11.29.2009

Spot of Shade

I've been walking for many days in white-hot light with an uneasy warmth in my belly. I havent been walking along a definite path because there's only flat, paved ground in every direction to the horizon. Everywhere I choose to rest is the same as the last. A perpetual deja vu and a salt-less taste in my mouth keep me company along with my own thoughts. The cloudless sky is also bereft of any avian life whatsoever. Although I have no way of estimating how far or for how long I'd been walking, it couldn't have been less than a month judging from the amount of growth on my face. I could walk or run for as long as I wanted and yet there would neither be any sweat nor would I feel tired.
I did try clawing at the ground looking for answers for the ground was the only thing I could actually touch and spit at. It didn't matter how hard I kicked or clawed, the ground would not so much as show the slightest indentation.
You finally made it home, I would hear my thoughts whisper. Something inside me was satiated, at home and at rest while the rest of my being craved something to latch my hands onto.
I could almost hear my insides curse at the light and the futility of this kind of existence when I saw a darker spot of ground not too far ahead of me. Stopped in disbelief and then hotfooted it to the spot before jumping outright into it.
My eyes took a while to get used to the lack of brightness like some well-meant power outage on the lightbulb of the earth. Then I noticed the earth on which I was standing on. Cracks with pure blackness between the gaps, loose gravel and vulgar wet tentacles flailing under my shoes. On closer inspection, the tentacles were in fact worms that had an affinity to emerging from under the sole. Oh, and I felt cold. And it felt very good.
I decided to walk further ahead and watch this curious spot of shade from the outside. Skin and bone protested when I stood in the white light again. I expected myself to burst into flames from the way it hurt. Of course, I now realize that it wasn't physical hurt at all.
Scurrying back into the cold spot of shade again. I thought of people, of buildings, of streets and food. All my life I spent wishing them away. One at a time.
Here, in this strange flat world of air and little else, I crawl back into my little spot of shade and poke at worms as I see how far removed I am of the things that made me human.