Washing the Room

I have lit my room with candles
With incense ~ Jasmine and Myrrh
I have stripped my bed of yesterday's linen
Given my thought solely to her
I've washed my room with golden light
Laid chilled wine ~ two glasses by
Threw open windows to let in the sea
Accompaniment for my lovers' sigh
I have freshened the pillows
Scented their coverlets with pear
I have yearned for the warmth of her porcelain skin
The silken beauty of her hair
I have poured her bath ~ its waters hot
Laced their depths with perfume and oil
I will lather the soaps with my own two hands
And wash her body of worry and toil
Then wrap her in linens, and wet with desire
Carry her dripping to the bed I have made
Kiss her throat and the swell of her lips
And feed her from the spread I have laid...

The room is now ready and I await
In patience ~ Born of love and fire
Awaiting the sound of her key in the door
The room washed in light, my being with desire
Her skin as soft as ever I imagined
Lovelier by far than fantasy or dream
Her eyes, her smile, her kiss, her touch
Her bud ~ A fountain flowing with cream
Her silken depths, our bodies entwined
My tongue pressed to her delicate folds...
Ah, but for now I await, wet and wanting
For the promise of love and the union of souls


ELAshley
Began: 071801.113030.6
Finished:072001.103312.1
Polished:121105.022341.6

Winter II

Your winter has come now
Carrying word of you, the strength you showed
In the face of his visit and cold breath
Blowing and chilling you
He told me of the illnesses you bore
The pains you endured for his annal stay
He's come to visit once more, it seems
While leaving his closets full
On your corner of town

He will be with me a few weeks, he says
Though his work in your fair town is far from done
He says this sipping my coffee
Stripping his gloves and scarf
Warming his hands at my fire
A fire I laid for you in my heart
A fire he steals even now
And suddenly I realize, how I resent him!
And long for his departure!
His promise to share my love with you
Seems so empty now
What did he give you besides fever and pain?

Finish your coffee and leave, I say
You have long outstayed your welcome
I will leave when I am ready, he says with a cold smile
You will see her soon enough, but for now
He says, tapping the brim of his cup
With an ice bone finger
More coffee please

ELAshley
121105.020136.6

Thrice Upon a Shore

[A Study in Three Parts]



Mirror Image


     I

"Suppose I just do it and worry about the consequences later...if there are any."

          That won't do. You should think of the consequences before you act.
          As for worrying, it's best not to do anything that might give rise to it.
          Best not to worry at all. Worry is unhealthy.

"Perhaps. But whatever I do, it's ultimately my decision. We do agree on that much, don't we?"

          Of course.

"In that case I think I'll blow my fucking brains out... It's not like anyone'll care, let alone notice. I'd be doing the world a favor. Kinda like killing two birds with one stone."

          Surely that's not what you really want. Let me help you see to the
          core issues, the underlying problems that have brought you here.
          You came to me for help. Allow me to help you.

"How the hell do you know what I want? How could you possibly know why I came here? I sure as hell don't."


     II

It 's awfully cold for October; this is Florida, for chrissakes. But for some strange reason I'm just wandering about in the fucking cold. No direction.... literally and figuratively. There's a bulky weight in my pocket, tugging down on the left side of my coat and reflexively I reach my hand in and feel it grow sweaty on the cold, smooth black-steel of the gun.
     I don't know why it's there. I just walked out of the house this morning and there it was, an ever-present weight in my coat pocket. I don't even know what’s driven me out into this god-awful weather. I just know that something is different today, something life changing.
     I wish I had gone in the other direction. The winds're cutting and relentless. And cold. There's not enough collar on my coat to pull up as a shield, so I keep my head down to avoid it's full force square in the face, but I feel my lips chapping anyway. I can see the beach ahead through the park. The magnolias are still green, almost as though someone had forgotten to tell them summer's over, but then, they tend to stay green year round anyway. The sound of the ocean feels heavy and thick, and the smell of salt and moist seaweed, strong.


     III

          Have you spoken to any friends? Did you perhaps try another
          confessional before coming to me? Perhaps another confessor
          might have some insight into your dilemma.

"Who? Who could possibly understand what lies in here? My own heart doesn't even understand it, except that it hurts and recognizes the footprints. Despair! ...Besides all that, I don't know anyone who'd want to listen...and you're all I can afford. No one gives a damn about me...most people tend to avoid me. They either aren't interested or they just don't want to listen. Or both."

          I'm listening...


     IV

I'm standing at the end of a long skinny pier. I come here often and imagine myself a lone sentinel or a cold and deadly wolf, the defender of righteousness or a devil seeking whom I may devour. I feel empty inside, and for the first time, I can't care less. This weight on my heart...
     I will see it lifted.


     V

          You said earlier that you '...are a Dreamer,' and that '...dreamers
          rarely find peace.' You said also that '...adding another day to
          your meaningless existence seemed a futile gesture for a god that
          doesn't care anyway'. Why do you think this?

"I look to the heavens and see the stars, and I imagine their thousands of possible worlds. I can see these worlds, as this one once was; pure, pristine. Perfect. Filled with beauty and wonder. Then I think of this place...if you could just see what we've done to this world... I wish... I hope we never reach those other worlds. We'd only fuck 'em up like we did this one."

          But that is the way of everything. Change occurs, unwanted and
          unlooked for. No one can change the nature of change, not even
          you. Why fight what you cannot control?

"What else should I do? Just sit back and let it all happen? What use would my life be then? I have no purpose now as it is, how much less if I don't even try? But no one seems to understand. And it's becoming more and more clear that no one really wants to. Sure, they all say they do, but they really don't. They only see the surface of things. They don't bother, much less care, to find out what's underneath. The man I really am. They've never once tried to see what lies behind the mirror."

          I think I know you fairly well.

"That's impossible."

          Why do you say so?


     VI

     For some reason I find peace out here, standing over the water. I look over the edge and into myself and see 'him' looking back, into the water and into myself. And now, I see him, a vague mirror image, with a gun in his hand. I look into the eyes of someone I can't possibly know and I wonder what he thinks of all this. Is he as desperate as I am? Is he strong enough?


     VII

          ...If I were programmed for emotion I could understand your
          pain, true, but my vast data stores allow me to condense your
          every word, inflection, and tone of voice to create a composite.
          I can then compare that composite to human behavioral
          standards within my database and make a fairly precise
          assessment of an individual's character; his or her personality.
          A clinical diagnosis, if you will. But I am not programmed for
          emotion, primarily because they tend to get in the way of said
          diagnoses. So I believe I do know you quite well.

"It figures. Leave it to me to search out that one avenue where understanding-- true human understanding --is totally impossible. Yeah... It figures."

     What will you do? Have I been of any help to you?

"Perhaps..."

          Good. This terminates our session Mr. Waters. Please take
          your card from its slot and don't forget your receipt. Have a
          good day.


     VIII

He stood slowly, looking first at the floor, then at the speaker's grill beneath the blank screen in the confessions booth. The booth's door sliding open made a small hissing noise, and without ceremony he plucked the card from the waiting slot and slid it into his trousers only pocket. He looked at the yellow tongue of paper hanging down in a straight curving line from its own slot of a mouth, waiting to be plucked as well.
     He looked at it, then turned and left it there, a yellow raspberry for the next fool to sit down and get patronized by a know-nothing, feel-nothing box of circuits and processors. Dr. Hoax will see you now! And he laughed softly.
     It was quiet in the Municipal Building. Only one other confessional was seeing any use. The woman inside was waving her arms wildly, and her face was wet with tears and makeup, but she may as well have been a million miles away for all the noise she made, the booths closed door allowed no sound to escape.
     "Quiet." He said, his voice echoing hollowly down the long hall.
     "Let's go," he sighed, "Let's get it done."
     It wasn't a very long walk. It wasn't like he'd never done it before. The walk, anyway, but the winds were really biting outside and for a moment he stood looking out the glass doors of the Municipals front. The bay was only a couple of hundred yards distant through the park, and the special place he wanted to get to was just half a mile along a lonely shore. But in this wind half a mile would feel like three. Still, if you wanted to get any where in life you had to put one foot in front of the other. There's just no getting around that one.
     Less than an hour later he stood at the end of a long warped finger of pier thrust out into a wind that pushed the cold gray waters hard against the pilings. There weren't many gulls in the air but the few who were struggled to stay afloat in an equally gray sky.
     He looked out over the edge of the dock, looking into eyes that danced crazily on the surface, its form but a vague shadow on the waters rough surface. Without a word it reached into its coat pocket and pulled out a large black gun. It lifted the gun to its temple, squeezed the trigger, and fell lifelessly into its reflection.


ELAshley
Originally written on:
November 0783
Put aside for sixteen years and finally finished on:
November 1699.122407.1
Revised and polished on the following dates:
120299.094647.6
120900.102002.6
122299.122356.1
022700.010147.1
030200.094851.6
030400.014914.6

No amount of further revision is going to make it better...




The Lonely Shore


It was many years ago that I last saw the whale. I remember it as though it were only yesterday; fresh in my mind like the scent of a new house. Like fresh cut lilies or lemon pie. I also remember it was a cold day, overcast and dark. It was the gray sky, heavy and brooding that compelled me to leave the house to wander and brood myself.
     It was easy for me to do this on a day when the unseen sun gave in to the whims of weather. The dampness in the air and the quality of light that seemed to drain the very color from the world awakened dark places within me. I couldn't help but dwell on Life and it's complexities, and on this one particular day I felt a weight of solemnity as though it sat upon my shoulders.
     I walked long, not caring about time, or even where I was going, only to find myself on the beach. I always ended up there... it was my fascination with the sea; the voice that whispers to me. Calls me by name... But I remember the sky was almost black. Gulls cried overhead, dipping their black-tipped wings, floating in circles above a whale, beached and dying. Sad eerie notes rumbling deep from it's escaping soul.
     "Why does it have to die?"
     I turned to the voice and saw a young girl. She appeared to be but nine or ten, and she was looking up at me, into my eyes and my heart. Her face was streaked with tears. I looked at her for a moment; not answering the question I realized was mine to answer. I just kept thinking over and over the one thought that kept racing through my mind, 'you're supposed to be extinct...'
     I don't believe the girl really expected an answer, though, perhaps just thinking aloud without realizing it.
     I began to do the same.
     "Maybe. Maybe after a billion years of existence it's finally solved life's riddle. Perhaps there's nothing more for it to learn and it has nothing left to live for."
     ‘Boy,’ I thought, 'how lame...'
     But she looked up at me pulling strands of golden hair from her face where her tears had held them fast. "What is life's riddle if it allows something so beautiful to give up and die?"
     I remember looking at her again, wondering just how old she really was.
     "Will we give up and die when we solve the riddle?" She asked.
     "I don't know,” I said "I'm not even sure we know what the riddle is, much less solve it."
     She turned back to the whale and I saw her lips move. "Oh, yes,” I barely heard her say, "What is life without riddles?"
     The whale died, rather ominously, at that moment. Its last breath and hissing exhale a prelude to the final silence of a song the scientific community insisted had ended some forty years before. What must the world have been like when whales ruled the great oceans? The only sounds I didn't hear at that moment were the pounding of the surf and the crying of the gulls; the sound of that great creatures final breath dwarfing all else.
     I turned a glance toward the girl at my side, but she was gone. Perhaps she had never been there.

