They come to her cave every day, this place she had chosen for its cool, damp solitude. They come with their wet eyes and their pleading voices and smooth, sleek bodies and say
Please.
She has never been able to deny these corporal children; they are too enviable, even in their state of permanent confusion. She would trade her centuries of wisdom for their brief lives. Who is she to deny them hope or, at the least, knowledge, in their dazzlingly short existence?
Yes.
So she makes their decisions for them, and tells some version of their futures, and fades a little with each answer.
No. Yes. No. Yes. Yes.
She has contemplated moving many times. The cave is not as cool as it once was. Her petitioners bring in their hot breath and slake their thirsts on her spring. The tears they leave behind are salty and full of too much regret. She could simply retreat into the deeper caverns, where blind fish swim in circles and the stalactites ring with whispers. But. . . she longs to be needed, even as the heat and aridity of the children shrivels her.
Please. Please.
Some of the children press her hand and thank her. Some stand still, digesting the answer she has given. Others run without another word, unable to face what she has told them, or so happy with the news that they cannot wait to be a part of that future. There are a few who stay and beg for more explanation, but she has none for them.
Yes. No. No. No.
When she is truly frail, she tells herself, there will be no more prophecy, no more answers. She will limp to the darkest corner in the remote depths and wait for the desperate to crawl to her. She will listen to their entreaties and then. . . for just one. . . she will grant her only wish that she can grant, and blow away on the wind of their contented sigh.
Please.
But this is not that time. Though she aches at night, and each new form clambering into her cave makes her wince, it is not yet time. She straightens as the child holds his hands out to her and pleads.
Yes. She loves you.
No. She loves you not.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Almost
I.
Sora stands at the window, looking out. I creep up behind her and put my hands over her eyes. She sighs and says my name in an absent-minded way, arms stiff at her sides. Letting go, I ask her what’s wrong. She turns, blinking, and jerks her chin at the sky. I look.
Something silver is falling.
II.
We stand at the window the next day. Sora has her arms folded, glaring outside with her lips tight. I lean my forehead against the glass, having cleared a circle away in the condensation so I can see.
It looks almost like rain, the whatever-it-is. Almost, but not enough. And in being so almost-but-not-enough, it’s almost more disturbing than a random liquid would be. It’s rain put together by somebody who’s never seen it. The hollows of the yard are filled with the stuff, and it’s spilling over onto the sidewalk. I ask her if it could just be mercury or something, and she gives me a moment of her glare before returning it to the view. Risking a shrug at her inflexible back, I walk to the kitchen and get a glass of water; suddenly I’m thirsty.
III.
The yard is soggy; Sora and I venture a few steps out onto it, huddled under umbrellas, before retreating to the house again. It feels nasty sloshing against our shoes, weirdly slimy and clinging. For some reason, we can’t bring ourselves to rinse our footwear, instead leaving them to languish on the back porch. I peel my socks off with the tips of my fingers, and I still feel the need to scrub my hands afterwards.
The almost-rain is still dripping, oozing, from the sky—it’s just viscous enough that I can’t call what it’s doing “falling.” Everything outside glistens from a coating of it, even the car. Sora makes several pointed remarks about how she wanted a house with a garage, but I’m too busy checking the window seams for leaks to be irritated.
IV.
Every container we own is placed under a leak now, and we’ve only managed to cover the kitchen and bedroom, sealing off rest of the house. Sora and I tip around the pots and pans as if they were landmines.
Sora sits on the bed, legs pulled close to her chest, frowning at the steady streams that have perforated our roof. We still aren’t sure how it’s getting in; wincing, I climbed onto the roof and checked for holes, some sign that it was toxic and had eaten through, but nothing. As far as I can tell, it’s simply extremely good at insinuating itself through the tiniest of spaces. She spends most of the day just glaring at the strange weather. She says that she can’t help it. I suspect it doesn’t help that we’ve been stuck in here together for a week.
We can’t bear to call it rain, or anything stemming from the word, so Sora has christened it “almost.” It’s a bit of an insult to me; she claimed that whenever I slept, I was talking, obsessing over the idea that it was almost rain, almost wet, almost alien—just almost. It does suit the stuff, though.
