Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category
Form Prayers to Broken Stone
Friday, November 19th, 2010
This is the third in the four-part Hollow Men series. Although this could be appreciated alone, three others have appeared (now revised): part I, part II and part IV.
I trudged for a day in a direction that had not existed the day before. Tramping to the bleak beacon was like plowing through mounds of slushy snow seeping through your boots. When the pair of shining black beams smote me, the going slowed to a crawl.
I’d passed beneath the beacon’s lower angle of the lantern room’s reach before the sensation in my goose-pimpled flesh returned.
A white-bearded dwarf exited the base of the beacon waving a replica of the lantern squatting above. “Turn back! Look not into eyes!” His voice was the grinding of gears.
The journey had worn my patience, so I toppled him. He fell back flinging his lantern behind. He hit with a clang; the lantern’s hinged glass door swung open and cracked against the rocky soil, and the cold, coal-black flame soared, guttered, and winked out in the indifferent wind. The man groaned as I carried on.
Years of severe weathering had pocked the formerly sleek obsidian surface of the beacon. I ran my hand along its rough flank and steered myself up the inner winding. The rotting wooden planks protested my weight. I pushed wide the trapdoor.
Inside the lantern room, I swung open the glass lens and slid shut the iron vent to suffocate the coal-black flame. Ice crystals formed in the cracks and spread across the vents.
The giant lens separated into smaller, distorting glass blocks–each chanced to point at the spire that had been my home since my days as unformed crockery. From this vantage, it looked little more than a mossy screw, but each lens block also pulled it in some direction that made my attachment to it laughable–fat, skinny, hour-glassed, warped. Watching, I noticed the screw turned when the hollow men climbed its slope. In fact, hundreds of screws turned just beyond this one. I daydreamed of erecting a bridge to cross the gaps so that no one had to fall off. Vertigo filled my skull and numbed my fingertips.
Pivoting to the opposite direction, I gazed across a broad desert, into a land leviathan’s slow blinking gaze.
“You fool!” The dwarf was hoisting himself up on the floor. “You’ve opened the misery gate!” The dwarf lisped the words, so it was hard to tell if the gate were a “misery” or “mystery.” He brandished a dagger, slashed and thrust.
I dodged. “Wait.” Again, the dodge. “I see your point. Please. Let me open the door, so the flame can breathe, and men won’t look in this direction.” With an elbow, I cracked the ice and slid the door open, careful not to let the chill black light fall on me.
The dwarf tilted his head back, basking in the light.
Yanking him off his feet, I tossed the dwarf’s heavy metal frame into the flame and slammed the door shut.
Reset
Wednesday, November 17th, 2010
Someday you may wish to reset your life. A tree falls, leaves your daughter paralyzed from the waist down. You forward the wrong email to your boss and are subsequently fired. While hunting you accidentally shoot your best friend, killing him. Such events are not as uncommon as we hope.
To reset, follow these directions.
1. To prepare your reset point, go to a soundless place and remember a day when things were still as they should be. Write out a complete description of that day. Leave out nothing. The two seconds of arousal when the charming neighbor greeted you, the half-second of formless panic when you thought you had forgotten the gift. Such details are essential.
2. With description in hand, leave your home at sundown and travel on foot to the nearest crossroads. Speak to no one. Minimize contact with metal. When you arrive, sit in the center of the crossroads and wait. Think only of your goal. Try not to move.
3. At midnight the universe’s first intermediary will arrive, recognizable by white-feathered wings, a halo, and a golden harp. This intermediary will offer, in a voice of gravel and thorns, to restore the universe to the desired point in exchange for your soul. Refuse. While soulless people live perfectly normal lives, this option will not allow changes. Your life will begin again, but you’ll be unable to alter events, instead repeating them.
4. At 3am, the second intermediary will appear, equipped with hooves, small horns, and a pointed tail. With a voice soft as the ocean wind it will offer you comfort for how things are. Refuse. While an improvement over the first offer, it will not correct the past. You will instead accept the unfortunate developments as immutable.
5. When dawn arrives, read your description of the day aloud in full, then wait. The universe might manifest as a robin in the grass, a sudden rainstorm, or a policewoman in her patrol car. Explain to the universe what has gone wrong in your life, then give the description of the day to it. Close your eyes and wait. Your life will reset to the desired day.
Troubleshooting
This procedure can fail if your description is incomplete. Without a full detailing, the universe will not be able to reset your life. If this happens, then you must start again.