Just enough
These are the days that
rarely come easily
half a bottle of Pendleton
head full of rain
and Mahler
the words run across the screen
and out back in the
pond
the fish fall asleep
listening to
the rain tap the surface
back in here
the music
the words
the glass of whiskey on the desk
looking almost
painted
nights like this happen, too,
the little victories
that keep us going
during the huge losses,
small victories laced
between the
sorrow
in bright threads
holding death
and fear
and worry
just
far
enough
apart.
these are the days that rarely come
about which wild tales are spun
these are the days that rarely leave
resonating each time we breathe
these are the days that rarely sleep
although exhaustion slowly creeps
these are the days that we remember
even in the darkness of December
these are the days that rarely come
days where we can see the sun
A Story of an Ending
“These are the days that rarely come.”
The words fell on silence, pregnant with trepidation. Hushed voices made up for it with active expressions and eager eyes. The platoon watched Captain Wilson with equal parts hope and despair. Hope that he would have something to quell their fears. Despair that they knew he wouldn’t.
“These are the days when you have to decide for yourself, what sort of man you’ll be before the lights go out. Before it all ends and you meet your maker, you’re born again, or you just become worm food, depending on whatever you do or don’t believe. That part doesn’t matter. What does is that it’s ending. You are ending, and the world’s just going to keep on spinning. And you have to decide if it’ll spin just a little bit better because of what you’ve thrown away for it.”
“So this is it, then?” The speaker was barely past boyhood. Eighteen, scrawny, with a spread of acne that probably made it difficult to get laid. “I mean, we make our stand here, now? There’s no way out?”
Wilson eyed the kid’s nameplate, stitched atop his muddied camouflage. “Out? I suppose you could hide, Pete, but they’ll find you. You know they will. Or you can act, and in that act, I’m not going to lie. You’ll die. There’s no better way to put it. When we plant that bomb and set it off there’s no way we’ll be far enough that it’ll spare us. We go up in smoke. And we take ’em with us.”
Peter hissed through his teeth. Probably when he joined up for the war he thought himself invincible. That clear cut of death was muddy until you got a solid taste of the blade, right between the teeth. Especially in young men, who thought themselves demigods. Wilson pitied him, but he wasn’t about to baby him. He couldn’t afford to.
“I won’t force you to go with me,” he said. Overhead, the sound of someone screaming ripped the air outside the trench. Those more shaken placed their hands over their ears before the inevitable bone crunching followed. “One of us has to get there. One of us has to get to that reactor. Just one. The rest are a shield. A shield of bodies. That’s the plan. Insane, utterly. But it’s all we have. And I won’t force you into it. But I want you to consider something before you decide.”
More silence. Peter looked ashamedly down at his gun, then behind him, where the network of tunnels led back to the city. It was what the human race had been reduced to. Moles, hiding in the dirt. It made Wilson sick, but more than that, it made him furious.
“You can keep hiding, maybe for a while. Maybe you’ll live, deep underground, hoping each and every day that they won’t find you. You’ll become subhuman, scavenging, hoping that maybe, just maybe, they’ll leave or die off. They won’t, though. And you’ll just keep going deeper, down and down, as more and more of you die off. By disease, by madness, or simply starved from want of sunlight. You’ll wilt like little flowers, and the earth itself will decay above you.”
Wilson thumbed the safety on his weapon. The explosives thumped against his side as he moved, eager. “So you’re going to end either way. You have to choose whether it’ll be in body, or in soul.”
Peter swallowed. The boy looked around at the others: Marty, Stephen, Luke, Joseph. They were all too young for this, but most of the prime fighters were dead or debilitated. They had one shot, the window was small, and it had to be taken.
“…I’ll do it,” he said quietly. “I got a kid sister. I don’t want that for her. Can’t have it. I’ll go with you.”
Wilson looked around at the others. Grim faces, streaked with mud, streaked with hopelessness. But one by one they nodded agreement, readying their rifles, eyeing the ridge above where Armageddon waited, temporarily clueless. Not for long, though.
He turned. The shuffle of feet on dry clay behind him made his heart jump to his throat. His words felt like bitter poison left on his tongue. He’d romanticized it, he knew. The plan was faulty. Shaky. Desperation made operation. There was a plain truth in it all, without heroics, without the sugar to swallow the pill of reality.
The days rarely came only because they were the last.
