Tradition part 3

Here is Part 1 if you haven't read it yet!

And Here is part 2!


When I awoke, I felt restored in spite of my wounds, and a feeling of lightness spread over me. I was free. My duty had been done and was successful. I even laughed out loud with a sort of giddiness that made me feel a little uncomfortable after it was over. I exited the cave and found my bag and coverings behind the rock where I had left them. My love’s remains were gone, I had hoped to perhaps bury them, but a part of me wondered if it wasn’t some trick of the beast that had materialized her in the first place. I donned my gear and began my journey back. It was still morning, and there was a bright sun that shone with a warmth that had been absent the day before. The forest sang with life, and the sound of drops from the melting snow played a sort of music to accompany my walk.

I stopped halfway through and ate the remaining third of my meal from the previous day. I relived my triumph with each bite. Once I was finished and refilled with pride, I carried on. As the sinking sun dropped purple curtain across the sky, I reached the cabin and was greeted with a raucous noise. The celebration which had been hesitantly waiting to begin exploded upon my arrival. The joy on their faces reflected my own and some even surpassed it. There were copious amounts of food, music, and dancing. I even saw some mothers clutching their young sons and crying.

One of the elders who had trained me sidled up to me when things had quieted a bit and asked how it had gone. I relayed my story, leaving out the presence of my dream girl. He smiled proudly and clapped me on the back, but I could see a disappointment in his eyes. I asked what troubled him, and he simply said, “Do not despair. Just promise you will help train the next appointee.” “Of course!” I replied. He simply nodded his head and moved off to talk to some other revelers. I was then swept off to a warm bath in the cottage. As the layers from my journey dissolved into the bath, I watched the water, dirt and blood combine into a color not unlike the beast. I shuddered within, and despite the shedding of my travels in this tub I knew that I would not get over this experience quickly.

An older woman brought me to the backyard near the fire to rinse off the residue of the bath. As she dumped the warm water over my head, it rained over me like a wave of comfort. The warm feeling spread, and I bowed my head to let it wash over me. I watched the ground as she poured the third and final bucket over me and saw the remnants of the cave forming a swirl within the puddles of water that had formed. Then I noticed a glob no larger than a bubble, and perhaps it was a bubble after all, but it seemed more solid then that. I was fully shivering now, not because of the cold air, but because the idea of bringing any piece of that beast back with me seemed like a betrayal of reality.

The woman wrapped a warm blanket around me and led me inside. I sat thinking of the bubble and realized that I had not defeated the monster at all. I had only killed it. I had killed it and then given it the means to return. My blood was all over that cave, moist and red. This was the vehicle it needed to return. I was its new creator. It was then that I realized my true role, that I was a part of a cycle now, a cycle that brought nightmares, pain, and despair; a cycle that resulted in the heroes and their victories becoming fodder for the next revolution to progress. An ever rolling wheel that turns flesh to dust, then mud, then flesh again.

Celebrate

Here begins a brand new story
An exciting tale of truth and glory
Promises of a shining year
Plots unfolding, future clear
Youth and age begin a dance
Brace yourself within your stance
Incite your dreams now, cast your wishes
Reel them in like thoughts and fishes
Try a new thing everyday
Hear the things your heart will say
Daydream often as you can
Always hold tight helping hands
You can always try once more
Reach up higher then before
Every moment make it better
Eat some ice cream, write a letter
Seek yourself somehow someway
Enjoy who you are everyday

Destination

A peak so high there seemed no top
and yet he still would climb
He never showed a need to stop
He never had the time
The clouds that ringed the precipice
Were ones he could see through
His arms would ache, his aim would miss
Yet his distance grew and grew
The path he used would peter out
He'd pause just for a minute
And with an effort and a shout
He'd find his footing in it
Though slips occurred he never fell
We'd watch him as he rose
His hands would bleed, his feet would swell
But his eyes would never close
He knew one day with certainty
The peak was his to claim
And at the zenith he would see
The peak did bear his name

Tradition Part 2

Part 1 is here in case you haven't seen it!





As blood poured from her, the rest of the beast emerged from the cave and began tearing her apart, piece by piece. From my chest emerged a sound I had never heard before; rage and pain co-mingled in this roar that escaped me, and just as it dropped the last shredded piece of her perfect skin, I charged at it full force.

