9.27.13

     A graceless dancer, she staggered through empty midnight streets.  Crows watched silently from above;  moonlight and fog painting a lonely tableau.  In her wake the smell of cheap perfume and alcohol, the bittersweet aroma of heartbreak and sorrow.      

     She stopped and leaned against a wall, fumbled through her purse and pulled out a crumpled pack of Parliament Lights and lit it with her last match.  This night would claim her, tepid trembling fingers reaching from the coldest depths of hell to pull her down and swallow her whole. 

I awake in darkness.  Cold, wet, naked and alone, I do my best to find my way to some light, but I wander for what seems like hours with no result.  The rock of the wall that I've been following crumbles wetly beneath my fingers as I slump against it and slide to the floor.  My companions are either dead or have run off over the course of our journey, and now it has become mine alone.  I feel my own fingers cold against my forehead and realize that I have begun to sob quietly, but I notice it distantly, as though merely a passenger in my body.  I think back to the beginning, to Calliope, to the start of the journey, to omens and talismans.

to move with true purpose

We stood in awe, enraptured.  It was long thought that the gods had truly forsaken us, had dismissed our doings in favor of some other less troublesome cosmic distraction.  Yet here before us stood a true goddess, glowing with some tranquil inner light, radiating palpable waves of well being.  The opals we had given her were set into a golden necklace, so thick and ornate and beset with jewels that it was a wonder the weight of it didn't cause her to stoop over.  We began to kneel in respect, but she caught our elbows and lifted her chin, indicating that we should stand tall.  The wind blew through the grass, an electric fullness quickened the sky. The world became a child's dream of tomorrow, full of promise.  

"Men and gods are much alike, as much as rain and snow.  Each with a strength and a power that is a blessing to behold.  We stand together here, at this moment, to stamp our hallmark into history.  Your old lives are done, you now shoulder a heavier burden, you the lucky few whose names will never be forgotten.  In time our ultimate goal will become clear, but the beginning of anything is always the continuation of something else, and now is the time to move with true purpose."

The valley was serene.  The air brought scents of honeysuckle and lilac, birds sang from the forest's edge.  We looked at each other, dumbfounded.  We looked back at her, and found our muse.  She smiled warmly and tilted her head slightly, like a bemused mother marveling at the magnificence of her children. 

Chiseled from the very stone of paradise

     Blackened stalks rose from dead earth.  Our footfalls made almost no sound, and indeed, the skeletal forest seemed to eat up all sounds like they were mother's milk.  Our path was illuminated by a thin and feeble light, so that we could barely see more than a few feet in front of us.  After a time, all was dread silence.  Such a cold, lurking, unforgivably un natural and sinister stillness that we all paused in mid step.  Our guide led us on, ever deeper into the wasteland.
     It soon grew warmer, and some life returned.  There was music from far off, though it was impossible to tell what direction it was coming from.  We quickened our pace as the dome of the sky grew brightly blue, our spirits lifting.  At last we came to the lip of a vast and verdant valley.  The wind swept upwards and blew off the cloak of rags that covered our guide, and before us was not an old haggard wretch, but a beautiful and beguiling goddess, chiseled from the very stone of paradise.

Opals for Calliope

     We crested the rocky black cliff face and took a moment to rest.  Behind us, a heartless wind blew through the valley.  The sky seethed with a darkling light, clouds boiling and churning.  Our hands were black, scraped worn and bloody from the climb.  We ate what little food remained and continued on.  From time to time we heard unseen beasts, horses, wolves and calls of some animals that we'd never heard before.  The air was cold and bitter, the embrace of a soured mistress.  It tasted of coal and sorrow.  Everything was grey, black, dark and unforgiving, even the trees; leafless limbs reaching from their graves, bleached grey with time and regret. 

At last we came to her home.  Crumbling columns stuck out like bones from the earth, impossibly clean in such a place.  We clambered over massive fallen blocks of stone, following the single line of smoke that rose from the center of that forsaken labyrinth.  She squatted in front of a tiny fire, dressed in dirty rags.  Unkempt hair clung to her face and hung limply at the sides.  She wore black henna on her face like a mask, and tiny bells hung from thin silver chains in her hair and across her neck.  Light gray eyes followed us as we approached, we were being dissected. She raised her hand palm up as we got close, and I pulled out a small leather pouch from my jacket.  I untied the drawstring and upended the pouch, letting three perfect opals tumble through that malignant air.   She gave a nearly imperceptible nod and stood.  She was much taller than she seemed.  She began to walk, and we followed.

We held onto the clouds instead.  Sometimes it felt like we were coming apart, but it was all an illusion.  The truth was, there was never anything there at all.