A reworking of post 2... ack, not getting too far, are we? Maybe I should have started at the beginning of the project, heh.
I am standing in the middle of no place, no feeling, life seen through the filter of a silent movie. You ask if I’m dreaming. Have you ever lived a dream, skipped a path paved with gumdrops and candied pecans? Truth in fantasy.
The world here is a self-contained speck of dust I’ve fallen into and I have to wonder if the fields of dreams filled with exotic (macadamia, coco, mongongo, etc.) girls with big coats of fur are out there real and calling me towards the path I follow because we all need something to believe. To justify the careless un-thinking that our imagination makes real like the way you now justify looking down upon me. Perchance to dream.
But this is it and this small patch of colorless earth both strange and familiar inherent in the cold calmness burning in me. Yet everything seems to have outgrown me - the safety of trees now expanding a few feet higher, a mile to me. This road I stand on. And now I am aware of the shadow of a winged beast engulfing me. There, ahead of me, the globular eyes of my blood nemesis, expressionless but glowing so heavily in the night as to practically create cones of blinding light. Just like I remember. And now it all comes back to me - the torture, the destruction, the acceptance.
My parents are dead. All around me. Nothing important.
Was it a politician or a minister? Nobody can say who spoke in the forum that day. I can say I was in the forum someday but someday there will be no recollection that words lived here. But I am here, somebody or nobody climbing down from the tree branch to hear this fellow.
Shall we trample it under our feet, look it in the eye and gun it down in the streets? Shall we drop our silent acorns overhead, swift the sickle never seen coming? How shall Shall we trample it under our feet, look it in the eye and gun it down in the streets? Shall we drop our silent acorns overhead, swift the sickle never seen coming? How shall innocence die?
We have to stop them before it happens again, he says. And we’re the crowd in front of the capital house, the sea of heads indistinct from tails. I can’t hear the Boss Upstairs, the crowd’s squeaky chants drowning out the reality-altering decision occurring upstairs, but later on the history books will reconstruct part of it for me.
Sir, we’ve got a situation, some faceless sap says. That mob sure looks rowdy today. Or, this is worse than the furry rights march of 1982.
When questioned about the impending crisis…
The squirrel standing behind the desk turns toward the window, hands folded.
…the Head Nut replied, the will of the people is clear. Our way of life is at stake.
And that’s where I come in, the newest recruit into the Delta Squirrel squadron of the 101st tree community.
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If I am reading this correctly, and the narrator is some strange catch in between person and squirrel, part furry, but part really aware of birds of prey...well, I really enjoyed this piece, especially the end, I laughed out loud.
ReplyDeleteI think in terms of power struggles this really hits home (again, assuming I'm reading this in the right way) because it really plays with the lines between being human and being an animal, and being something in-between. I like how your lines have a lot of double meaning and can serve as metaphors or in an ambiguous way...the Head Nut...the shadow of a winged beast...
Taking this with your other posts seems to bring up the questions of what really is real and what isn't...what's imagination and what isn't, and where does one draw the line, which I think is really interesting. I think your imagery and description is really effective, and I like your short sentences that punctuate your paragraphs (Perchance to dream...Nothing Important).
It's interesting, the intermingling of human political figureheads and conflicts and even mythologies (fictitious power relationships and hierarchies) with the lives of squirrels. Like a strange elevation of the animal by placing our perspective onto them.
ReplyDeleteThis section seems a good deal more abstract than the others I've read of yours, and I suppose it gives us a chance to see into the narrator's mind, the way his thoughts are processed. It has both a dreamlike and war-like feel to it, balancing passive description of the world through such a small creatures eyes with discussion on war and death and battles waged and squirrels lost.
I'm admittedly a bit confused, but definitley intriqued by your work so far.