My veins bursting with rage I hurtled toward it like a bullet. I sunk both of my fists into its carmine chest and screamed in its face. Only then did I realize it had no face: no discernible eyes, nose, or mouth. There was only a head shaped lump atop its massive humanoid body. At that moment its thick claws stabbed into my arms and extracted me from its chest. As it pulled me backward from the wounds I had opened, I saw blood gushing into the empty cavities. I quickly realized, though, that the monster wasn’t bleeding, it was healing. The blood filled the cavity, but rather then spilling, it congealed. The beast was whole again.

As I lay on the ground bleeding and whimpering it turned and began to recede back into the caves maw. My pain turned to rage and I grabbed its ankle and dug my fingers into its gelatinous flesh. As I squeezed, its flesh came through my fingers like dough. The muck of flesh then spread over my hand and seemed to hold me fast to the beast’s leg. It dragged me into the cave with it raking my flesh across the rocks as it did. When we reached the heart of the cave, it threw its leg forward, and with that I was released from it and slammed soundly against the cave wall. My shoulders took the brunt of the blow.

I feigned unconsciousness and took the opportunity to watch it. It sat silently facing away from me. It made no noise and had no breath. The only sound in the cave at all was my breath and intermittent drips down near the entrance. It sat in the fashion of a frog with its knees up near where its ears should have been. I studied it looking for anything humanoid about it besides its shape. As I observed it, I began to realize the vulnerability we have as humans. As safe as we feel with our skulls and spines and ribcages, we still have eyes and orifices to attack. Skin protects us from the elements but is easily broken, and our blood seems so eager to escape, to run. A hopelessness settled deep within me, and I began to wonder if I could figure out a way to defeat the beast.

As my blood pooled beside me, it formed a crimson mud with the dirt on the floor. It reminded me of the path and the brook on my journey; how a cave is formed by drops of water; how a colossal tree rose from a small seed. Those thoughts, and my lingering pain for my lost love, brought me to my feet once again. The monster turned toward me, and its legs tensed, then it sprang forward, its claws surging toward me. I quickly stepped to the side but grabbed it by a wrist and dug my fingers in like I had before with its ankle. I began twisting to avoid the surge of blood that was trying to cover my hand and hold me fast. As I twisted, the connection of its hand to its arm became damper and damper with blood. Then, as if by a miracle, the hand separated from its body.

Without thinking, I plunged my hand into the base of the severed claw. I was sickened by the sensation, by the sound, as the partially congealed blood once again grabbed a hold of my hand. This time it would be to my advantage. Once my new hand seemed firmly in place, I set to slashing. I swatted at the beast, and a piece of its flesh flew from it and landed on the ground. The wound resembled the innards of a blood orange, and this time it didn’t heal. With this new found knowledge, I began slicing and hacking at the beast. It fought back, but I was propelled by a legacy of devastation, the most recent being out in front of the cave. I forged that pain into a warrior’s swiftness and accuracy. I received nicks here and there, but I was doing most of the damage, and the monsters flesh was dropping wetly to the floor in large chunks and darkening.

In one final push of determination, I screamed with an unfettered rage and sliced unwaveringly for each of the slain boys; each of the mothers cries of pain; each of the fathers done in by their own hand after the shame became too great, and they were swallowed by it. The cave floor was now covered with a quickly darkening sludge that once formed the beast. It seemed to writhe as it shrank and dried into a scabby crust upon the floor. I sat upon the one clean surface in the cave, a rock, and breathed a deep sigh of relief. As blood still dripped from me, a triumphant feeling washed over me bringing tears and sobs, partly from joy but mostly from exhaustion. I leaned against the cave wall, and, before I could stop myself, I fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.

Tradition Part 1

The sun peeked over the earth, and its light covered the ground like a gush of water; the meaning, however, was that of a youthful infatuation: as the wind poured from the east cutting its teeth on my face, and my eyes fought back with a salient defiance. The absence of warmth bent my back and hunched my shoulders. In spite of its brutality, the day did not lack beauty. The new snow, untouched, resembled the warm comfort that then lay rumpled on my bed. The comparison made my mind jovial just before I realized I was then wrapped within the day’s cold fingers and not my beds warm embrace. My feet crunched through the ice with each step, and as the barren trees grew closer, they towered above me in their skeletal majesty. I caught my first full breath as the wind receded for a few short moments, and my lungs quaked from the cold of it.
I broke the tree line and slowed my pace.