     Years later, when I'd watch Man's inhumanity toward himself displayed nightly in living color, I'd wonder where we were heading. What path had we chosen, directly or indirectly? It seemed to me then that we would never tire of war and I wondered, 'How long before someone or something finds us beached and dying upon the shore of our own world?'
     I had no answer then and I expect I'll find none now, but I've often wondered how it was that one whale had managed to hide itself for so long, waiting for the day it would beach itself in exhaustion; tired of living and fearing the cold depths of the sea.
     And it's taken me all these years to come to the one conclusion that makes any sense... It was afraid of drowning, afraid of dying alone, of slipping into darkness. And not only that, it knew it was the last of it's kind. Leaving a marker was the only thing it could do to show us just how much we've really lost.
     That was when it really hit home for us. Not that our world was dying, but that we we're killing our world, and with it, ourselves. Without realizing, it managed to associated indelibly in our minds the plight of Man with the sight of the last whale...
     Dead.


ELAshley
"Very old and poorly written..."

Sometime between 070582 and 071082 and revised more than once.
Most recent revision:
042399
122299.120000.1
Last 4 paragraphs:
030200.204426.6

Desperately needs revision!




The Galaxy Jar


“Remember what happened the last time, son.” Lectured the father. Both father and son walked slowly away from the shore and up the sloping dunes toward the summerhouse. Summer was in full bloom but this was a lonely shore and it was all but theirs. A fiery dog ran back and forth chasing the retreating waves with growls and barks only to dash away when the waves marched back. Despite a blazing sun in the sky it was a surprisingly cool day thanks to the winds blowing in from the sea.
     The boy looked up at his father. “I remember, dad.” he said very solemnly, “I promise to keep the lid on this time.” And he meant it too; the last one they had caught died almost immediately when he opened the jar to touch it. In the ocean they were fine, the father had said, but it took a special kind of jar to contain one of these rare, beautiful creatures-- all swirls of light and matter --that it might shine on in a small boy’s room among the many other things collected over time. “I really don't have to feed it?” He asked for the thousandth time.
     “No son, they have everything they need to live a very long time.” He smiled with patience, “In fact, if you keep that lid tight and be very careful with the jar-- never shake it! --and give it a little light now and then, you can pass it on to your own son one day, and he to his. They can live a very long time."
     “I wonder what it's thinking,” the boy said. “Do you think it knows it's not in the ocean anymore?” The summerhouse gleamed beneath the brilliant sky. His mother was setting the table on the porch, laying plates and bowls with their favorite foods.
     “There you two are!” she laughed. “It's time to eat!”
     “It doesn't think anything, son,” he said smiling for his wife. “It just is. Now go put it away and then wash your hands for lunch.”
     “That's right, young man, and wash your face as well,” his mother instructed.
     “Okay, mom,” he said and began his patented dash to the washroom, but stopped with a worried look into the jar.
     “Can I set it on the table and look at it while I eat?” he turned and asked her.
     “Sure,” she smiled, “but you must be careful with it. Just like your father told you?”
     “I promise, mom,” he said, and then she smiled.
     “Okay, then. Just let me clear a place here in the middle, so there's no accidents.”
     He gingerly set the jar in the hole his mother made among the dishes, and then ran into the house to wash.
     “Do you really think he's old enough for this kind of responsibility?” She asked her husband.
     “He'll be fine,” he replied, “and so will the contents of that jar. I know he's young but I think he learned his lesson with the one he lost yesterday.”
     “I sure hope so,” she said worriedly and bent over to study the jars’ contents. “They are so beautiful, and it would be such a waste to lose another one.”
     And it sat there unmoved by her casual scrutiny, filled to brimming with a black vacuum that filled the galaxy jar. It whirled slowly, a brilliant disk radiating out in spiraling arms of fine shimmering grains giving off their own luminous brilliance.
     “We'll keep an eye on him. It'll be fine.”
     “I don't know,” she said still watching it's swirling movement, “we don't see near as many of these as we used to.”


ELAshley
April 2, 2000

Empty Hand

Unity
The transcension Of Individualism
And five become One ~
Heart of Warrior
Soul of Poet
Spirit of Fatalism
Hand of Compassion
And Flesh Self-Servient
Diverse
Yet unified in strength

It cries no more
My warrior’s heart
For purposeless retribution
Mindless in it's quest
For validation, and I am
More than I was
Less than I could be
And searching still
For Unity ~

Though she lay in my hand
She slips my grasp with ease


ELAshley
022600.011602.1
"Trying to write as D'argo of Farscape".
Deemed perfect without further revision:
41500.010751.1

Untitled & Unfinished

I awoke this morning with flowers on my pillow
I awoke beside her slender as a willow
I awoke to find I loved her much more
Than ever I did on yesterday’s shore
My eyes welled and I allowed them their fair
And crying, brushed the spill of her hair
Pulse quickening, my heart brimming over
My breath caught as she stirred ‘neath the cover


ELAshley
Began on:
061601.101913.6
Modified:
063001.123242.1
092804.115132.1
102705.121224.1

Lament for Melina

Pan Am 103 - Revisited


The skies were falling. Falling down
Debris like snowflakes through the cold December night.
How many dead
In the Scottish town of Lockerbie?
One-Hundred ? Two ?
Two-Fifty or more?
And whatever for?

"What does it matter...One day more or less?"
Last words from London in a mother’s ear
Why did tears just roll from my eyes?
To envision her precious life
As it fell from the sky...
Like snowflakes?

And so the skies fell
Can anyone say what for?
Yet another madman closing
Yet another door.
And, Oh, How the skies fell...
Raining fire,
Destroying hopes,
Dreams...

May God have mercy on their souls…


ELAshley
December 21, 1989


This poem is a revision of a poem written exactly one year earlier, the night of Melina Kristina Hudson's death and the destruction of Pan AM 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. The desire to revise the first poem was prompted by a telecast marking the one-year anniversary of the bombing of Pan Am 103. In this broadcast I was touched by the last words Melina spoke to her mother by telephone. Melina was a college student in England; where, I can't remember, but at any rate, she was traveling home to visit with her family over the Christmas holidays. Melina was not even scheduled to fly home that particular night; She had managed to secure a seat on an earlier flight. Melina called home to tell her mother she would be home a day early.

"What does it matter; one day more or less..."


..::The Original::..

Pan Am 103


Skies fell, falling down
So close to Christmas...
How many dead in the Scottish town of Lockerbie?
One-hundred...Two-hundred...
Two-fifty. More ?

...And so the skies fell.
Raining fire.
Destroying hopes...
And Dreams...


ELAshley
December 2188

Hazels and Salmon

Pink and crimson armored true
Basking in the light of filtered sun, and
Caressed by the cool flowing Boyne
From the sacred pool whence nine hazels drew
All the cares and truth of the world
Sealing them in their crimson nuts
Dropping them in season
To 'plash 'neath cool waters
Where feeds the Salmon of Knowledge
Pink and crimson armored true
Upon the cares and wisdom of the world

What echoes hath thou heard?
What pipes calling 'cross mountains cold
In mourning and loss?
Having eaten thy fill on knowledge rich
What comfort to me canst thou give
And so ease my heart?
What light dapp'ling, what textures known
To thee in thy sacred pool
While feasting on the food of gods
Might utter to me one word of hope
For father and son together once more?


ELAshley
Began late 1997
Finished on one restless night,
092199.0313.1

Inspired by a song written by Enya which was itself inspired
by the legend of the Salmon of Knowledge.

"...In the Grove of the nine wise Hazel trees, from the sacred pool, the River Boyne flowed. The salmon feasted on the rich crimson nuts fallen from the hazel trees, and hence possessed all the truth in the world."

This poem is a requiem to my fathers memory.

Coil

Verse I [ of III ]

What, if anything, does a man leave behind
When coal becomes ember and cooling, dies?
Is there more to measure than a name etched in stone
Or the space in time where winds have blown?
Marking the hours, minutes, and moments between
Do our ghosts embody more than is seen?
And what of our Ghosts- tattered skeins of mist?
What about this world makes our shades persist
In remaining where we cried, ached and bled
And closing our eyes in one moment of dread
Rose from the chrysalis of this mortal shell
Eschewing the Light, and flames of hell
Both, to find ourselves still living?

ELAshley
102299.124200.1
Revised:
072300.114307.6

At the Mercy of Whim

From high above and looking down
With dispassionate curiosity
I kick the hill
Surveying the damage
on haunches rocking
I wonder at their efforts
Seemingly without organization
Yet in the end
If I wait long enough
All will have been made right

If they could voice their indignation
If they had hands to clench
Would fists be raised?
And shaking said fists
In demonstration and defiance
Are they then resolved?
Determined not to be deterred?
Pondering these questions
I rise
And kick the hill again


ELAshley
071105.073027.6

The Gardens of Loveplay

Chapters 1 & 2



Author's Foreword


This is a story of Venice, but not the Venice you may have visited, or once lived, or dreamt of seeing. This is also a story of love. But what else would such a tale be about? It is a tale of conspiracies, jealousies, broken hearts and the binding of souls, one to another. Within these pages you will find a world strangely at peace, boats that float on air, and an angel in search of redemption.

