Dancing on the beach in bare feet. What a careless thing to do. You could get glass in your feet, or step on a sharp rock. And what on earth are you wearing? It's too cold out; you'll get sick. Get back in the house this minute, girls. It'll be dark, soon, anyway, and you shouldn't be out after dark. That's when the bad men come out.
Sometimes, I wish I could be like you. Innocent, with the world ahead of me. Able to do silly things like dance on the beach at sunset without worrying about the consequences. But...
Time stopped the moment I recognized the driver. I clenched my fists and stepped back onto the curb but the car screeched to a stop and I knew he'd recognized me.
I could have run back into a building, found an exit into an alley. Instead I bolted into the middle of the street and froze on the crosswalk. My eyes met the driver's and I heard as if from a distance the honking horns and screams of cars and people.
My throbbing pulse sent cold pumps of blood through my body and my skin prickled, and my clothes dampened...
She could tell I was faking it. My smile felt wrong, though no one else knew. She knew. A glance at the priest standing before us revealed that he was none the wiser to my feelings. But she could tell, I know she could. She stood there, hands grasping mine, tears shining in her eyes, a wide grin stretched across her face. Was she faking it, too? I was panicked this morning, knowing that I was to be married in a few hours. Maybe she felt the same. My calm facade got me through the waiting, but I was nervous...
It would be a long walk. To no where. Ending some where. A where long off. Tulle of mist. Footage of stage. A wide glow of white pixels condensing to green. Corridors of sparkling black. A long walk but he took it.
Once, in Beijing, a young girl in a red gown huddled in a doorway. She shielded her eyes from the flashes of light that arced across the blackened sky, her face soaked with tears, her heart pounding in her chest as the cacophony of noise rattled her skull.
In London, a family huddled together in a corner of their living room, across from the window that had blown itself out from the force of the first impact. They held between them the grandmothers crucifix, praying to their God as if he could save them.
A man stood atop the Eifel...
And why shouldn't they? For ten years they worked to instill their beliefs, ritualize my family, and remove any lingering signs of hillbilly. They begrudgingly looked past my slow drawl, crooked teeth, and ragged clothes for the opportunity to have me hit a ball with their community adorned on my chest. Oh what sacrifices! To bring in such a heathen and educate him and trust him around your daughters. And what did they get in return? My car in the wall of town hall with a needle in my arm. Your fears were realized, your stereotypes were dead on. But...
"Hello" Beth said.
"Howdy!" Jacob beamed.
That was it. The same greeting they swapped every afternoon as he strolled into the building. Beth gazed at him from the reception desk as he strolled past, holding her eyes steady with the cockiest of smirks.
He knew she wanted him. She want him like they all did, only she was cute enough to maybe consider. She had that dirty-librarian look about her.
Beth watched the man continue through the lobby, leering at her. She smiled her best at him, but really saw her knife plunging into his mouth and out the back...
The chill of the water slowly crept up his trunk, until it reached his tusks. He couldn't move...not that he even wanted to, any more.
They had won.
He'd faced adversary ever since he'd announced his intentions. At first from his parents, then from his friends, until he was the laughing-stock of the whole herd.
"How are you going to pole-vault?" they'd sneered. "You don't have any arms!"
"You think they're going to let you in the Olympics!? Ha! You don't even speak the same language as the humans...how are you even going to communicate your intentions?"
His parents had...
Leaving was the easiest decision to make, and the hardest action to take.
They were just sitting there In the box. Helpless.
Helpless was the only word that seemed to match all around. Why wouldn't someone destroy everything in that box. Why wouldn't they be debauched to within an inch of the last bit of everything there ever was?
She was always too soft when it came to things. It's like her house was the place where things came to be rescued, rabbits, fledglings, dogs that ate the rabbits that took refuge there and demanded to be rescued themselves, and...
Pollution is an artist
and poison is a poet
Death is the brightest of colors
Noise is the sweetest song
Pollution won a grant
and poison won a fellowship
We're meeting for drinks downtown
to celebrate their well-deserved
recognition.