People
I woke up to darkness this morning. Someone or something has blinded me in my sleep. Cotton wool, the colour of shadows, covered my eyes and I stumbled. It was disconcerting. At first, I could not find the ground for my feet to bear the weight of my body. "Where is it?" I tried to feel about with my toes but all I could find was more depth without an end.
Taking a hasty breath, I leaped. It may lead me to a crushing death of speed, or it could lead me to... ground. Crunchy and yielding, it felt like barren earth. "At least I'm still alive".
For the longest time, I stood there, unmoving, uncertain of which direction to take. I was paralysed with doubts. "Should I just move, towards anything, find a wall, or fall through a hole, or should I stay here, immobile but safe?" There was no imagery in my mind to terrorise me into fearful flight or embolden me to finding connections. There was only darkness.
And there was music. A tinkling of grains as the earth shifted beneath my feet. I held my breath and waited for some kind of pattern; like an old habit learnt from somewhere. "Where?" Somewhere. It sounded like a tiny xylophone, drummed like cymbals. My heart squeezed and expanded like a mirror. At intervals, I was flying and burdened, cleansed and polluted, dreaming and despairing. I had to move.
So I did. Step by step, I focussed on the change of intonation in sand. It neither urged not warned. Merely present and fluctuating in erratic rhythms. It was quite peaceful as I found my mind empty but for the echoing tones which filled my being into form. I was as ephemeral as the sounds. Imagining myself as wisps of cloud or sillhouettes of mountains. "I can see?"
There is a rectangular glint of silver light just in front of me. I hastened my walk and let the sounds dissolve into nothingness. A silent trade occured, with my desire for reflection. "How do I look like?" Hoping the light leads to a mirror. "Wasn't the shape just right?" Ghost of a memory.
The light framed the blackness in perfectly straight lines. Dazzling, the outline blinded me to everything else. But I was still hungry. A yearning I could not understand. I wanted to walk into my eyes and grab the truth shadowing behind colours. Somehow, "I know it's there."
Touch. I wanted to hold the texture of the darkness. It felt like skin against me. "Did I feel skin with skin?" I could not puncture no-thingness by persistent walk. The skin of dark defined by light bound me. I could not see. I could only feel the stubborn resolution of walls. A bile of panic hurled me into a desperate clawing for escape. "I have to get away!" But without sight, who is the "I" referred? "Can anyone tell me?"
"Please"
Taking a hasty breath, I leaped. It may lead me to a crushing death of speed, or it could lead me to... ground. Crunchy and yielding, it felt like barren earth. "At least I'm still alive".
For the longest time, I stood there, unmoving, uncertain of which direction to take. I was paralysed with doubts. "Should I just move, towards anything, find a wall, or fall through a hole, or should I stay here, immobile but safe?" There was no imagery in my mind to terrorise me into fearful flight or embolden me to finding connections. There was only darkness.
And there was music. A tinkling of grains as the earth shifted beneath my feet. I held my breath and waited for some kind of pattern; like an old habit learnt from somewhere. "Where?" Somewhere. It sounded like a tiny xylophone, drummed like cymbals. My heart squeezed and expanded like a mirror. At intervals, I was flying and burdened, cleansed and polluted, dreaming and despairing. I had to move.
So I did. Step by step, I focussed on the change of intonation in sand. It neither urged not warned. Merely present and fluctuating in erratic rhythms. It was quite peaceful as I found my mind empty but for the echoing tones which filled my being into form. I was as ephemeral as the sounds. Imagining myself as wisps of cloud or sillhouettes of mountains. "I can see?"
There is a rectangular glint of silver light just in front of me. I hastened my walk and let the sounds dissolve into nothingness. A silent trade occured, with my desire for reflection. "How do I look like?" Hoping the light leads to a mirror. "Wasn't the shape just right?" Ghost of a memory.
The light framed the blackness in perfectly straight lines. Dazzling, the outline blinded me to everything else. But I was still hungry. A yearning I could not understand. I wanted to walk into my eyes and grab the truth shadowing behind colours. Somehow, "I know it's there."
Touch. I wanted to hold the texture of the darkness. It felt like skin against me. "Did I feel skin with skin?" I could not puncture no-thingness by persistent walk. The skin of dark defined by light bound me. I could not see. I could only feel the stubborn resolution of walls. A bile of panic hurled me into a desperate clawing for escape. "I have to get away!" But without sight, who is the "I" referred? "Can anyone tell me?"
"Please"