Snow covered much of the forest floor, so the dangers and beasts were now equally hidden and baring their teeth. I wove between the trees my ancestors planted, treading a path they had worn through bloodlines and tradition. The dawn of the first snow is the time; the cave of the beast is the place. An appointment made by the souls of the first born sons of my people and kept by the second born.Tales of the massacre and first born extinction had been told to me throughout my life by the wavering voices of the elders and by the tears of mothers who still mourn. Though years have been removed, the pain stays fresh on the surface. On the anniversary, it was a smell in the air, like the embers of a fire or the blood of birth. That anniversary was tomorrow. Today was our insurance that the fires would not be filled with bodies, and the wails would be only for the past.

The elders had expressed how important this walk would be, to absorb the peace of it and commit all of the sounds and sensations to memory. I would need them, to replace more terrifying moments later. Instead of breaking bones, I would hear snapping twigs; instead of hell born roars, bubbling brooks. This process was as vital as its end would be. It was the only way to come out of it alive. I listened to each branch cracking from its burden of snow. I watched the rabbits dart from their homes, bounding confidently through the forest floor’s thick coverage. I felt the cold air stick to me with each step, as if the layers of the snow itself were stuck to my skin. I reveled in all things natural, for soon, in spite of its harshness, it would be a comfort I would long for, even beg to be with again.

As the sun reached its peak, it sent shafts of light through the bare thick branches of this dead forest. I could hear snow, as it melted, drip upon the stones on the ground. I stopped for a few minutes to eat my last meal in the fashion which the elders had instructed. I divided it into 3 portions: one for me, one for the forest, and one for the hope that I would return. As I trekked on, the sun slid down the sky, turning the forest into a museum of shadows. One might see them as dark beings waiting for you to turn your back, so they can take you away. I saw them as those who had made this journey before, the ones who didn’t return. They knew what the result could be and still stood in support.

The sun settled on its haunches; red and orange light alighted from the horizon. As I got closer to the cave, there was an unnatural warmth in the surrounding area. The ground at this point was wet from the melting snow and slid beneath my feet. Each time I lifted my foot, it made a sucking sound, each footfall an uneasy splash. My shoes quickly became caked with the thick mud, adding weight to my already realized trudgery.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, the cave appeared like a looming threat. My heart tried in vain to depart from my chest. I drew in a startled breath; the gasp echoed into the mouth of the cave, and footsteps echoed back. I scrambled behind a rock and shed my bag and coverings, so that I could move more swiftly. A beautiful young woman emerged from the dark opening: a woman I had loved in my dreams for many years. Her skin was a light brown but seemed to shimmer with a gold hue. Her eyes , a dark brown, emanated an unrivaled warmth and welcome. Her mouth was broad, smiling, and surrounded by perfectly shaped lips I had kissed a million times, in my slumbers over the years. Her body, that I had held countless times, was soft and shapely.
Then with a voice I knew as well as my own, she called to me “Aza, come to me.” I turned the corner, ready to run to her. She smiled even more broadly, and I saw her eyes sparkle at the sight of me. Then a claw shot from the mouth of the cave and tore through her throat.

Song lyrics: Getaway Car

You know my soul is wearing thin with each and every passing day
And I don't belong in the place I'm in you know I've got to get away
Jump in my car and start to drive can't go below 55 the breeze don't feel as good
Today's a day just for myself won't do what anybody else keeps telling me I should

Things have got to change
before I go insane
I'm wiping off the slate today

The air's much sweeter when the strain is gone I almost forgot to breath
I'll just keep driving til dusk or dawn I'll take all the time I need
pick up my baby then we'll go the destination I don't know and I don't really care
We'll go the ways we've never been until we find ourselves again until we're happy there
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This song is great for singing at work when your stressed. No one listens to the words and you sound happy!

