I see a lake through the fog
This is the second time I have ever been on a train.
It is so fast, and the material is the wind as it whistles past.
It cuts through the country like a diver through water.
I feel even faster when we pass a train going the other way.
We pass a lake in the train.
In the December fog, my sight is trimmed so that I can scarcely see the water right next to us.
I can only see the reflections of bare trees.
It looks like the ground has disappeared.
I imagine the train veering off the tracks into the water.
I imagine never breathing again.
Then we go into a tunnel.
It is a black that stamps out all thought.
Horseracing
"Come on, Bang Smash!"
"Oh, what a rubbish jockey. Can't she do any better?"
"That's my son racing Straight Ruler. My little boy!"
"And Supernova is edging ahead!"
"What! False start!"
"Fifty to one bet that Alaska Gold will be in first, then lose!"
"Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"
"All that money gone."
Oh well, I never really liked Thunder Before Lightning anyway."
"Liar."
Only one voice in the crowd is saying anything along the lines of,
"That was fun!"
I see the sun through the fog.
I'm on a train.
I have never been on a train before.
The train's motion feels like I'm swaying on the rocking chair in my room.
I now know why so many stories have a baby being lulled to sleep by the movement of a train.
I see the sun through the fog.
The sun is beautiful.
The is stripped of its shine by the mist, to be transformed into a circle ringed with black.
It looks as if it isn't the sun, but a hole made in the sky with a paper punch.
What if the sun does go round the earth?
I imagine it on a train, carried round, sitting on its own at a table seat.
I imagine the sun being lulled to sleep.
Like a baby on a train in a book.
It is always asked of me
Why I do not find love and claim that
I never will.
It is because of this
Simple truth.
Many have fooled into disregarding it, but it always holds sway
In this world.
It is this.
Love can be sore
But heartbreak kills.
Take this unto your being, friend, and live by it
When threatening to have love for a human.
The roar of the tornado was immense, almost seeming to manifest itself in the funnel that was twisting and turning like a bull under a bronco. The cloud of dust snaked after its master, stifling the ground below. Illuminating the whole scene was the rising sun, eerily highlighting its strengths and my weaknesses.
Panicked, scattered cattle were trampling the grass in the face of the twister, bellowing. Their appearance was of leaves being blown about by a blower as they galloped wildly to the other end of the field, before cautiously edging forwards until they were spooked again, repeating the short cycle. In the early morning dew, human tracks formed paths that showed me the way to safety, seamlessly weaving among one another, testaments to other's fear.
In the next field West, my Land-rover shook in the twisting gale, accompanied by a whiff of petrol, carried by a momentary gust. A solitary strand of sinister barbed wire snapped free of the fence at one post far enough away to be pushed away by the wind rather than pulled towards it. As it flailed and whipped itself in the wind, it narrowly missed the car and swept threateningly in my direction. I held my breath... SNAP... my guts twisted into a game of Cat's Cradle as the wire flew past me, the barbs avoiding me by a hand's width.
The twister even cast a shadow, the dust that blocked the light constantly swirling, giving the shade a moving depth. More lengths of wire waved freely in the wind, snake-like in their flexibility and speed. The mighty thunder of the tornado drew ever closer, threatening to hurl me into the sky. The car was too far away to reach safely. I turned and sprinted away, along the trail left by the souls that had departed before me.
Oblivion
I lean over the side of the bottomless well, watching the murk disappear into oblivion.
The well extends beneath a crumbling castle, rising above me in an array of crenellations and loopholes.
The castle surveys from the top of a hill, gathering fallen chunks from the walls.
Surrounding the hill is a forest, standing on it's carpet of leaves being woven by the wind's skill.
The forest lives on an island, an island that takes a day for a raven to fly across.
The island is in the middle of the sea, forgotten by all but the waves and the gulls.
The ocean is enclosed by a tent with starlight for thread and the sky for fabric.
The stars are all that is left in the world, and I am one of them.
Blood Moon
As the thump of staffs rises to fever pitch around me, as the chanting weaves its way through the air in a beautiful crescendo, the blood moon rises.
It is full, as waxed as it can be, and after this, it will never cast the same light on Earth again. The rite is done.
Almost.
"Mages! Listen to me!" Sorcerer Deus faces us, a silhouette against the scarlet moon as he faces us mages. "There is but one simple component until we - not the Dark Ones of Stars- we shall become GODS!"
We cheer, howling to the sky, stamping our feet on the dew-spattered grass until the sorcerer raises his staff.
"I am sure you all know what that component is?" We nod in assent, eager.
He throws his face to the stars, a lonely figure on the altar standing in the empty plain. "THE NAMING!"
"THE NAMING!"
"Glosbe! Come up here!"
My jaw drops like a felled tree, for surely i, of all people, should not be the first. "I, I, O Sorcerer, I am the one least in power, why should it me me?"
Deus chortles in his deep tones. "Why, Glosbe, you are the most loyal among us, for otherwise you would have seized the opportunity instead of saying you should be last! Come forwards.
Marching forwards to the altar, I gaze at it. It is laced with many colours, gold and scarlet and silver and green and blue and bronze, but it isn't bright. Indeed, it seems faint, as if it almost isn't there, trying to hide. Nevertheless, I walk up the stairs and onto the surface, going round the white fire to join Deus as the other mages whisper with envy. But I feel no prise, only like I have usurped them.
"Now, Glosbe, I sense that you long to fly with the birds, to be with nature. Glosbe, you shall be the god of the wind and the natural. You shall be..."
Strange thumps come from behind me, and Deus spins me round to see all the mages dead on the ground.
"Glosbe, you shall be dead."
I see the crow overhead, predicting my doom. i hear the Sorcerer's murmur in my ear, I feel the diamond blade of his knife piercing my back and coming out the other side, I smell the death on the air, I taste the blood in my mouth.
Glasses
16/11/2016
Dear Diary,
Tomorrow I have to go to the opticians and get glasses. I don't want to get glasses.
Everyone will laugh at me because I'm short-sighted, and it will be SO embarrassing. I'm already bullied for being a crybaby and now I have to have spectacles, as mum calls them. They'll be spectacles and I'll be one too. No one else in my year has glasses.
I would pretend to be ill tomorrow, but mum will know that it's because of the glasses, because I've told her over and over and over again that I can't wear them, because I'll be a laughing stock.
It's bedtime. See you, whoever is reading my diary when they're not supposed to, Michael.I'm talking to you.
18/11/2016
Dear Diary,
Wish me luck.
18/11/2016 #2
Dear Diary,
Guess what - no one cares! I just walked around with my glasses on and the worst thing anyone said to me was that they didn't think glasses suited me, but that was it. I guess I did make a big fuss of it all, but it's fine now.
Oh come on - I have to go do the chores. Well, GO AWAY MICHAEL!