Swallowed Soliloquy

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Blunt Truth
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Joined: Fri Oct 06, 2017 6:24 am

Swallowed Soliloquy

Post by Blunt Truth » Wed Feb 07, 2018 11:13 am

Waterfalls are seen as peaceful, gentle things. They are sought after by lovers and artists to admire the beauty of something so mundane was water rushing in endless supply from heights of mountains. Even the air they say, is crisp and delicious.

I stand now among the cliffs of Nexus Falls now; a staircase of torrents of tumbling water that deafen my senses to even my own thoughts. Harsh strikes of flaxen light escape the cumulus clouds that weigh the sun down into dusk leave little light for me here with my chore. I work with a shovel, pitting steel against soil to the rhythm-less downpour that cuts through the mountain.

My fingers are numb as the cold night air begins to bite at my digits. Still I dig my hole, three by eight with six feet down. Even as the thick fog of the evening begins to suffocate the freshness from the air my lungs accept each breath with greedy need. Anything to break the distance between me and the me that digs this pit will suit me just fine.

I dig this hole because it is my duty, I remind myself as I step now into the progress I have made. Earth is flung haphazardly over my shoulder as my shovel makes way, bite by bite. It gets in my hair, my garments, my boots. I try not to think of the crawling insects whose homes I have disturbed that now writhe beneath my work. Salvation through labor and I am addicted to my trade.

I can still see him, my companion who joins me on these loud and deafening cliffs. He is tall and broad; dressed like a crusader, just like me. But his vision does not bring me a softness. No, when I look to this man who sits motionless with hands folded atop an impossibly high shield, donning the standard of Akanax I feel a pit in my stomach that threatens to consume me from toes up.

Perhaps he speaks to me over there from under the tree. Maybe he speaks words of encouragement, solidarity, or perhaps he only expresses his disdain for the chore all together. Regardless I cannot hear the man over the roar of the falls, which by now the sound is near dizzying. With every inch made deeper it is harder to look up. I forget for a time that an 'up' was even possible, my mind consumed with the the precise patch of dirt I was to assault with my spade next.

My head is spinning. Why I doing this? I am alone in this pit, digging myself a grave for no one that will thank me. It is dark and cold; my company is a lover's cadaverous silence and the beetles that crawl across my skin. I feel myself screaming profanity and curses but like everything else here my sound is consumed in the violent serenity of the Nexus Falls. There is nothing here but peace, and duty. So I dig.

To question is my nature, and these questions suffocate me more than the air drowned in fog. Yet still the me that continues the labor and the me that screams in wordless outrage of a tilted deal are no longer one in the same. I am possessed by my need to finish what I've started. I persist. Through the deafening roar of the falls, the questions, the cold, the evening and the grief, I persist. That is my answer. That is my reason.

Spade and claw, I tear myself from the grave I've dug and look now to my only company here in this wretched graveyard. The Akanaxi lies there motionless amongst the headstones of the graveyard, as he was when I found him. The pit in my stomach reminds me it's still there, knotting in my naval. Nothing about this is graceful or romantic. I grasp the cadaver by the wrists and try not to think of how stiff they are. It's heavy, heavier than I remember him ever being. I try not to think about that.

I drop him into the grave and he lands in a messy heap. Through the noise I try to decide if he would mind and as I do I stare at the man I called my lover and my friend, now a corpse in a cold gash in the earth.

And finally, there is silence.

When I notice the absence of sound I hold my breath, fearing the evanescent moment. It is bitter and delicious all at once and I defiantly persist with it.

I look at Theoros, considering the man and his grave, and I decide that I will not share it. Instead I arm myself with my spade, the familiar bite of the grip a note of solidarity. In the blessed silence I bury the corpse of the man I shared bed with. It's in those moments I find the words for the burial Rites. In the holy prose I find solace and Theoros, his final sermon.

Soft rays of gold break through a carmine dawn. Like swords of light that cut through the gossamer fog. My hurts are not lifted from me, not even as the dawn comes and I stand atop my duty complete.

I will persist.

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