Song lyrics : Scrutinize

What a time for me to start over again
got too much riding on it now
trying hard to be the person I've been
Don't want to be found out

You don't know what you've done to me
Can't explain how this came to be
I close my eyes and you're all I see

All these dreams have taken a hold of my head
Sucking out all the pain
Try to light the candle at both ends
But getting burned by the flame

I wouldn't call it affection
Maybe just a connection
Then why all the dissection
Scrutinizing down to the inflection
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Go sing along here!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ais6wHr80X4

Fresh Snow

The bite of a breeze,
The wet of the air,
The crystals that freeze,
in your uncovered hair,
The blanket of quiet,
The eeriest calm,
The canvas a riot,
When it's tread upon,
Heartbreaking steps,
on its unbroken face,
The distance and depth,
that remembers your place,
Each footfall now minted,
within a cold cage,
Your wanderings printed,
upon it's white page

Beyond Survival

When life itself plays that perfect chord,
When no more cuts the rusty sword,
When eyes reveal that they understand,
When even fate is a helping hand,
When crushed insides begin to heal,
When circumstance won't make you kneel,
When weight is shed from tired shoulders,
When gravel sits where once were boulders,
When the words means joy instead of pain,
When the maestro plays a bright refrain,
When escapes your heart rather then chances,
When the you inside now preens and prances,
Let it in, this glorious arrival,
and enjoy the world beyond survival

Ember: Part 1

I always want to start in the middle. That's where the action starts. I don't want to wait, the waiting was the hardest part so why would I put you through that fair readers? So should we speak of the sword first? The one that split their skulls and severed various limbs from various foes or do you really want the beginning. Why would the woman becoming the destroyer be of any interest to you? Do you need to know why? The proverbial straw, the accelerant to the ensuing inferno explained? I suppose it's important that you can understand why an executioner became such. If not to make sure you do not tread the same cliff's edge then to make sure you can at least understand and stop the next bringer of doom. Ember is my name, they chose it for the black hair with a tuft of sparkly red at my widows peak. They did not yet know it would also represent the smoldering that would occur within me. The explosion that would level a town. Now at that moment it was a long way off, but the flames had already been fed. You see they did not name any girl in the village until she reached the age of 5. You may think it was due to disease or just perchance unfortunate deaths of the young citizens of the village. Notice though that I said girls. There was reason that we hardly made it to 5 years. That reason was the men of the village, well, the men's brutality and the women's acceptance of it. Now I've already told you that it was the girls that died in great numbers before 5. I suppose now you'd like to know why. As if it matters. Would it be easier to accept a wholesale slaughter of the girls when the food grew sparse, or sexual brutality by sick men that often went too far too fast. In ways that a toddler girls body couldn't handle. Perhaps it was just that the girls, upon ability to walk, were given the gathering jobs in woods thick with perils and hungry beasts and frequently didn't return. It could have been any one of these things or all of them but I'm not going to give you the pleasure of knowing so that you can reason yourself into tolerance. I was named at 5, as I said, and was given a broom in the ceremony. This was the ritual. What did this symbolize you ask? Servitude. Not magic not a clean slate but servitude. That was the woman's role in this village. The only one. One day I was sweeping with my new broom at 5 and 1/2 and a beast approached me. It tried to grab me it tried to hurt me. I beat it with the hard end of the broom until it lay on the ground in agony still trying to move towards me. The stick was dull but I still managed to drive it into the beast through a hole that it already possessed but when I felt resistance I kept pushing until it was dead. My mother found me and the now deceased foe and quickly urged me to drag it into the woods. Women were not the hunters. Women weren't allowed to kill things. I asked here what I was supposed to do let it kill me? She only nodded. We cleaned the broom and though streaks of red still lived on it, it was hardly noticeable. Still she urged me to rub it with rocks to try to remove the stains. She locked me in the vegetable hut for 3 days so I could complete this task. When she returned the broom handle was clean and the garden spade was sharpened and hidden within the folds of my skirt. I would not be caught unaware again. She smiled with a smile of relief and told me excitedly that she doesn't think any one has caught on to what had happened. She said it as if our vegetable yield had been double what was expected. I asked her why she was so excited by that, why it wouldn't be better for the village to know. Perhaps this was a form of protection we could exploit, fear. It seemed a popular one amongst the men in the village. She beat me and threw me back in the vegetable shed. By the time I reached 11 I had racked up a total of six months time in the vegetable hut for saying things like that. So when I once again slipped up she sent me to the local inn instead, to help clean up there for 3 days. I shortly realized upon arrival what that meant. This is where the adventurers and hunters from other nearby villages would stay while on their trek. It was all men, of course. I had my trusty spade with me but the risk of being in a building full of men that all believed that same things was perhaps made it too high a risk if survival was my intent. The gods however smiled upon me. The man I was paired with was a drunken fool. He passed out swiftly and harmlessly the first two nights. On the third night he made a move but could not deliver on his end of the tryst. As he cried himself to sleep I settled in the chair in the room. As he left the next morning he complained to the woman who managed the Inn and just before my mother came to pick me up and she beat me. Just as my hand reached for the spade my mother arrived. I still wanted to slice her a good one but just as I had been spared, I supposed she could be as well. Besides I had this growing feeling that I should wait until It was absolutely necessary to reveal my defense. I felt the danger growing each day. I felt the band stretching tight and soon, it would snap.