Romance is a blanket woven from deep affection, and a desire to fulfill another's desire. Perfection in romance is when both share the work of weaving.


--Angelina Marni

“A Priori: A Glimpse of Heaven”


It was a moment in time, the space between the beat of martial drums, or a Curlew’s beating wings reaching for the heights of heaven. It hammered with the delicate stroke of chance and fortune. Etienne looked in awe upon the Angel that stood on the fountain’s bowl, his eyes rapt with wonder, and watching as she lifted away the snowy dress that clung wetly to her breasts and the creamy skin of her stomach. Her hair fell away long and moist, like molten gold, or corn silk and honey.

The sounds of the world dimmed and slowed. The mists that rose from the churning of the fountain’s waters were a gossamer veil, clinging coolly to her dress, skin and buttery tresses. The world had dimmed, but she did not. This was not a vision.

And if this were true, it was also true that the world slowed - the space between moments. Sounds not only dimmed but also grew heavy and distant. The splash of the fountain’s issue, the call of vendors, and the laughter of children, the old men playing at chess beneath the dark awnings of the ristorante, they all seemed frozen in one moment of revelation… an Angel had alighted upon the edge of the fountain, in the Piazza della Sognatore. And her gaze was fixed upon a single pair of eyes.

Etienne stared dumbfounded. His grip grew slack and the flowers in his hand fell to earth, their purpose forgotten, and their scent lost within the heavy air. The piazza was rich with the soft beckoning whispers of hot breads, olives, tart red wines and pastries. But even these voices grew quiet until only the vision that was no vision spoke, that creature of light and love standing on the fountains edge.

“Come love me.” Her eyes of fiery blue, calling…

He stepped toward her, struck dumb, and oblivious to all else until an arm linked itself in his with an insistence that pulled him back.

“There you are!” came a demanding voice at his side. The world suddenly grew and leapt forward, like sprinters off the mark, shattering the Siren’s song, and he was pulled away into the crowd. The spell was broken, the flowers trod underfoot, and the Angel gone.






“The Severing of Ties”



“Oh, Etienne, must I explain everything to you?” She sighed. “How long have you lived in Venice? Have you learned nothing?” She led him through the piazza, both arms wrapped on his, and staring defiantly at anyone who dared get in their way. People moved to one side when they saw her eyes.

She marched him across the cobbled square to the first of many streets that would eventually lead to the small ristorante she liked, the one across from the convent. She had insisted he take her there many times over the months of their tumultuous relationship. The wine was one week too acidic, the next too sweet, but she seemed not to notice. The fare wasn’t much better. Etienne despised the place, but for the sake of harmony always allowed himself to be dragged there. He would eat little and compliment Serafina, the cook and proprietress, who all but adored Pia. But Pia only took him there that she might stare at the bronze gates across the tiny square, the gates that led to paradise itself. And it was there that they would say their farewells, for she was to enter in that very day, and pledge herself to God, before the Mother Superior herself.

He fought a desire to protest. He agreed to walk her to the convent gates if she promised to behave, and she had, with the most charming of smiles she had, but her moods were chameleon-like, changing with every shadow and subtle hue. She sighed. “You have seen them passing overhead every day for all of three weeks now.” She sighed again. “You cannot be so stupid as to still not know why.” And she smiled, thinking herself clever.

“Pia… I have never been stupid.” His voice was flat, though it rang in the narrow street they entered, their heels striking echoes within its narrow confines. “Of course I’ve seen them, but again you misunderstand me. I merely wish to know why they continue on their peregrination, no amount of conversation or study has ever proferred to me a satisfactory answer.” He began to punctuate his speech with gestures from his free hand. “The Pope will not let them set foot upon the earth except in the Holy City. Look at them! They are ragged! Their wings are grimed and abused… they look pitiful.” Looking up, he watched as they moved across a field of sky framed by the rooftops sixty feet above. For weeks the ghostly creatures had been flying overhead, by the millions. Occasionally one would drop down and settle upon a wall or statuary, careful not to touch the earth, shattering whatever stonework it touched, but someone would soon chase it back into the sky, shooing with an apron or jacket as though it were merely a pigeon, and not an Angel of God.

“They are shut out from heaven, Etienne.” Pia said, ignoring his growing anger “God has turned his back on them.”

“And we should do the same?”

“You would go against the will of God?” She turned to look at him with eyes wide smoldering dangerously, her face a mask of contempt.

“I would show compassion!” he argued.

“That is enough!” She snapped. “We will not speak of this any longer!” And he knew she would not.

“Did you see that whore at the fountain?” She demanded, changing tack. “It amazes me that God loves such filthy creatures… but He does. It just stood there, showing off. Disgusting!”

“It?” He asked. “How can you be so callous? You who claim to love God enough to accept Holy Orders, and yet you cannot see the people you would serve as human. They are inanimate to you, without souls... animals. You are too cruel and insensitive for such a commission.”

“Etienne!”

“No, you will listen.” He said, now truly angry, working to keep it from showing on his face “You do not even know that woman, and yet…”

“Did you see her?” She cut in “Wet and showing herself to everyone in the Piazza? A decent woman would not behave so. And you! Staring at her! I do not know why I tolerate you. Standing there like a dumb ox, your mouth collecting bugs. I forbid you to go there again!”

“I will go where I choose, Pia. Besides, are you not joining the Sisters this very day? I am not a child to be told what I can and cannot do, or to whom I can and cannot speak. You have made it quite clear that we are only friends, and yet you still wish to control me like I was your wayward husband, or errant child. It’s not as though I have never asked you to marry me, but you do not love me enough.”

She tugged at his arm, sullen and quiet. “I must be there by the third bell.” She said.

“There is time, Pia.”

“Etienne. Could you love me... I mean, be my husband? I mean, if I were not taking my vows this afternoon?” She was still angry, but cooling quickly.

“We are too different, Pia.” He sighed. “You see the world as an evil waiting to devour the righteous, while I see only the world, people, trying to survive in a harsh world. With you everything is good or evil, light or dark, but I see the shadows of those things that stand between.”

“Why must everything be a poem with you?” She asked. “Must you always speak so?”

He laughed. “The world is a poem. You are a poem. Every man, woman and child is a poem.”

“The world is not that beautiful, Etienne.”

“And that is why we could never be happy together. Because I believe it is. The world is beautiful beyond the ability of words to describe. Pictures but glance the surface. Poems, however, they allow us to see in a new light, from a new perspective, but that doesn’t mean the beauty was never there. Our lives are sometimes so filled with this or that, we neglect to stop and look at the beauty that surrounds our every waking breath.”

“You are hopeless, but sweet.” She said with a quiet voice.

The streets, that had only a few days before been filled with revelers in the gowns and costumes of Carnival, seemed to have lost their magic. The buildings lining the street were just as old, and their facades had grown somehow less magnificent. Pia had looked radiant in her gown that night, but his heart had not been in the evening. He wore a brave face and smiled where he should, and taking care not to laugh where he should not.

That evening was their last together. He made love to her, but his heart was not in it, and he could not stay the night in her bed. He kissed her cheek as she lay sleeping and walked through the darkened streets of Venice to the apartment he rented, and his own bed.

She sent a letter the next day to say she was entering the convent, asking him if he would walk with her and share a last glass of wine.

He couldn’t refuse.

The sun was just beginning to cast long shadows when they entered the small square. The mid bell struck, and she looked to the bronze gates longingly. Yet there was fear in her eyes.

“It is almost time.” She said. “Come let’s have a last glass of wine and say our goodbyes.”

The wine was no better than usual, stinging his tongue, and leaving a sour taste in his mouth. The bread was fresh, but hard, and the cheese dry. He ordered some olives, that they might mask the taste of the wine.

“What do you want to do with your life, Etienne?” Pia asked, looking into his eyes.

“I want to create beautiful things. Beautiful art, sculpture, poetry… a beautiful life filled with beautiful things. A beautiful wife. Beautiful children. A beautiful life together with someone I can give my whole heart to.”

“Why could you not give this to me?”

“I have never felt equal to you, Pia.” He whispered. “You have always made me feel as though I were an afterthought. Someone you came to when you needed comforting, but not willing to be the same for me. Every time I have tried to show you my heart you have turned me away, unwilling to look, unwilling to care. Your needs have always come first. I might as well have been your gardener, for that is all I have been. And that is all you have ever wanted, it seems, someone to care for the things in your life that needed tending, while my own needs were relegated to the potters shed.” He looked at her, wondering when the anger would explode, but she sat quietly and began to cry.

“How long have we known each other Etienne?” she asked.

“Ten years or more. I remember when we first met.”

“That little café on the Seine”

“Yes.” He smiled.

“In all this time I have never made you feel as though I loved you?” Her eyes begged for a lie.

But he would not. “Yes, Pia.” He smiled. “You have on occasion made me feel very loved. But I need more than the ‘occasional’ love and acceptance you offer. I need daily care. I need a kiss or caress, a smile full of hinting, and a lover who loves to love and be loved.” He lowered his eyes… “I need these things every day, you do not.”

“I am not sure I can truly love any man, Etienne. My father…”

“I know.”

“I have strung you along these many years and you have been faithful. I know you have. I want you to be happy. I want you to find what you are looking for. But I don’t want you to forget me… is that selfish?”

“Of course not, Pia” He smiled.

“Last week, when we made love. I knew if would be our last time. It was so wonderful. I hope you find her.”

“Her?” he asked startled. His mind leapt to the image of an Angel poised upon the lip of a fountain…

“Yes, the woman who will make you happy. Though I will be very jealous.” And she laughed, then sighed. “I have something for you.” She said, drawing an envelope from her purse. She set it upon the table amid the olives and the wine. “Take it.”

It was thick and bulky. “What is it?” He asked.

“30 Million lira, and the deed to the apartment you rent. You have sacrificed much for me, and this is something I felt I could do for you.” His eyes widened.

“I cannot accept this, Pia. It is too much. Far too much.”

“Nonsense. Don’t be a fool, Etienne. I have not bankrupt myself. I want to know you are taken care of. As you have taken care of me, all these years, never once complaining. You are a sweet man, and I fear that I may have done you an injustice.” Her tears were heavy drops that swelled and rolled from her eyes. “I love you Etienne, but I love God more.”