As far as we can tell, the almost doesn’t seem to be dangerous. It doesn’t hurt. We just can’t stand to touch it. Several times we tried to go for the car, but the first drop of the almost that fell on our skin, and we sprinted back for the shower. It’s so insidious that the most elaborate weather-proofing does no good, and we are compelled to wash, trapping us at home again. Not that I think it would matter; it seems to be everywhere.
V.
Sora’s gone. I don’t know how, or when. We’d been fighting for days, in the pettiest ways. She left my favorite book next to one of the overflowing pots of almost, so it was ruined twice. I poured a cup of it over her feet so that she had to clean. But I still would have thought she would have taken me with her.
VI.
My bathwater this morning had a silvery sheen to it.
VII.
When you get used to it, the almost is. . . well, almost like water. Tastes a bit odd. It’s almost a flavor I can identify, but not quite. Sometimes I pretend that Sora didn’t really left, that she just discovered what I did, that the almost isn’t all that bad. Perhaps she just. . . dissolved in the night. That would be good, I think.
I lift a glass to my lips and take another sip. Almost good.
Sora stands at the window, looking out. I creep up behind her and put my hands over her eyes. She sighs and says my name in an absent-minded way, arms stiff at her sides. Letting go, I ask her what’s wrong. She turns, blinking, and jerks her chin at the sky. I look.
Something silver is falling.
II.
We stand at the window the next day. Sora has her arms folded, glaring outside with her lips tight. I lean my forehead against the glass, having cleared a circle away in the condensation so I can see.
It looks almost like rain, the whatever-it-is. Almost, but not enough. And in being so almost-but-not-enough, it’s almost more disturbing than a random liquid would be. It’s rain put together by somebody who’s never seen it. The hollows of the yard are filled with the stuff, and it’s spilling over onto the sidewalk. I ask her if it could just be mercury or something, and she gives me a moment of her glare before returning it to the view. Risking a shrug at her inflexible back, I walk to the kitchen and get a glass of water; suddenly I’m thirsty.
III.
The yard is soggy; Sora and I venture a few steps out onto it, huddled under umbrellas, before retreating to the house again. It feels nasty sloshing against our shoes, weirdly slimy and clinging. For some reason, we can’t bring ourselves to rinse our footwear, instead leaving them to languish on the back porch. I peel my socks off with the tips of my fingers, and I still feel the need to scrub my hands afterwards.
The almost-rain is still dripping, oozing, from the sky—it’s just viscous enough that I can’t call what it’s doing “falling.” Everything outside glistens from a coating of it, even the car. Sora makes several pointed remarks about how she wanted a house with a garage, but I’m too busy checking the window seams for leaks to be irritated.
IV.
Every container we own is placed under a leak now, and we’ve only managed to cover the kitchen and bedroom, sealing off rest of the house. Sora and I tip around the pots and pans as if they were landmines.
Sora sits on the bed, legs pulled close to her chest, frowning at the steady streams that have perforated our roof. We still aren’t sure how it’s getting in; wincing, I climbed onto the roof and checked for holes, some sign that it was toxic and had eaten through, but nothing. As far as I can tell, it’s simply extremely good at insinuating itself through the tiniest of spaces. She spends most of the day just glaring at the strange weather. She says that she can’t help it. I suspect it doesn’t help that we’ve been stuck in here together for a week.
We can’t bear to call it rain, or anything stemming from the word, so Sora has christened it “almost.” It’s a bit of an insult to me; she claimed that whenever I slept, I was talking, obsessing over the idea that it was almost rain, almost wet, almost alien—just almost. It does suit the stuff, though.
As far as we can tell, the almost doesn’t seem to be dangerous. It doesn’t hurt. We just can’t stand to touch it. Several times we tried to go for the car, but the first drop of the almost that fell on our skin, and we sprinted back for the shower. It’s so insidious that the most elaborate weather-proofing does no good, and we are compelled to wash, trapping us at home again. Not that I think it would matter; it seems to be everywhere.
V.
