Saturday, May 12, 2012

Ta da!

They all came out
even though they had been
stuck there
for a while.
I pulled each one
out.
A letter, a voice, a movie
a picture, a thought, a phrase.
I sunk them all down the river
and turned away.

It seemed all too real.  I was standing at a crossroads with several many splits father for each one.  I saw memories past them, floating above each one, laughter and sadness, all of the misery and hope scattered evenly.  I didn't want to choose.  But that was a choice in itself.  "I'm dreaming," I automatically said.  "Or am I really?" I replied just as fast.  I pushed and pulled trying to break free, out of this box, but instead I fell again.  This time I saw the same routes, but I was sitting at the lunch table, surrounded by familiar faces, eagerly awaiting my decision.  I sighed, trying to escape again.

She was a naive fourteen year old girl skipping under hollowed white branches.  Her hair was a shiny black, almost black as the contrast of the night sky against the moon.  Under the starlight, her eyes were a black, a encompassing black that seemed to leave you devoid until she turned her eyes away again.  She was singing a nursery rhyme.   "I hear thunder, I hear thunder.
Hark don't you? Hark don't you?
Pitter, patter raindrops,
Pitter, patter raindrops,
I'm wet through; so are you.

I hear thunder, I hear thunder.
Hear it roar! Hear it roar!
Pitter, patter raindrops,
Pitter, patter raindrops,
I'm all wet! I'm all wet!

I see blue skies, I see blue skies,
Way up high, Way up high!
Hurry up the sunshine,
Hurry up the sunshine
We'll soon dry! We'll soon dry!"  Every so often she laughed, as if she was simply skipping through a meadow of flowers but the harsh reality was that she was skipping through a minefield of explosives.  No matter though, for she did not care.  She simply kept skipping through as one exploded after the other, the sparks causing no alarm or excitement or speed.  Perhaps she couldn't feel it at all, in her happy little meadow as she skipped to her death.

3 comments:

  1. Another nicely dream-like piece. I especially like the nursery rhyme-style song and the image of a girl skipping through a minefield.

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  2. I suppose that imagery reminds me of a post-apocalyptic future, and it makes me think all the way back to the "beginning" of life, from when the universe first began in the big bang... and all the patterns it followed and all the life it created here on this planet until we apes evolved to this point- and how, at any time from then until now, it is telling that what a being truly values is play.

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  3. I really liked the dream-like aspect of the piece too. If that's what you're going for, maybe remove or edit the 'is this the real life or is this just fantasy?' parts that bluntly pose the question to the reader... he or she can figure it out by the subject matter alone.

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