The Storm

A Story by thinkingsam

I wrote the following on 19/6/06, but the story behind it is millenia old...

The Storm

He was the storm.

It was in the way his hair flew like the banners of old in winds of war. It was the fire in his eyes and the steely gait; and his robes, oblivious to a frame carved from marble, that flowed like the waters of the waves that buffeted your boat.

And he was approaching.

Can you see it now? The storm surrounds him like a coat of shimmering chain. As your skin tingles you almost see crackling lights and flames encircling him like a majestic hurricane; he was the centre, the eye, the focal point, the Glory. For a moment you understood it all:

He was the storm.

He strode between the waters like a pillar, like Atlas beneath the skies; you imagine him reaching to the heavens with an arm of stone and bearing the storm with his might. The world. He was bearing the world with his might. Take courage!

And all this while, he was staring at you.

Dimly a word appears in your mind: charisma. The eyes of the man of stone wearing a garment of the storm were like deep, deep wells. You see love, justice, care and beauty in his dark eyes, you see an assuredness that has spilled over into his followers' lives. You would give it all up for this man. You did. Come.

A mere man would have drowned, but this person was so much more. As the waves buffet your craft, you climb slowly out of your boat, and begin to walk.