Sora’s gone. I don’t know how, or when. We’d been fighting for days, in the pettiest ways. She left my favorite book next to one of the overflowing pots of almost, so it was ruined twice. I poured a cup of it over her feet so that she had to clean. But I still would have thought she would have taken me with her.
VI.
My bathwater this morning had a silvery sheen to it.
VII.
When you get used to it, the almost is. . . well, almost like water. Tastes a bit odd. It’s almost a flavor I can identify, but not quite. Sometimes I pretend that Sora didn’t really left, that she just discovered what I did, that the almost isn’t all that bad. Perhaps she just. . . dissolved in the night. That would be good, I think.
I lift a glass to my lips and take another sip. Almost good.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Undue Blues
It is not fair—
nor right—
nor good—
to cry for a spring that has not yet left,
for trees that still contain their leaves,
for flowers still asleep.
But this breezy beautiful day,
with its sun enough
to let me doze outside—
it’s breaking my heart,
because I know how soon
it plans to leave again.
nor right—
nor good—
to cry for a spring that has not yet left,
for trees that still contain their leaves,
for flowers still asleep.
But this breezy beautiful day,
with its sun enough
to let me doze outside—
it’s breaking my heart,
because I know how soon
it plans to leave again.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Pebbles--explanation
Wrote this for my mom's birthday. I admit, it ends a little cheezy, but I quite like that main bits.
Pebbles
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who liked rocks. Igneous, sedimentary, metamorphic—she liked them all. She liked them so much that she collected them. When she went to the store, she would buy quartz slides and carved obsidian. Every time she would go for a walk, she would return with pockets full of stones—river pebbles, bits of shale, and little white rocks. If it was a rock, she would try to take it home with her.
And that was the funny thing about the girl. She really did like every kind of rock, from the tiny emerald chip that had fallen out of her grandmother’s ring to the rough lumps she would find by the train tracks. She would clean and polish each one carefully and put it in its own special place on her collecting shelves.
Sometimes, people would make fun of the little girl. They told her that it didn’t make any sense to collect boring pebbles from the side of the road. They told her that she should only focus on the most exciting rocks, the shiny gems and the sleek rare minerals.
The little girl didn’t listen. She just kept collecting her rocks, no matter what kind they were, and no matter if she already had a dozen others just like it. To the little girl, each one was special.
When the little girl grew up, she became a geologist. She went all over the world, traveling from deserts to canyons to beaches, examining her beloved rocks. And when she got a little too old to kneel in cold mud, she became a geology professor. She taught each of the students about rocks, and she taught all of them to love stones as much as she did.
On the last day of class, she would give each student a hug, a rock from her now vast collection, and a little index card that said:
Just as every stone is special, so are you. Just as each rock is different, so are you. And just as each pebble is important—so are you.
And even if not all her students went on to become geologists, or even teachers, they never forgot what she said, and they remembered to love each and every rock. But most importantly, they remembered to love themselves for themselves, and that’s the best lesson of all.
And that was the funny thing about the girl. She really did like every kind of rock, from the tiny emerald chip that had fallen out of her grandmother’s ring to the rough lumps she would find by the train tracks. She would clean and polish each one carefully and put it in its own special place on her collecting shelves.
Sometimes, people would make fun of the little girl. They told her that it didn’t make any sense to collect boring pebbles from the side of the road. They told her that she should only focus on the most exciting rocks, the shiny gems and the sleek rare minerals.
The little girl didn’t listen. She just kept collecting her rocks, no matter what kind they were, and no matter if she already had a dozen others just like it. To the little girl, each one was special.
When the little girl grew up, she became a geologist. She went all over the world, traveling from deserts to canyons to beaches, examining her beloved rocks. And when she got a little too old to kneel in cold mud, she became a geology professor. She taught each of the students about rocks, and she taught all of them to love stones as much as she did.
On the last day of class, she would give each student a hug, a rock from her now vast collection, and a little index card that said:
Just as every stone is special, so are you. Just as each rock is different, so are you. And just as each pebble is important—so are you.
And even if not all her students went on to become geologists, or even teachers, they never forgot what she said, and they remembered to love each and every rock. But most importantly, they remembered to love themselves for themselves, and that’s the best lesson of all.
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