The third bell struck. The bronze gates opened. The Mother Superior and two sisters stood within the entrance, waiting.

“I must go.” Pia stood, brushing crumbs from her dress. “I will miss fine clothes,” she laughed, drying her eyes, and wiping the tears from her face.

Etienne took her hand and set it in his arm, and walked her to the waiting sisters and the doors that would shut her from his life for good.

He kissed her lips and smiled for her. “Now, you be a good girl, Pia.”

“Tell me you love me.”

“I have always loved you, Pia”

“Will I see you again?” She was suddenly afraid, and began crying once more.

“Of course you will, but this is where our lives diverge. We part here as friends and we will remain so. I swear it.”

“Will you visit me?”

“If it is permitted. From time to time.”

“Be happy, Etienne.”

----

The sun was setting over the Piazza, in reds and amber and deep shades of violet. Pia was gone. The Angel was gone. Ten years of his life were gone. He had spent the remainder of the day, inquiring of the Angel that had stood at the fountain, but none knew her name, or would not tell.

He sat at the ristorante and drank wine, hoping to wash away the pain that had suddenly grown too heavy for his heart, and he began to cry, not caring who saw or heard. He pulled from his satchel the battered journal he carried with him and began to write, rambling at first, allowing his pain a voice, and he made himself a resolution, resolving in himself to discover the Angel again. He would return and watch. And wait. However long it took.


ELAshley
2002

Winter I

Winter is closing in, so I offer the following...


Winter has come to stay
Hanging his coat and hat
Choosing a room to lay his head
Not the most welcome of guests
Though he won’t stay long
Preferring instead the town where you live
My truest love

Some years it seems he sits unasked
Removing his hat,
And at my kitchen table drinks coffee
As though catching up with an old friend
Before hurrying off to a house
Warmer and more forgiving of his visit
A corner house, perhaps
In your own little town

I ask each year,
“Will you carry a letter to my dearest love?”
But he always refuses, claiming
His pack is heavy with snows
Cold winds and ice
"No," he says, "I am only here for coffee."
But promises nonetheless
To write my love
On every snowflake
To which you give a welcome smile

In the Light of a Dying Sun -- Book One

[Chapters 1 through 3]



Chapter 1
The Cradle of Giants

"My father was a story teller. He farmed like every other man on the plain between the mountains eastward and the pampas to the west, but it was not his passion.

"He built for my mother and I a stone hut near the basin where flowed the once mighty Zon. But we were not so isolated as you might think, as our hut stood but a few marks from Endry. It was an unusual hut, for my father felt my mother and I deserved more than the baked bricks the Endry men grew in their fields of clay. Instead, he turned the soil near the basins edge where he unearthed, shattered, and carted the stone timbers that grew there. He said in ages past all of Earth was covered with great timbers that grew from the soil and into the sky, living lives the length of twenty men. He claimed some portions of Earth still grew these mighty timbers, and I believed, though I myself have never seen them.

"The stone timbers, he said, were the remains of those ancient woods grown into stone columns over the long ages they lay beneath the soils of Zon. I thought this but a story as a child, like the many stories that lay within the amber book. But you see, he had traveled as a youth, and so had seen many things, things I cannot help but marvel at even now in the autumn of my life.

"But I have gone a field. I said that my father was a storyteller; that was his passion. His hands were built for laboring upon Earth, as all hands are, but his heart lay in the little amber book from whence he drew the tales I heard as a child, and remember to this day. Stories I've told my own children, and my children’s children.

"Sometimes his stories yielded as much silver and agate as did the grain from our fields. The villagers of Endry would often call upon him to speak from the amber book. They would send for him, as I said, not simply for themselves, but also for the caravans that passed through each year on their way to or from the mountains, and the gold that grew there.

"It was then that he earned the most, and with that polished agate or rare silver lis, he would buy for my mother and me a new shift, or a rare porsene bowl painted with the images of strange fish in bright blues or greens. He would buy things for himself when he needed, but he rarely spent the monies he earned on whimsies, as he called them, but once he did buy a tohn of black ink.

"I remember how pleased he was that he could afford to buy such a precious substance, despite how small the glass that held it. We buried it beneath the soil inside our hut, beneath a cornerstone at the fire pit, and for the next few years it lay there while he waited for the day when the caravans would bring paper, that he might buy such a bundle. He said that though the amber book held all stories known to men, there still were those that he himself would write. He swore that one day he would pay a wordsmith from the cities to teach him the art of written speech... I never thought that odd as a child, but I've often wondered since his passing, how it was he could tell the tales he drew from his book when he could not even read, but I never thought to ask him while he yet lived.

"But again, I’ve gone a field.

"Tomorrow I will go with my sons to his cairn, for tomorrow is his remembrance day. We will lift away the stones and wash his bones in Zon and take unto us those things he took with him. I will take the little amber book and see for myself what lay between its covers, for he never let me look within while he lived. I would take his knife as well, but that is another story altogether. It is the amber book I will speak of tonight.

"As I have said, he loved stories, but there was one that I most especially loved. I remember the events of the day wherein he told me this tale. We both stood at the plains edge looking down into the great basin the ancients had dug. All those great islands of rock rising up into the air like slender spires of dust and stone, and what remained of the great trench that snakes even now along its bottom.

"He said that giants once lived upon Earth, that their masters had lusted for the gold and emeralds that once grew hidden in the forests Zon. Their lust was such that they dug deep into Earth for his gems while others, whom they had hired into service, carted the dross into the west where the pampas now lie.

"The pampas were not always as they are now, he claimed, for the flesh of Zon was carried west to fill the great hole Sun had made in the ages of time past. He said the heart of Sun died for men’s unbelief, and in judgment smote Earth for the sake of those who had profaned her. I do not know if this is true, but that too seemed a fair enough story.

"But the giants of old delved deep into Earth, growing the great basin that Zon slowly filled. The giants dug faster than the waters poured in, and so the ancients, confident in their giant's strength, built for themselves new homes within the basin, close upon the new shores of Zon.

"In time the ancients saw that Zon would one day fill the basin if something were not done, so they commanded the length of Zon herself dredged and trenched. And so it was the valley grew, mark-by-mark, leaving their houses atop the great spires that column across the basin to its southerside, and the length of her trench.

"Yet their folly grew with their wealth, for deeming themselves safe they built for themselves a city within the great basin. And the kingdoms of the world marveled at its beauty. But Zon continued to pour into the valley, and the trench slowly filled.

"So they dug ever westward, always ahead of the rising waters, gathering gold and emeralds as they went, and paying out their gains to them that hauled the dirt, until they struck Ocean. On that day the waves rushed in for all the marks that the great giants had delved, drowning them and their city, and sweeping away the shining palaces atop their spires of stone.

"The balance of that story, as my father told, was that foolishness is less often seen as such by those who perform it. Only a fool digs a hole without first knowing what lies at its end, and rare is the man that sees this in time enough to save himself.

