The exercise:
It's feeling like a random sort of Sunday, so let us return once more to the random CD prompt. Choose a song as randomly as you care to and then borrow its first line for your poetry or prose. Credit where it's due, but of course.
Had a nice, quiet day off with my family. Pancake breakfast, spent some time at the park, enjoyed a nice afternoon nap, and capped things off with a roasted chicken for dinner.
Have a few errands I need to run tomorrow morning, otherwise taking it slow until we begin our box harvest tomorrow evening.
Mine:
Dancing Years - We Danced Last Night
We danced last night for an hour or so, despite my better judgement. I got caught up in the moment, I suppose. Moments, technically. There are a whole lot of moments in an hour. Each one as compelling as the one that came before it, or so it felt.
I should have known better. I am well past the age where such foolishness is appropriate. Now my feet ache, my back complains at every turn, my ears feel like they're still throbbing in tune with the music.
I barely managed to make it from my bed to my writing desk and I have no intention of leaving it until it is time to return to bed. Small sips of water only; there will be no bathroom breaks today. The toilet is on the other side of the house, though it might as well be on the other side of the ocean.
Knocks on the door will be ignored, as will the ringing of the telephone. I am here and here I shall stay. Perhaps if I hold perfectly still all day long my body will have recovered by the time I wake tomorrow morning.
Sigh. What utter lunacy. What madness came over me last night? Why would I...
Oh, yes. Isabella. Of course.
Worth every muscle spasm.
2 comments:
That sounds like a nice day, and I see you're almost caught up on your comments as well! You've been working hard :)
Fascinating band and song you picked there, with a really amusing moment in the middle of the video where the singer forgets his lyrics briefly. I thought it was kind of beautiful, and will probably grow on me more as I listen to it. Amber Run, who I've picked today, were listed on the side-bar and I'd not heard of them or any of their songs until just now.
I really like the progression of your story and I can completely sympathise with the narrator and his feelings of exhaustion! I think, in his shoes, I'd do the same thing. And it must have been one helluva dance!
Noah by Amber Run
My name is Noah and the sea is my home, and I am standing here outside the Gare du Nord watching Paris burn. The fire is strongest to the West and there are columns of thick black smoke rising into the sky as though they support it now. The columns are woven through with bright sparks of yellow and red like precious stone included in marble, but this is just where the fire has left its earthly home and strives to reach the heavens. There are similar columns to the East, South and surely to the North but I cannot see there for the station. Sirens howl in the air, dopplering across the city as the emergency services identify the most important points and try to save them first. You can be sure that none of the poor live anywhere near these important points.
The station is crowded at almost any time, but now the press of humanity is suffocating. There is no room for anyone to move anywhere; if the doors open then the unfortunates who are at the front will be pushed over and trampled by the mass of the mob behind them. They do not know it, do not appreciate it, but they are worse off than those at the back who will do the pushing. The taxi lanes, around the side of the station, have been empty for hours as the taxis have long since left the city. Anyone with the means to has left; all that are left are the altruistic, the halt and lame, the poor, and... and Noah.
I stand alone in a small space; no-one gathers here because there are walls behind me and no way into the station. I am ignored because I am clearly mad. Yet here, against the wall, is a small wooden chair made from the wood of a boat I once captained thousands of years ago. It looks unprepossessing, but I know that it is a throne, waiting for me to take my seat.
The smell of the smoke mingles with the smells of sweat, desperation and sickness from the mob; their voices – its voice – ululates their pain and terror. The doors of the station stay closed, and though the mob do not realise it (yet), I know that the trains have all left and the station is as empty inside as this city will be when the flames are done with it. Fire is a terrible mistress to take.
I feel weary all of a sudden, and I feel, through the paving of the street, the flow of water that the citizens seek to use to extinguish the fires. For a moment it resists me, and then it bends to will, as I learned to do with it when it rained from the sky and tried to drown the earth. Holding it firmly in my intangible grip, I take a step backwards, and sit down on my throne.
Greg - ... and now I am, at long last, caught up once again. Woo!
Yeah, the Mahogany Sessions have introduced me to a lot of great music. Noah is another song that I can get caught up listening to over and over.
Very intriguing scene, with some truly fantastic details littered throughout. Great continuation from that opening line :)
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