zeeshan89
02-02-2010, 09:33 AM
…Eclipse…
The car smelt of dead leather. There were little yellow dots on the dashboard. Thousands of little dots clustering around the speedometer. With every minute, more dots appeared. ‘Probably an infestation,’ said Mr. Pin. ‘It’s a wet country, with occasional showers almost everyday. And the crack of heat at the dawn of summer is enough to melt brains and bones. And winter—oh, my back is itching!’ Mr. Nin lifted his paw and ran it through the brown hairy neck.
The car smelt of old muslin. Those little yellow dots have spread throughout the car. You could no longer see where you were going. The steering wheel came away in the hands of Mr. Nin with a sickening squeal. One had to stop. One could not go on like this. One had to stop, even if one could go on like this. The yellow dots were ready to burst into a thousand flowers. Nin and Pin left the car in a damp ditch among rotting bodies of kittens and autumn leaves.
An old fort is a boon for fishes. At high tide, when the whole sea strains and whirls and shudders in tune to the silent music of the moon, the timid fishes come in shoals to the half-sunk fort, which is still doing its masters’ bidding though now centuries old. The dance-hall is now for all those timid fishes who are abandoned by the sea when it aches for the moon.
‘Where to spend the night?’ asked the horse. Mr. Nin sat on a huge flat stone (probably a toppled wall), his tail frozen in fear. The salty air chilled his big pink tongue. ‘Let’s stay in that old fort for the night,’ said Mr. Pin. The wind dropped abruptly. ‘Should we stay in that old fort?’ asked Mr. Pin, ‘or should we find a house? Come on…say something! Ooh, look how cold it is!’
The insides of the old fort were eaten away by the salt, and green moss flourished in every leeward nook. Pillars leant on pillars like drunkards. The roof had caved in decades ago. The magnificent arches lay on the uneven ground like gears torn out of some primordial machinery.
Behind a shattered pillar, hidden by many shadows, and surrounded by moss lay a creature wrapped in a blue coat. It was hardly bigger than a child’s raincoat, with deep pockets filled with flowers. ‘Wild flowers,’ it whispered in a terrified stutter, ‘wild flowers…I fear death, fear it like an eclipse…fear…flowers all around, red and blue and pink, and those yellow ones with large petals...petunias, roses, lotuses, asphodel, edelweiss, the mourning sunflower that follows the sun, and what…what else…my mind is going, going far away from this brazen sun…like an eclipse…and the timid lily, heavy with nectar…this air is eating me from the inside, draining me completely, until I become a shadow…though I have no regrets, none at all for I was sent into the unknown without a ticket home…nothing but the data I sent will remember who I was…these wild flowers are all that will remain to speak of mankind’s glory…nothing else will remain…to scentless death I come, full of nectar, and filled with flowers.’
Like a blue balloon with a leak, the raincoat slowly crumpled into itself. And then there was nothing left but that little raincoat. The shattered pillar will remain, and so will remain the will, the will to speak of our midnight visitor.
The night was cold but the coat kept them warm.
…z.i…
The car smelt of dead leather. There were little yellow dots on the dashboard. Thousands of little dots clustering around the speedometer. With every minute, more dots appeared. ‘Probably an infestation,’ said Mr. Pin. ‘It’s a wet country, with occasional showers almost everyday. And the crack of heat at the dawn of summer is enough to melt brains and bones. And winter—oh, my back is itching!’ Mr. Nin lifted his paw and ran it through the brown hairy neck.
The car smelt of old muslin. Those little yellow dots have spread throughout the car. You could no longer see where you were going. The steering wheel came away in the hands of Mr. Nin with a sickening squeal. One had to stop. One could not go on like this. One had to stop, even if one could go on like this. The yellow dots were ready to burst into a thousand flowers. Nin and Pin left the car in a damp ditch among rotting bodies of kittens and autumn leaves.
An old fort is a boon for fishes. At high tide, when the whole sea strains and whirls and shudders in tune to the silent music of the moon, the timid fishes come in shoals to the half-sunk fort, which is still doing its masters’ bidding though now centuries old. The dance-hall is now for all those timid fishes who are abandoned by the sea when it aches for the moon.
‘Where to spend the night?’ asked the horse. Mr. Nin sat on a huge flat stone (probably a toppled wall), his tail frozen in fear. The salty air chilled his big pink tongue. ‘Let’s stay in that old fort for the night,’ said Mr. Pin. The wind dropped abruptly. ‘Should we stay in that old fort?’ asked Mr. Pin, ‘or should we find a house? Come on…say something! Ooh, look how cold it is!’
The insides of the old fort were eaten away by the salt, and green moss flourished in every leeward nook. Pillars leant on pillars like drunkards. The roof had caved in decades ago. The magnificent arches lay on the uneven ground like gears torn out of some primordial machinery.
Behind a shattered pillar, hidden by many shadows, and surrounded by moss lay a creature wrapped in a blue coat. It was hardly bigger than a child’s raincoat, with deep pockets filled with flowers. ‘Wild flowers,’ it whispered in a terrified stutter, ‘wild flowers…I fear death, fear it like an eclipse…fear…flowers all around, red and blue and pink, and those yellow ones with large petals...petunias, roses, lotuses, asphodel, edelweiss, the mourning sunflower that follows the sun, and what…what else…my mind is going, going far away from this brazen sun…like an eclipse…and the timid lily, heavy with nectar…this air is eating me from the inside, draining me completely, until I become a shadow…though I have no regrets, none at all for I was sent into the unknown without a ticket home…nothing but the data I sent will remember who I was…these wild flowers are all that will remain to speak of mankind’s glory…nothing else will remain…to scentless death I come, full of nectar, and filled with flowers.’
Like a blue balloon with a leak, the raincoat slowly crumpled into itself. And then there was nothing left but that little raincoat. The shattered pillar will remain, and so will remain the will, the will to speak of our midnight visitor.
The night was cold but the coat kept them warm.
…z.i…