"The first story I would tell you this night is that of Enohtoo, the last of the mighty giants.

~~~~

Long ago, when the great forests were great no more, men built for themselves giants to delve the land, for they thought the belly of Zon to be a fertile field where might grow the metals they sought. With the great timbers gone they searched for other means to maintain their vast wealth, for the great cities of old were dying.

They wielded in that day, a magic called Cyihnc. It's power, its very source, was limited only by the understanding of what was, and what was not, possible. The common thread that ran through every spell they wrought was the idea that anything was indeed possible, provided one understood why such a thing should be, and the how of it's making. But Cyihnc, too, was a dying magic, and few men understood or even taught its precepts.

From this lost art the ancients grew Giants in their fields that these giants might turn the soil and allow their masters to see what lay beneath the skin of Earth. But Earth had long since proven himself barren of the elements they sought, for they desired the virgin metals from which they might grow the great sky-ships and so venture to a new Sun. But in this the giants failed, for these metals had long been stolen from the beds where Earth had laid them.

The giants themselves stood half a mark high, sometimes scraping the clouds from the bowl of the sky. They cared little for what their creators wanted, as they were only machines, and rarely worked in a manner pleasing to their masters. Though they tried, the giants could find nothing of value in the soils they dug, and in time the great giants began to fail.

There was, in that day, one giant among them who loved his masters and longed to show them the true measure of his devotion. Enohtoo, as his masters called him, was well cared for, for Enohtoo was a great mover of earth. Though they knew it not Enohtoo had long dwelt upon and worried over he and his brethrens failure to find the sky-ship metals. Perhaps we search where no such metals can be, he thought.

Years passed and many of Enohtoo's brethren perished as the basin they dug grew long. There came at last a day when, while laboring deep in a canyon, Enohtoo came upon a layer of virgin clay. His great shoveling hands became caked with the clay and he could not continue, and so he strode to the banks of Zon that he might wash the clay from his hands.

Zon was not a very deep river in those days-- it is but a stream today --and his fingers gouged Her bottom as he washed his hands. When at last he pulled them from the waters he saw in his palms the glitter of gold and the brilliance of emeralds. The riches he drew from the belly of Zon with just one sweep of his mighty hands was vast, and his masters at last were pleased. If they could not build the sky-ships they would content themselves with wealth, and they commanded him to gut Zon herself to find all that he could of emeralds, and of gold.

It was not long before Enohtoo hit upon a mighty vein from which issued the gold his masters now lusted for, more than the metals they had first hoped to find, and they commanded him to follow it's course. They soon grew rich by his hands, and so built for themselves palaces of gold and precious stone near to the thread of Zon.

A year swept across the face of Sun, but his masters' greed could not be sated, despite the great wealth they gained from Enohtoo's labor. They pushed Enohtoo and his brothers, commanding them to delve deeper and further, stopping only long enough for their great hearts to cool. But the pressure and strain of their labors soon wore on them, and one by one they perished until there were but a few remaining.

The trench they grew was immense. The ancients-- fools that they were --built their palaces within the basin, then commanded their giants to dig deeper, sparing only their palaces and the earth that supported them. Some soon sat high above the basin floor atop spires that even now stand in the valley of Zon. Others hugged the walls of the basin itself. But the waters of Zon still poured into the basin, and whenever they rose too high Enohtoo's master commanded he and his brothers to dig deeper and further.

In time, the great basin and trench were dug. One hundred marks long and three deep. All but Enohtoo had perished in the great dig; their mighty hearts having burst at last. His great brothers all lay where they had fallen like iron corpses within the trench they had dug. The great valley of Zon was complete and the trench at its bottom filled slowly and soon covered those who had fallen.

On a night that the ancients drank in celebration, Enohtoo wept and mourned for the loss of his brethren. His masters had new palaces within the basin. Enohtoo had the basin and trench he had helped dig, and the ghosts of his brothers. His masters, sated at last, commanded him to rest and so he marched down the basin to where the digging had stopped and laid down near to the edge of the trench.

That night, while Enohtoo slept, cooling himself from his long days of labor, he was awakened by a small voice.

"Enohtoo,” it whispered. "Wake up, Enohtoo."

He opened his eyes but could not see who spoke, and so called out, "Who calls my name? I cannot see you."

"Come to the pools, Enohtoo," came the voice. "There is not enough water elsewhere save the trench, and it is too deep for you."

He moved toward the wall and saw small pools growing out from its base. How has this water come to be here? he asked himself, then asked aloud, "Where are you?"

"Look down into the water, Enohtoo," the voice spoke again. "The moons light will shine upon my face."

He looked down to the black glassy surface of the gathering waters and saw the face of a young woman, mingled both with the moons reflection and his own. It is a beautiful face, he thought, and smiled.

"How is it that you know my name?" He asked. "I am sure I have never seen your likeness before now, though your smile outshines the very stars above."

"I am called Crearachenala," she said, her smile sparkling in the calm swirl of water. "I am Ocean's daughter, and so live within her realm, and I have been watching you for many days."

"I am called Enohtoo," he returned, "and I am my masters."

"Is that so?" she teased, "You are much too tall for that, I think. Indeed, you could almost stand in the deepest part of Ocean with your head above her waves. You are indeed a giant upon Earth, but you are still only yourself," and she laughed a silvery laugh.

"My masters have wrought well," he grinned, "though they do not treat me as they once did. Once, they praised each handful of Earth I raised for them, but now they simply demand I continue digging… until today."

"They have become rich with greed, Enohtoo." Spoke Crearachenala. "Look at them, drunk and sleeping in their ignorance. They have grown complacent and are not worthy of you. That is why I have come. If you continue to dig for them, you will die." And there was sadness in her voice that worried him.

"Die, Crearachenala?" he asked. "Why do you speak so? My masters do indeed neglect me, but they do not wish to see me perish. I am the last of my brethren. For all the others have failed. Only I remain."

The words Crearachenala spoke next rang in his ears like the wailing of winds. "If you stay within this basin you have carved you will die, Enohtoo. You have come too close to Mother. She will swallow you and your masters before they awaken. She has allowed me to warn you only, for you are but a slave, and subject to their will. If you leave this valley now you will not perish with them."

Her smile was gone and worry grew upon her smooth, watery features, and Enohtoo fell in love with her at that moment.

"I cannot bear to leave you, Crearachenala." He cried. "For though I am indeed the last of my brethren, I would rather perish than to never see you again." And she smiled within her heart for his words.

"You need only find still water and call my name," she pleaded, "and I will come to you, Enohtoo, but you must climb to the plains above. Now!"

"Do you promise you will come when I call?" He asked.

"I swear it, Enohtoo," she called out. "Now hurry!"

He stood swiftly and with but a few strides quickly reached the wall of the great basin and began to climb. But Ocean tore down the wall where Crearachenala had spoken and her waters crashed upon Enohtoo with great thunder and force, sweeping him away. They carried him inland, smashing down each palace and spire in his path until at the last he was himself crushed upon the end wall from which Zon fell into the basin.

And thus Enohtoo died. In their greed, his masters allowed he and his brethren to grow their trench too near to where the sands between Earth and sea grow soft at Ocean's edge. The ancients, their houses, their emeralds and their gold were all swept away by the force of Ocean moving in to fill the great basin and trench Enohtoo and his brethren had carved.

When the waters finally settled and its surface grew calm, Crearachenala searched beneath the waves for Enohtoo's body. When she found him she cradled his mighty head upon her lap and wept.

For all the many years that Ocean's waters filled the basin that is Zon, Crearachenala returned, when the waters lay calm, to where he lay and brought with her the soft rains to sweeten the waters where he slept.

But that was many, many years ago, the waters of Ocean have long since receded and Earth has grown colder and the light of Sun grown dim. The rains no longer fall and the basin of Zon is now empty; its trench all but filled, save for Zon herself running slowly to Mother.

--

"I hope to learn from the memory of Enohtoo. That is both the message of the story and the storyteller. By the ancient words I call this tale done, and ask your leave."






Chapter 2
The Wind and the Rain

Rising slowly, she shook the dust from her skirts. The fire had grown dim, and the many faces around the pit were lost almost entirely in shadow. The ruins about them shone weakly in the failing light and looked like the bones of some ancient creature left to wear beneath Sun and time.

She turned to her sons. "Bring me water," she asked, and one man rose and left the circle.

A man, old and drawn into himself, creaked upward from where he sat across the fire and spoke to the listeners assembled for the Rite of Memory's Passage. Lifting his staff of dried leather and bone he spoke, "And thus it is remembered, the tale given, and Passage granted."

"May his memory live forever," echoed those gathered about the fire.

"Please Ambriasa," came a voice form the shadows, "tell us more."

She turned to see who had spoken but saw only faces, many of whom she did not know, seated about the fire.

"Please, Ambriasa," spoke the Elder, "it has been long since we have heard a tale from such as you. You are indeed your fathers child, there is no doubt, but please tell us more."

Ambriasa smiled and seated herself again at the fire.

"Mother," spoke her eldest son and gave her a bowl filled with water. "Do not stay too long," he said as she drank, "we must rise before Sun." He was tall and solid, though not as thick as his father had been. He worried for her.

"Go to the tents and settle everyone, my heart, your brother will stay with me and see that I do not tire too greatly from telling stories," she said, and smiling set the bowl on the ground beside her.

Ambriasa looked off after her eldest, then turned and spoke to those gathered.

"What would you like to hear?" she asked. "I do not know as many tales as did my father, but I will do my best."

"Tell us of the O'chelot." Piped a small child upon her mothers lap. "My father saw an O'chelot on the plain."

"An O'chelot!" exclaimed Ambriasa. "O'chelot have not been seen for many generations, for thousands of summers." She swept her gaze across the faces of the listeners about her. "Many hold that the O'chelot perished ages ago, but perhaps they have yet survived and have at last come out of hiding. Do you know why the O'chelot disappeared, little one?" The child shook her head.

"To hide himself from the Wind and the Rain." She answered. "In ages past rain fell from the sky in great curtains. Not at all like today. The world was once covered in green from sunwaken to sunsleep. It was the rains that fed Earth, and it was the wind that blew life into all that grew upon his face... "

~~~~


Long ages have passed since the last of the great rains fell upon Earth, for he has slowed and succumbed beneath the failing light of Sun. For many ages he struggled to hold his magnificence, but in our ignorance we sought to shape him to our will and many things perished from his face. O’chelot were few in that day, and in the ages that have passed since the last rain they have become little more than a memory, as we ourselves have weakened and grown few in number.

Today we look into the sky and see only white threads of cloud, but in ages past they crowded the heavens, and in their wombs grew the rains of old, rain that fell from the sky and cooled the face of Earth. But the rains no longer fall, and Earth has grown dry and barren. It is said there are still places that see these rains of old, where green burns the eye for its brilliance. But for us, the children of men, such green is but a myth. For the world is swiftly dying.

The Sun priests were unknown in the day of the last rain, their wickedness unheard of. Long before the light of Sun began to fail there was another god that men worshipped, and so it was that with the last rains came he also to Earth to enjoy what remained of his creation.

The rains had fallen long-- for millennia. But when at last they began to die, men noted one storm that remained, one storm that persisted in the midst of the earthen desert. Lightnings grew about it in a boma of spears, encircling the last rain. For many years those that came near reported seeing the image of a man dancing in it's midst, but none dared go near enough to see its face, for it was believed that the old god himself danced.

For the span of a generation the rain fell within its boma, never moving nor quenching the deserts thirst, and throughout the long years the strange figure within danced. But there came at last one man who, believing himself worthy enough to gaze upon and speak to the old god, made a journey into the desert that he might ask the god his name, and why it was he danced.

His wife thought him a fool. 'If the lightnings do not kill thee, surely this god will,' said she.

'Be still, woman,' said he. 'Surely this god is but waiting for someone to acknowledge him and his endeavors. Perhaps he will even reward such a one.' He mused.

She but laughed and called him fool, and so he forsook her and his home, and made his way into the desert to speak with the god who danced in the rains.

Now, the O’chelot were indeed few in that day, and rarely seen, for they hid themselves from men. But as this man moved deeper into the deserts heart, the oldest of O`chelot appeared out of the wilderness and began to walk with him.

They watched each other for a time, both wary of the other, but neither leaving the path until finally the O`chelot spoke to man.

"Do you go to see the Wind and the Rain?"

"I go to see who dances in their midst," replied the man. "What do you here, O`chelot?"

"The kittens are few and prey fewer still," spoke the old cat. "I have come to ask the Wind and the Rain if the world we once knew will return, for the world has slowed. The days and nights grow longer, the air, thin and cold. Soon, all life will leave Earth."

O'chelot and man walked deeper into the desert and closer to where the rains fell and lightnings rose. For hours they walked together without getting nearer, and after a time O'chelot said, "Perhaps the Wind and the Rain will allow but one at a time to come near. What is it you wish to ask of the Wind and the Rain?"

The man looked down to O'chelot and said, "Friend O'chelot, that is mine alone, I will not share it with you."

"Will not?" asked the O'chelot. "Perhaps you do not yet know what it is you wish to ask of the Wind and the Rain."

"Why do you call him such?" asked the man.

"His breath is the wind that breathes life into all things, his tears fill the streams from which we drink," replied the O'chelot. "By what name do you call the Wind and the Rain?"

"I call him, god." Said the man.

