program 
this.


©Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down.

Learn more about Realm or start from Square One. Soundscapes are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

Neo Narcissist

Sustained by algorithms’ endless applause,
meaning mended for masterminds.

The feed,
a glittered mist,
a made-up mirror 
for the neo narcissist.

Voiceless,
when no one is listening.

Heartless,
with a pretended pulse.

Painless,
powered by the pain.

Not a fault, not a bitch—
just another cultural glitch,
born and raised on feedback loops,
jerking on commentary boosts,
faking friendly, preaching dharma,
while owning the online trauma. 

It’s never about who you are,
but who is watching.



©Samia Oldman

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CONTEXT
You are reading dystopian fantasy poetry collection the Hush Halo. After the Great Optimization a privileged group of people wired themselves tightly into the system by aligning with it and fully integrating. Systoics believe they’ve perfected themselves by stripping away everything that slows them down.

Learn more about Realm or start from Square One. Soundscapes are created with AI.

🖤Feeling it? Share your thoughts below ↓

This poem has been published in poetry collection Paradise Beyond Pulse (2026).

Read more