Days of Fear
These are the days that rarely come. If I think about it too much it pains me, and it already does without the thinking. These are the Days of Fear. They come once every year. The Castle chooses one person to fight--and hopefully kill--the Feared One. Of course, nobody yet has come back to tell the tale. Young children are told stories of the Feared One, the man that captures our sheep, and sometimes humans. Elders say that he eats them. Mothers tell their children that it is nonsense, but you can see the worry in their eyes. The King has never, of course, tried to kill the Feared One himself. He is too cowardly. Us Villagers protest against his judgement and say that he should send many soldiers at once to fight the Feared One. But it is not like we can do much. No, not much at all. So we will continue to let people 'fight' the Feared One, and wait for them to come back when the never will. We will continue to let people die under our sickened watch.
Brick
"These are the days that rarely come," she said to me. "You know? It's not every day that I get to see you. You're either stuck at college or working or whatever...It's good to have you back."
As we sat together on the old, wooden swing on her front porch and watched as the cars passed us by in a way that seemed to slow down time, she scooted closer to me until our legs were touching. Then she grabbed hold of my hand and wove her fingers between mine, and I could feel our pulses beating out of time. The weather was beginning to settle into deep autumn. The leaves were changing, dying, and falling. The air seemed to slow everything down.
I took a sip of my water bottle that I had stuck between my legs, and then I turned my head to look at her. Her eyes seemed to no longer radiate. Her cheeks seemed to have lost complexion. Her hair seemed to fall dead across her shoulders. As we sat there in uncomfortable silence, she steadily pushed the swing back and forth. Eventually, she grew tired of neither of us talking, and she said, "So how's school going?"
"It's going, I guess. I do, however, enjoy my classes. In my literary theory class the professor brought up a good point as to that some resolutions to conflicts can not really be resolutions at all but just an interpretation."
"Hmm. I need to tell you something...It's important." She then stood up and stretched her legs while I still sat on the swing.
"What is it?"
"I'm pregnant..." She turned her head away from me, and when she turned back, her eyes were red while a tear trickled down her cheek. We both then stayed there in silence for a few moments before I spoke up to somehow give her a sense of reassurance.
"It'll be okay. Tomorrow I'll call in an appointment at the abortion clinic for you."
She gently wiped a tear from her eye, and then her voice began to choke up. "It's just...It's just that it's not that simple, Mark. I wish it was. But this is a child we're talking about. A child's life is at stake." She sat back down again, and then I stood up and walked away. The gentle breeze hit my skin, and I felt a shiver up my spine. I walked to my car and opened the door. "Mark!" I heard her exclaim. "Mark! Come back! Let me explain! Listen!" Then she rubbed her forehead with her thumb and middle finger. "Okay, fine. I'll get an abortion. I'll get a damned abortion! Are you happy now?"
I got into my car, put the key in the ignition, and drove off. For some unknown reason, fury fumigated inside of me like never before. On the way home, I was listening to Lithium, and "Brick" by Ben Folds Five came on. Then I saw that she was my brick, and I was the one that was drowning slowly. She was the brick that tied me to the ground, and I was going nowhere.
Exam Days
These are the days that rarely come. Nevertheless, you dread them. They bring about a feeling of fear so intense, so vivid, that you can practically taste the trepidation.
The night before you had stayed up, torn between a vibrant curiosity and dreadful terror. The curiosity was that of wonder - what exactly these rare days would embody. The trepidation was that of the future - what exactly these rare days would bring.
That, and you had stayed up all night studying. Today was the first day of five nine-hour days - unlike the 180 others. These days that rarely came were the accumulation of knowledge learned... Exam days.
Days
These are the days that rarely come,
When children play in summer sun,
And flowers bow before the breeze,
These are the days to live and breathe,
To wander with an easy gait,
Upon Gods firmament so green,
And restless minds can ponder fate,
These are the days to dwell and dream.
Not a story, but that first line was so inviting.
To be interpreted as you wish
These are the days that rarely come; the days I rarely see.
"What's the schedule for today?" I turned to my distant love.
He said not a word but he smirked with that grin where his dimples were craters in the moon and his eyes were the stars that defined what light was. I cupped the sides of his face and brushed my thumbs across his cheekbones. Together we melted and his touch was the only thing I knew. He put his lips to my forehead and the tears trailed down his cheeks then onto my skin. I pull away even though I am weak. I step back and he grabbed for the door knob. He walked away and the door shut behind him with a tiny creak which was simultaneously in sync with my heart. I go to re-open the door to capture one last glance but then he was gone. And before I knew it I was staring at the ceiling of the room laying on his California king bed. Gone. The day where you come back to me has yet to come, but darling you stay in my dreams.