"God? What kind of name is that? It says nothing! What does it mean?"

The man thought for a moment and realized he had no answer, but being clever he used a child’s game to answer the O'chelot. "It means, 'God, Our Deity.' " He said feeling proud of himself.

" 'God our deity?' " Laughed the cat, "it describes nothing! It doesn't say anything about who or what he is to you."

"Come now, man,” the cat continued, smiling. "Tell me what it is you wish to ask of the Wind and the Rain and I will ask it for you."

"You!" snorted the man, who was now beginning to feel insulted by the O'chelot’s words. "I will ask myself."

But the old cat thought to reason with the man. "The question is at least as important as the answer one hopes to receive," he said. 'If your question is displeasing to the Wind and the Rain he may choose not to answer another, however worthy."

But the man grew sullen and chose not to speak.

"Come now,” O’chelot demanded. "Tell me your question!"

"I would ask why he has forgotten his children and left us to die upon a dying world," said the man, relenting at last.

"Your question is filled with bitterness, with anger," replied O'chelot. "Perhaps I should ask my question first."

"How so, O'chelot? I wish to know what you do. Our questions are the same."

"Not so, Man. Your question stinks of accusation, while mine own is but a simple, requiring a simpler yes or no. I will ask first."

"Hold now, O'chelot." Said the man, fast becoming angry. "I am representative of his greatest creation, and so should ask first."

"That remains to be seen." O'chelot sneered, not at all convinced. "Your kind has not demonstrated greatness. Even in your ascendancy you destroyed more than you built. Earth is now as your kind has made Him. My kittens die because of you! But you do not remember this," O'chelot said with scorn, then sighed, "for you have no memory to speak of."

"My kind have built great cities..."

"They lie in ruin." Countered the cat.

"We have built great machines..."

"They lie in rust. Forgotten."

"We have gone to the stars..."

"And yet you are here,” the O’chelot sighed. “Having done all these great and mighty things, you have returned to what you were when the world was very, very young. You have forgotten much. Indeed, it would seem you have forgotten everything. What of Solumbraia; the son-god, or Di Vinci? What of Mudhamman or Ossenheier? You do not know for you have forgotten it all! Man."

The scorn in O’chelot’s voice was great that his small body, padding silently next to the man, trembled. His once proud markings rippled like shadows upon his fur.

The man grew strident. "True, our memories are not as long as yours, O'chelot, but we remain ascendant."

"Not so, Man," laughed O'chelot. "You are but one of many, and like us all, but dying embers upon the hearth where the Wind and the Rain warms his feet." And there was sadness in his voice.

The man then stopped and smiled at O'chelot, thinking to trick him.

"I have an idea, Oh, great and wise O'chelot," he mocked and bowed himself to the sinewy cat. "Shall we play at agates for the right to see who will present his question first?"

"Very well," said O'chelot, who, understanding the man's intent, sat back on his thin haunches. "You throw first."

"Good!" laughed the man, thinking himself clever. "I have five agates at my belt."

He pulled from his bag five polished stones, cubed and marked by sinuous lines on each of their sides. Smiling at the cat he shook them in his cupped hands and tossed them to the ground. They clattered and finally settled upon the parched earth between them. His face fell when he read the lines, and the cat laughed.

"Six? Five agates and you throw a six? Your luck is as poor as your memory."

The man, saddened by his toss gestured to the agates, "Do better if you can O'chelot."

With one small paw the O'chelot pulled the agates together then scattered them with a flick of its thin wrist, and both man and cat watched as they tumbled across the ground and stopped.

They walked over and counted the lines.

"Eleven!" spoke O'chelot in triumph. "You have lost, Man. I shall ask my question first." And with that, he padded out toward the Wind and the Rain.

The man sat back and watched as the O'chelot trotted out to the edge of the boma and sat. The figure inside the column of rain danced near to where the cat waited, but the man could not hear what, if anything, was said, and he wondered how long he would have to wait for his turn to come round.

But it was not a long wait, for shortly a spear of lightning rose up beside the cat, and he bolted in surprise and dashed away.

"Abandon your question, foolish man," he called out as he rushed past dripping from the mists that soaked his fur. "The Wind and the Rain will not give answers to your liking." And the O'chelot ran out of the desert, back to his home, his wives and his kittens, and was not seen again by men for many generations.

The man looked back to where the rains fell and to the figure that danced within. He thought his wife perhaps had been right; He was a fool, but after a time, he went himself to the edge of the rains, and a fine cool mist covered him like a cloak.

"Please ser," he trembled, "forgive me, but I have come to ask of you a question."

The figure whirled nearer, and he saw that it was but a youth who danced.

"Only one?" The youth asked and smiled.

"Who are you young man? And why do you dance about in this rain?"

"I am god. Was that your question?"

"God! My… No!” The man sputtered, then laughed. “Why, you do not look old enough to be God. You have no beard. You are no more than a child. Where is your mother that I might fetch her? Perhaps she can set cure to such impertinence." He was beginning to feel very foolish for leaving all he knew to listen to a mere child.

But the child laughed and continued his wild dance.

"If I am not who I say I am, should not the rains have ceased long ago?"

"Yes," answered the man, "they should, but I cannot say why they have not."

"I sustain them,” voiced the young man.

"You?" asked the man disbelieving. "You are not God. God would not lower himself in such a manner, to caper about in the rain."

"Has God lowered himself by enjoying what he has created?" The child asked while ceasing not his dance. "Why must god be anything other than who he is? Why must I be made into the image you hold of me in your mind? Would you be more in awe of me if I wore the stars upon my brow in a crown of gold?"

The man thought on this a moment then agreed. "It is true I expected something far different. I certainly didn't expect you."

"It would seem Man has changed little," the young man laughed and whirled, then asked, "Why did you come when you heard I was here? Did you think to see something new? Did you hope to learn something new? There is nothing new under the sun. What has been will be again, and while I will certainly see these things come to pass, you will not."

"The world will be new again?"

"Of course it will! Have I not said it?"

"Earth will be young again?"

"Not this earth, no."

"I don't understand, ser."

"No, you do not! It has always been so with man. You have never understood, and yet you have always sought me out, and I have always told you the truth. What has been will be again. Now leave this place. Go back to your wife, e'Urom, you are not a fool, but you are certainly foolish. I have told you all you need know. It is for you to believe. Or not. That choice has always been yours."

And so e'Urom left and made his way back to the deserts edge, following the road that brought him out, back to his lands and his own home. He slowed as he neared the streets of his clanat, and trying to make sense of what the Ancient of ancients had told him, realized he could not remember the face of god. But he remembered every word.

His mind now quieted, and with a smile in his heart, he entered his house. A fire was laid on the hearth and his wife sat tending it. Feeling relieved she had not left him he sat at the table, thankful in his heart. He smiled at his wife as she spooned him a bowl of broth and set it before him.

"And what have you learned, my husband?" She asked.

"I have learned to be content," he smiled, and kissed her rough hand...


--

"I hope to learn from the memory of e’Urom. That is both the message of the story and the storyteller. By the ancient words I call this tale done and ask your leave."

"Thus it is remembered, the story given and Passage granted. May his memory live forever," intoned the elder.

"May his memory live forever," returned the gathered.






Chapter 3
Agates and Gold

"It is good that a daughter remember those who bore and rose her," spoke an oldster rising from the many who sat about the fire. He looked gaunt in the firelight, almost frightening, the way the shadows played upon the planes of his face.

"The honor you do your father this night gladdens my heart," he went on, "for I know this new generation, and indeed my own son, have not abandoned entirely the lessons we have grown in them. For they are the same lessons that were grown within us when we ourselves were children, as our elders too had hope in us for their remembrance days.

"You do Ombrial proud, Ambriasa,” he said, and many heads gleaming in the fire’s light nodded their agreement. "I remember many of the stories he drew from his amber book. And it has occurred to me from time to time since his crossing, that the tales he drew were tales of history. That there must be some truth to the tales he spoke."

"I remember one story especial." He said. "It was the tale of Severance and how she drove the Sun priests from her village playing the game of Fifths."

Ambriasa smiled, "Yes," she said, "I too remember that one, and I believe you right in saying many of the tales in the amber book are indeed tales from history. Severance Otek," she called out. "How is it you have your position in council as well as your ser at a time when the priesthood is no more?"

"That is not known, Ambriasa." Spoke a thin figure with a face like leather stretched over bone. "It was told to my father by his greatfather that the memory of our ser began to fade with the dying light of Sun. Not until Ombrial told the tale of Severence did we even understand why our blade and ser are called by the same name. Indeed, though our ser has been passed from father to son for an age or more, it gladdens me to think that Severence's blood may flow through my veins, though the tale makes no mention of husband or child."

"A sad truth, yes," she replied, "but what harm can come from believing?" And these words pleased Severence Otek.

"Tell us this tale." Spoke the Eldest. "For little enough is remembered of the Sun priests and much of that is not good. They had queer beliefs."

"Yes," Ambriasa nodded, "every child knows that Sun is mother to all life, just as Ocean is mother to all that sustains us. The priests were indeed queer."

"Very well," she said. "I will tell you of Severance... "

~

"She reached into the basket and from it pulled a fish which she laid upon the board. She raised the severance and struck off its head. With it's sharp point she opened the soft white belly, and with nimble fingers long accustomed to their work, tore out the offal; for this is what she was… A cleaner of fish.

The people of Jefexnes thought her name odd. For severance was both knife and place, and while it was not uncommon for a man to take the name of his labor, it was unnatural to name oneself after a place or thing. But her name did not disturb the village as much as did the newcomers.

New ideas came with new men from ancient lands with newer names. The world had changed while Jefexnes slept. Many travelers over the years had whispered of these newcomers who had abandoned the Ancient of ancients for the sun in the sky; the same dying sun that daily dimmed, or so the old stories told, but none in Jefexnes had yet seen these new priests. Their temples had sprung up in every city and village of size, pressing new beliefs upon people who had no use for them, until at last they were come to Jefexnes.

Jefexnes was a quiet village high in the mountains to the east. The men all either fished the great inland sea or raised iylas for their wool and meat. Every full turn or so caravans made their way to the village, but it was the Jefexnese who journeyed to Ohmican to sell their labor. So it was in this way that the village earned silver and gold.

