The City

I.

The streets are cracked and rutted.  The fog creeps through the streets and around corners, a lost ghost mourning injustice.   The trees are still green and full.

There was a storm here last night, but the people don't know.  The old city lights still wink, but it more resembles the sad drooping of an old, sleepy eye.  Most of the street-lights are dead, but a few still shine through the dark.

And still the people sleep.

A can rolls, hollow sounding on the bridge.  The brand might bring a smile to a face, if faces were to be had.  But they are all asleep.

Below the bridge, a river runs full and clear.  The storm has made it plump and robust , filling it with a life the people always stole and never managed to give back.  But not this time.

Lonely and misplaced, a bench sits on a far hill.  From the bridge it seems absurd, and any face occupying the bench would seem equally misunderstood.  The swell of the hill is gentle�"not too steep and  not too small. 

The fog pulls gently at the edges of both bench and hill, fingering them with tenderness.

The blocks and nooks or the cul-de-sacs barely cut through the terrain, it was so changed.  If the people woke, they would never recognize the place they had once called home.

But that was okay.  This had never been the people's city.

And still, the people sleep.

 

II.

A sigh came up from the ground, expelling another soul.  As it joined the fog, a moan could almost be heard.  Almost.  There was not a sound here.

There had not been a single man-made sound since The Halt.

The fog continues its lonely walk.  To eyes, if there had been any to witness, the fog might seem t part and form shapes.  Vague limbs, aghast faces.  But there are no eyes, there are no ears, there are no lips. 

The Halt had taken them all away.

In its wake it had birthed a soft, gentle world.  The silence settles in and out, and there are no thoughts.  The fog dances along the water; even the dead danced�"if they were, in fact, dead.  There are no doctors to pronounce rigor mortis�"when it began, when it ended, what the cause was.

There is only perfection here.

From where I stand, I smile widely.  I cherish every breath, since The Halt.  Instead of choking for it as I once did, I breathe freely and clearly.  We all do, now.

The Halt made us free.

 

III.

Some say that our time is short.  I do not believe them.  I do not believe them.  The people are all asleep, and we have taken their place.  Every nation, every people, every empire�"they have had their time.  Some were short, some were long, but that was when the people were awake.

They are sleeping now.

Others say that the people are awake; that the faces have come back from the dead.  Sometimes I try to wrap my mind around it, but I can't imagine it.  We are all so alive here.

How could we be alive and they be awake?

If that were even possible, then The Halt was more than any breathing thing could imagine.  Could the perfect world, reborn from the people's death, be so good?  But what good had ever existed between the faces and us?

All they'd done was use and destroy, for millennia and era. 

A small number of the faces had tried to save the fragile life left in us�"or so they called it.  In truth, our lives have been fragile all the time.  Only The Halt had given us true strength.  It was not meant for the people to see.

This was our own pride; the eyes of the faces alone would disgrace us. We couldn't let the people over-run us again.  I wouldn't.

 

IV

Time is different here.  The very idea was created by the people, as well as the measures that marked it.  Lately, The Passing seemed stuck in a capsule. 

That is what we call "time"; The Passing.

The ground seemed to sigh and vent profusely, and then refused to emit a mere breath.  The whole city was pushing and pulling, against itself.  I did not like it, because it reminded me of The Halt. 

If The Halt had brought us good, and brought the faces to justice, then what might happen next if The Halt collapsed? 

Could our chance at life really be so short?

Reviews

[Haunzwürthe]

This has a very Jerusalem's Lot feel to it. The ambiguity of the people in contrast to the imagery you place in the city gives a feeling of insignificance to the grand scheme of the world. Definitely leaves me wanting more but in a Stephen King-ish good way. This is a really good one.