It's been a while . . .
titled: "the boy-who died-was shut up"
alternatively titled: "undated- number 02"The boy-who died-was shut up in a cold, unforgiving cell by his captors. Burdensome locks and chains bound him to the cracked floor: they refused to release him; there was no escape, not the slightest possibility. He knew nothing of the illimitable feeling of freedom.
Thus, one lonely night, when the Oppressors were asleep, the boy took up a brush he had hidden and painted the bleak story of his troubled, charred existence. A feverish intensity consumed him-transformed him, wholly, hauntingly-as he poured himself into the task at hand. With eyes a-blaze and strokes of fury, he worked unceasingly through the unobserved twilight.
Painful recollections of the past flooded through his maddened, shock-ridden mind: the cold, emotionless rigidity of the soldiers in columns, marching through the streets; his homeland in bombed, burning ruins; the meaningless torture and slaughter of his parents-for his mother was raped, and his father disemboweled, both disposed of; his tumultuous abduction; and now, his final resting place, his home, his cell, where his life of a light remained, decaying, dimming.
Yet-such a work of great pain and suffering had yielded beauty unparalleled. The mournful colors mourned no more, and blended together in magnificence. The mad intensity of the strokes produced a serenity never seen in the boy before. All was finally revealed-all was laid out-through his brush and paint upon the canvas of a wall. This was his essence, his life, his Purpose . . .
The next morning, before the brilliance of the sun conquered the night’s darkness (he would not have seen such splendor, though, for there were no windows in his cell), They came to check on him. They found him asleep, curled underneath his creation. His face was soft and in utter peace.
His art They saw, and in it, his flicker of hope. They were afraid . . . ghastly, grimly afraid.
They punished him: They stole his voice, and beat him till the floor was soaked red; but the greatest atrocity, the highest injustice, was the removal of his precious, worn hands; and, to mock him were the words, large and apparent upon the wall,
“the brush is mightier
than the sword.”
The little boy without a voice laughed, for nothing could ever touch him (he Believed!) . . . and then, he died.
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============================
I first started this a while back, when my stuff was undated. I think I originally planned for it to be a poem, but later decided to "prose-ify" it. It is another fairly obvious work of mine, as I like to believe. Tonight I decided to "finish" it... it was by chance, really.
This piece underwent a lot of change as time went on, as the things I wanted to say differed. In fact, I removed something very substantial tonight that places it all under an alternate (perhaps better) light.
Comments... criticisms... cynicisms... questions... thoughts... interpretations... all is welcome.
alternatively titled: "undated- number 02"The boy-who died-was shut up in a cold, unforgiving cell by his captors. Burdensome locks and chains bound him to the cracked floor: they refused to release him; there was no escape, not the slightest possibility. He knew nothing of the illimitable feeling of freedom.
Thus, one lonely night, when the Oppressors were asleep, the boy took up a brush he had hidden and painted the bleak story of his troubled, charred existence. A feverish intensity consumed him-transformed him, wholly, hauntingly-as he poured himself into the task at hand. With eyes a-blaze and strokes of fury, he worked unceasingly through the unobserved twilight.
Painful recollections of the past flooded through his maddened, shock-ridden mind: the cold, emotionless rigidity of the soldiers in columns, marching through the streets; his homeland in bombed, burning ruins; the meaningless torture and slaughter of his parents-for his mother was raped, and his father disemboweled, both disposed of; his tumultuous abduction; and now, his final resting place, his home, his cell, where his life of a light remained, decaying, dimming.
Yet-such a work of great pain and suffering had yielded beauty unparalleled. The mournful colors mourned no more, and blended together in magnificence. The mad intensity of the strokes produced a serenity never seen in the boy before. All was finally revealed-all was laid out-through his brush and paint upon the canvas of a wall. This was his essence, his life, his Purpose . . .
The next morning, before the brilliance of the sun conquered the night’s darkness (he would not have seen such splendor, though, for there were no windows in his cell), They came to check on him. They found him asleep, curled underneath his creation. His face was soft and in utter peace.
His art They saw, and in it, his flicker of hope. They were afraid . . . ghastly, grimly afraid.
They punished him: They stole his voice, and beat him till the floor was soaked red; but the greatest atrocity, the highest injustice, was the removal of his precious, worn hands; and, to mock him were the words, large and apparent upon the wall,
“the brush is mightier
than the sword.”
The little boy without a voice laughed, for nothing could ever touch him (he Believed!) . . . and then, he died.
============================
============================
I first started this a while back, when my stuff was undated. I think I originally planned for it to be a poem, but later decided to "prose-ify" it. It is another fairly obvious work of mine, as I like to believe. Tonight I decided to "finish" it... it was by chance, really.
This piece underwent a lot of change as time went on, as the things I wanted to say differed. In fact, I removed something very substantial tonight that places it all under an alternate (perhaps better) light.
Comments... criticisms... cynicisms... questions... thoughts... interpretations... all is welcome.