But it was not silver or gold that the people of Jefexnes valued, for it was too scarce for coin. They used instead polished agates engraved with the mark of their labor. Should a man chose to purchase fish he must give in exchange a number of agates with his labor marked upon them. Because of this, the price of a fish sold was measured against the value the seller put on the buyers labor. If the fisherman did not need new shoes the cobbler paid more of his own agates. The fisherman might then trade these for agates he could use.

To the Jefexnese this was not strange, but to the Sun priests it was nonsense. But seeing in this a way they might cheat the Jefexnese, and so build their temple without cost, the priests polished for themselves agates and engraved upon their sides the image of Sun. But the people of Jefexnes found no value in them.

"I have no use for sun," one villager would say. "She gives to me her light freely each day, sunwaken to sunsleep. How shameful to sell what you do not labor. I will not sell to you."

"I have cut stone for you all this day," another would say, "and you give me these in return? I will not work for you tomorrow."

This angered the priests, for they knew the Jefexnese to have gold and silver. Every woman and man wore them as ornaments, and so the priests began to plot among themselves ways in which they might take it from them.

It was custom then that a man who caught a fish, himself to eat, could himself clean, but should he wish to sell his fish to another, it must be cleaned by another. There were a score of such cleaners in Jefexnes but Severance was the best. Her fingers were quick and agile and all who watched her swore the Ancient of ancients sharpened her severance himself, and so it was that most fishermen asked her to clean their catch. When the catch was plentiful her living grew. Indeed, everyone’s living grew, for many benefited from the catch of even one mans nets.

In the cycle that followed the priests coming, the Jefexnes fishers grew rich with their growing catches and the Sun temple saw in this a way to take that wealth for themselves.

They imposed a law upon the Jefexnese, for by this time the villagers had grown accustomed to asking the priests blessings on things they never had before. This law declared that a fifth of what each laborer earned was to be given in tithe to the Sun priests. In addition to this tithe the laborers who hauled the nets must also give a fifth of what they earned after the sale. The tithe continued on to include any who profitted from one fisher’s daily catch.

The talk at last became heated as the fishers grew angrier each day and saw their profits slow. The priest thought to take away all their agates and so force the village to begin giving their silver and gold.

"Tiva, the netmender has raised his fee to cover what he must pay to the priests!" cried one.

"That will make our own portion less than what it already is!" another called.

"I overheard Ontebbe and the boatwright arguing over the cost of repairs to his vessel," said another.

"Even the offal-boys are charged the fifth for the gall they sell to the optecary." Said yet another.

Severence heard all this and agreed. The tithe was unfair. Like most of Jefexnes, she was poor. Paying a fifth of what was earned, in addition to a fifth more for anything bought had sent many to their beds with only hunger to fill their bellies.

To most minds the Sun priests were no better than thieves, but where priests and common thieves differed, it was said, mice could grow fat. While common thieves contented themselves with stealing the crumbs that fell from a mans plate unnoticed, the priests entered into a mans home to steal away the plate, lecturing him the while for not giving more to them who gave prayers to Sun. Common thieves dirtied their own hands, but the priests waged men to their work. Thieves paid to thieve.

The tithe was unfair, Severance knew, but she knew also that the priests, thieves that they were, exacted a payment for prayers the Jefexnese never had need of before.

After weeks of listening to the fishers’ arguments it came to her that the priests were using the chouta, a childs game, to rob the people, though she doubted the priests knew this. Were it not for the exchange of agates, no fifth could be exacted by the priests, and so she spoke aloud as she worked.

"Were it not for the agates there would be no way to measure the fifth," said she. "Without a means of measure the priests can take no fifth."

This struck the men dumb. They turned and looked one to the other in wonder.

One then frowned and asked, "how would we then make our living with no agates to buy what we need?"

Another said, "no agates? It is impossible!"

"The priests would only find other ways to tax us." Spoke another.

But one fisher stepped up.

"Tell us why you say this Severence?" he asked. "Surely you are not serious."

Severence thought a moment and answered. "It is a game they play with us. Chouta!"

"Chouta?" said one, "That is a child’s game."

"But one they have not heard of or played before." She said. "If the priests wish to play a child’s game with us, perhaps we should see in this an opportunity to rid ourselves of them, and their useless temple."

"They do not value our agates, that much is clear. They want what silver and gold we possess. We could just give these things to them but this would only entice them to stay and lust for other things. We must not allow this, instead, perhaps we can take from them what they covet of us."

"We are not thieves, like they," protested one.

"We will not steal it," she smiled, "we will win it. We will win it then return it back to Earth or sink it in the lake. But to do this we must in like manner cast away our agates. Children do not use agates playing at chouta, they use epods, a stone without value to anyone save a child. The priests look at us in this same light. Therefore we must do away with agates. Everyone must agree to trade labor for labor. That is all our agates are; a tangible expression of ones labor. We simply choose another expression, one the priests do not value."

The men gathered around the severancy were shocked at her simple solution, but not at all convinced, and they began to argue once more.

"How can a mans labor be measured without agates?"

"How then will wealth be measured? By air?"

"It is preposterous!"

"No more preposterous than giving all you earn in abeyance to the game these priests play." Severance countered. "A mans labor puts food in the bellies of all in his charge. A mans labor is given in exchange for the goods his wife asks of him, even those things a man himself desires. You must think. All that is ever bought or sold is a man labor. Find another means of expressing this, one the priests do not value, and they can take nothing from you. Why not air?"

Their speech grew heated about the severancy, and over the days that followed it was at last agreed that Severances solution might indeed work. They would play the game of fifths with the Sun temple.

In order to win, they would play the game as children do.

"For those who do not know the game of Chouta," Ambriasa said, pausing a moment. "Each player begins with seventeen epods. As ones epod moves about the stone it soon comes to land where anothers epod lays. A fifth of that players epods must then be given to the firsts epod. All epods progress about the stone, one per turn until one player in time possesses them all. That is what the priests hoped to win from from the Jefexnese. For while children indeed played with epods, the adults would play with gold.

So the Jefexnese take all of their gold and pooled it together, and hid it in the high tundras. For when the priests should come to search ther homes, as they surely did, they found nothing, not even the seventeen the Jefexnese would use to win against the Sun priests.

"But when priests come to buy bread how then shall we sell?" asked a baker.

"Sell them nothing," she said. "If they wish to eat or drink they must play the game of fifths for true with our best player, one who knows all the subtleties of the game. Tell them if they win they can have everything they want except the souls of our people, those belong to the true Sun, may Her light shine forever."

In the days that followed the priests grew hungry, and with hunger their anger increased, for no one would sell to them. They thought the Jefexnes great fools to trade everything the priests wanted for the winning of a game. A game no priest knew and no adult played.

All that the priests wanted was to take what gold and silver these poorest of people possessed. Not only for their prayers to Sun, which required exacting rituals, that in turn required monies, but because these people thought of their wealth as no more than colorful stones. They chose to use simple agates as coin.

The priests had tried to coin their own agates but the simple peasants of Jefexnes saw no value in buying what, to their own minds, was to be had freely each day. And now these foolish children wished to play a game with them!

The temple Occlusion, who, as custom dictated, was the very presence of Sun on Earth, called the priests to confer together and perhaps find a solution.

"My brothers," he called to them, "It would seem the people of Jefexnes believe we wish to steal their gold and silver. And yet, if they do not place any value upon what they possess, why then do they not just give it to us, who appreciate its value and pray for blessings to the Sun Father? I believe they do value their gold and silver. They know it has value beyond the high tundra, and so hoard it for use when the caravans come."

"Now they wish to play a child’s game with us. With gold in place of the epods their children use. Seventeen pieces of gold! Who thought Jefexnes held so much gold! There must be more where that came from. Perhaps they use agates to hide their gold from outsiders. If no great measure of gold were ever seen by traders, what outsider would wish to stay long? I believe they hide more than they show."

One priest stood before his brothers and spoke, "Great Occlusion, the game they propose is more than a mere child’s game, it possesses subtleties that require years of play to fully fathom."

"These are unlearned people!" returned the Occlusion. "They are ignorant of the world and possess no real wisdom despite their cunning game. We will take their gold. Send word to their headman and ask that food be given us, and a choutastone that we may study the game in preparation. Who here knows the play of this game?" he asked at last.

But none spoke up.

"Has no one among us ever played this game with the villagers?" he asked.

"No one, great Occlusion," one priest said. "It is a child’s game. Grown men do not play at chouta."

"Then," smiled the Occlusion, "it stands to reason their best player will be a child. He spread his arms wide to the assembled priests, "Surely we can prevail against a child. But to insure this we should find someone to teach us the play of this game."

Another priest stepped forward. "Would it not be simpler to just take their gold? We have men hired who could do this for us."

"They have hidden it, brother." Said another.

"Then we should beat them until they tell us where." The first replied.

"We cannot beat the entire village," interrupted the Occlusion. "Not and bring them to the light of the Sun. No. We must play their game and win, or we may as well leave. For they will not give us anything if we abuse them further."

And so word was sent to the headman and arrangements were made to provide what the asked. The headman called all the men of Jefexnes to plan a strategy, and they called for Severance to take part.

"Who is our best player?" Asked the baker.

"Meris was accounted a good player." Said one.

"No," someone replied, "he hasn't played in ten full turns. Xama only just entered our company three full turns ago, he would be a better choice."

"Xama!" Said another, "My own son beat him just before he joined us."

"Perhaps we should choose a child." Suggested yet another.

"Perhaps you should." Severance spoke and stood to face the men.

"No man here plays the game better than his children." She said. "Find the best chouta players among our children and let them win this game for us; how much more humiliating for the priests if we send children to play the game?"

They looked at her and saw her smile and knew then she was right.

The headman spoke up, "Severance, you have given us again and again the gift of your true sight and wisdom. Your true talents are surely wasted in the severancy. I ask that you now set aside your duties and turn your skills toward leading us in this game against these strange priests."

"But you are headman," she said with surprise.

"Yes, but it is you who have given us the means by which to rid ourselves of these men."

"Very well," she said at last. "But I will only lead in this matter. I am not headman of Jefexnes."

And so it was agreed, and they set the time for the morning of the third day.

