Nyctous

a person walking in the middle of a street

Nyctous

adj.
feeling quietly overjoyed to be the only one awake in the middle of the night—sitting alone with a laptop and a cup of tea or strolling down the center line of an abandoned street—taking in the world like an empty theater between productions, stripped down to a simple black box, open to be whatever you want it to be.

From Nyctocereus, a genus of cactus that blooms only at night. Pronounced “nik-tuhs.”

O’Erpine

a person looking at a grave

Gobo

Cover image for the Gobo word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Looseleft

Cover image for the Looseleft word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Ellipsism

a hand clawing at a wall

Malotype

Cover image for the Malotype word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Mogging Folly

a person sitting on a bench