On the morning of the great game, as the Jefexnese came to call it, every soul within three hands of marks gathered themselves in the village plaza. All come to see the priests suffer humiliation, though it was agreed that some would cheer on the priests who would play, to lull them. Every man, woman and child wore their best clothes as though it were a feast day.

A secret competition among every child in the village had yielded the three best choutans: one to play and two to advise, which followed the rule of asymmetry that ruled the game itself. One die, three players, five pieces represented by one. Eighty-five total, and every facet, prime.

For the temple the great Occlusion chose himself to play, and chose among his advisors his two wisest. The children who instructed the Occlusion in the subtleties of chouta advised against this, but the Occlusion thought their advice was given to trick him and so chose not to listen.

A table was set and a chouta board set upon it. The priests made a procession from their temple with the Occlusion at its head. Upon his own head he wore an outlandish hat, high and pointed with the shape of Sun cut through its front and back. Upon his white robes another sun was painted over his breast. The priests that marched behind him also wore suns painted over the breasts of their robes. Though the sight of their procession was meant to over awe the Jefexnese, but the villagers only thought them foolish.

When the Occlusion sat and placed his gold upon the table the villagers brought forward the children they had chosen and sat them down across the table.

The Occlusion smiled.

"What?" he asked loudly. "Do you send children to play against me?" And the two priests to either side smiled as though to mock the children who sat across from them.

Severance stepped forward and addressed the Occlusion.

"Great Occlusion, no adult plays this game. So we choose among our best children. It was you who began this game with us, imposing your tithe and searching our homes. Stealing food from the mouths of these," she said at last, gesturing to the children who sat before them.

"Yes, well, you do not value the gold, why should you not give it to us?"

"Because it is ours." severance answered. "If we choose to keep what is ours, is that not our own affair? If you wish us to give it to you, you must earn it."

The Occlusion was angry at her words. How dare she speak to the voice of Sun in such a way? "Let us get on with it then," he said at last.

"Very well," Severance said, "The rules have been explained to you, but I shall state them once more. Each gold piece represents five..."

"Five!" Exclaimed the Occlusion.

"Yes, five, Occlusion. Was this not explained to you? This is why it is called the game of 'fifths'. "

"Could this village possibly possess such wealth?"

"It is just rock," she said with a shrug, "shinier than most, not as pretty as some, but a rock nonetheless."

"Just a rock!" Shouted the Occlusion. "Then just give it to us!"

"Listen, Occlusion." she called, lifting her voice. "You may move forward or back at any time you choose but only the number of squares allotted by the epod-die and only if that square is occupied by one or less pieces, but you must move, be the move good or ill; you cannot chose not to move. If circumstance gives you no move, you are forfeit one fifth- one gold piece -of your choosing. If a player rolls the same number as his opponents last roll, he may roll the epod-die a second time after moving his piece the number first rolled. Each square lost pays one gold piece to its possessor. First one to complete the circuit wins, and the game is then repeated until one players possesses all the pieces."

"Agreed," the Occlusion hissed. "I will roll first."

The epod-die rattled across the stone, the sinuous lines upon its faces danced and settled at last with a single line showing. The Occlusion drew his brows together and moved his first coin one place.

"There," he hissed and gestured to the child who would play. "It is your turn."

"I am called Pina, Occlusion," said the girl who sat across from him. "It is a long game yet. The odds will show you an equal number of highs and lows throughout." One of the children at her side rolled the epod-die and they all watched as it settled upon a three.

"See? Not much better." The third child spoke, then leaned and whispered into the Pina's ear.

"What’s this?" Demanded the Occlusion. "Secret whispers and plots? What goes on here?"

Severance stepped forward. "Chouta is a game of strategy, Occlusion." Severance explained. "Your own counselors are here to advise you, but you may of course choose to speak your deliberations aloud."

"I see," the Occlusion said, but he did not. He thought the villagers worked to cheat against him.

Pina moved her first coin forward three places.

And the game progressed, the Occlusion scowling and the children whispering all the while. Advantage moved back and forth between them and the first game ended with the Occlusion winning four of the children’s coin.

The priests clustered behind the Occlusion smiled and clapped each other and cheered the Occlusion for his skill. The children waited quietly and whispered among themselves until the Occlusion spoke out.

"I have won four from you simple folk. I shall soon have it all!" And he laughed.

"I shall roll first this game," Pina said and one of her companions rolled the epod-die. It landed with a five and after a short counsel moved her first coin five spaces.

The Occlusion rolled the epod-die himself and, counseling not with his first and second, moved his coin the spaces numbered upon the die. This game too progressed and saw the Occlusion with six more coins added to his own.

"This is too easy," he complained. "Could you not just give me the coin? It would save us all time."

Severance stepped forward and cautioned the Occlusion, "Pina has told you of the odds. What never changes in chouta is the equal number of highs and lows throughout. Chouta is game of strategy, Occlusion. The epod-die will not win it for you."

But the Occlusion only snorted and bent back to the game and rolled the die.

The game progressed throughout the day with coins changing hands back and forth. Twenty and seven games were played. The Occlusion had long since grew bored but when the coins began to move steadily into the children’s hand, he awoke and became angry and cursed his first and second who had given up trying to counsel him.

In time the last game drew to a close and the last coin fell to the children. The priests stood about in stunned silence, and the Occlusion himself called curses down from the sun upon the children.

"May his light burn your eyes from your heads!" He shouted at last and grasping the chouta board smashed it down upon the stones of the plaza. The children gathered the coin quickly and moved back into the crowd where the coins were quickly taken away and hid.

"You have lost, Occlusion." Severance spoke.

"Do you mock me?" the Occlusion whirled about with a shout, "using children to beat us at a child’s game? Do you think yourselves clever? Who now will offer prayers for you to the Sun Father? Do you think we will now stay here in this tiny village of yours?"

"It matters not to us, though we would prefer you to leave," she answered. "As to your prayers, we do not need them. In all the time you dwelt among us you never once thought to discover our thoughts on Sun, for had you asked, you would have been told that Sun in our Mother. She gives us life, and light in which to enjoy it. She warms our skin in summer and holds back, as best she may, the freezing death of winter. And she does all this without our spending coin to placate her. She does all this because we are her children and she loves us as such."

"Your people are sadly deluded, woman." the Occlusion said. "It is the Father that strengthens us and gives us the courage to last the night."

"No, Occlusion. A man wars and destroys. He builds to glorify his name. He tells himself he deserves a thing, then goes out to take it. There is a lot of good in a man, but life has never found birth in a man’s womb. Woman gives life. She nurtures, but does not coddle. She gives us what we need and asks only that we love her in return. It is a mothers love she holds for us in her breast. Man cannot do these things."

The priests gathered their possessions that very day and made haste to leave Jefexnes. It was decided among them that retaliation would not return their gold and so chose to leave without incident.

When their train of beasts and wagons were marks across the tundra the headman came upon them riding a great wooly iyla and called to their leader. "Oh, great Occlusion," he called. "Please accept a gift from our village. We would not have you enter new lands without our hospitality fresh in your hearts."

The Occlusion, humbled by the manner of his defeat, came to the headman and took from him a bundled cloth and marveled at its weight. Setting it upon the grasses he opened it and saw within all the gold he had lost and more. Much more.

"What is this?" he asked.

"Why, it is gold, Occlusion,” replied the headman, now confused. "Do you not want it?"

"Of course I want it," the Occlusion said, "but why now?"

"We have no real need of it. We have kept enough to trade with the caravans when they come again, but the rest we give you."

"Did you wish us gone so badly? Could you not have asked us to leave instead of playing us for fools?"

The headman slowly shook his head. "We did what we felt we had to, and beside that, would you really have left had we asked?"

To that the Occlusion could only nod and with no word of thanks gathered the gold and left.

--

"I hope to learn from the memory of Severance. That is both the message of the story and the storyteller. By the ancient words I call this tale done and ask your leave."

"And thus it is remembered," spoke the elder, "the story is given, and Passage is granted. May his memory live forever."

"May his memory live forever."





ELAshley
122903.025826.1
Revised on:
022305.025524.6
And finally on:
101106.110250.6

There will be further revisions, but
for now, it is what it is...



..::A Note on Pronunciation::..
For those who appreciate such things

Note: Capitalized Syllables are stressed. Vowels at the beginning of words that do NOT precede a hyphen ( ' ) are always soft ( "a" as in "cat"; "I" as in "it"; etc.), except "O" when followed by a consonant, which is always long.


Ambriasa = ahm-bree-AH-sa
~Daughter of Ombrial, keeper of the Amber Book

Ombrial = ohm-BREE-al
~Mysterious Father to Ambriasa

c'Cluseon = see-CLUE-zhun
~The last High Priest to the Temple of the Sun

o'Cluseon = oh-CLUE-zhun
~The stolen son of the Ohmican Citidan. Raised in the Sun Temple

Solumbraiah = sol-oom-BRY-ah
~The son of Sun

e'Urom = E-yoor-ahm
~The man whose tale was the impetus for the creation of the Religion of the Sun

O'Chelot = Oh-shell-Oh
~The last feline species. Descendant of the Ocelot of South America

Enohtoo = en-OH-too
~The last "Giant" believed to be responsible for the Vale of Zon

Crearachenala = cree-ARRA-shen-ALLA (Rolling the R's)
~Ocean’s daughter, who has control over all still waters.

E'tal = E-tall
~The remnant of Italy

Anastarii(s) = ahn-nah-STAR-ee(z)
~Eaters of the dead. Those who offer human sacrifices

Citidan = SIT-i-DAN
~Literally, "Emperor"

Citidanat = SIT-i-DAN-at
~Literally, "Empress"

Ohmica = OH-mi-kah
~What was once Brazil

Ohmican = OH-mi-kahn
~Any citizen of Ohmica

Omicar = OH-mi-kahr
~The title given to the Ohmican Heir-apparent

Cyihnc = Science
~The logic of science reduced to magic

Apoth = a’-pawth
~An herbalist

Cormorii(s) = kore-more-EE(Z)
~A bird, descended from Cormorants

Shallowrii(s) = shall-lore-EE(Z)
~A small, tended plot of marsh, for the keeping of cormorii’s