The Whole Story

An overlooked detail,
a loose thread, that part that is just ever so slightly off.
That is what I seek, as if a keyhole to help me unlock your mysteries.
I want to unlock you and pore through your dusty boxes.
I want to pick all the locks.
You say that's me in a nutshell but I want to crack it open.
I want to see everything from kept receipts of what you've sold,
to the annals of history that form the story of you.
The giant sign on the wall is nice
but the fortune you saved from a cookie long ago that's tucked into a tiny box in the corner is just as telling if not more so.
Do not relegate yourself to a summary,
you are so much more.
That clever blurb eventually becomes you, clever but limited.
Present the whole story and keep the ones who are clapping and crying with you at the end.

Self

This is my neon sign,
my drama, My very public tantrum.
I am making noise, calling out to those who need an awakening or just want to witness another's.
This is my banner, my t-shirt, my emblem.
This is what I stand for and support, this is my pride on the line,
my shield in the battle of existence.
This is my stage name, my costume, my mask.
This is how I have chosen to show you who I am,
this is what people will analyze after I am gone if they care to know more.
These are my volumes, my grimoire, my oral history.
It is made up of all of me, what I think, what I feel,
who I am, and how much that can change day to day.
This is my closet, my attic, my basement.
All the things I have collected throughout my life,
things I should have thrown out that I have kept and things I have lost that still pain me to remember.
This is my resume, my final, my thesis.
This is my offering to the world,
from my perspective shaped by many others and reinterpreted by me.
This is my brain, My heart, My gut.
Things that matter and things that don't but they all make up a life that is still learning and growing.
One that cannot be easily defined or even put into words properly
not even by it's author
but I will continue to try, not for you, but for me.

Spoken

I have no thoughts I can nail down,
A superhighway through the crown,
So much talking so few words,
Seeking cream and finding curds,
Floating aimless against my will,
I cannot move and can't sit still,
Is it the planets or the stars?
Or just the fear of showing scars,
Imperfections curse my mirror,
Until the blur gets ever clearer,
I have nothing more to give,
And yet my words still breathe, still live,
I feel the surface just now breaking,
All I know now is the aching,
Remove the robes to show the skin,
Build up the good to smite the sin,
As tongues work harder now to hide,
The darkened places deep inside,
The light attacks and tears me open,
Pray the truth now shall be spoken

Broken open

I once thought I was broken but the truth is I'm broken open,
That nerve that screams from the slightest breeze,
The skinned knee that means adventure,
That succulent orange freed from it's rough skin ready to be devoured,
That snake that now shows a new skin, more vibrant then before,
That boring rock that hides earths lustrous treasures,
That sentence or sound that you could never let slip,
the one that could end everything or begin the healing,
That present that you never knew you wanted and now it is the best one you have ever received,
I am unwrapped, I am exposed, I am naked, I am raw,
The useless discarded,
the substance within ready to be tasted

A Breath so Deep, A Heart so Full

My eyes can only take in the pleasure of it all,
My mouth can only sit agape at the wonder,
My heart squeezes it's feelings to my eyes for it is too much to hold in,
My arms have lost all sense of purpose and composure,
My stomach a creature that folds and twists and flutters,
My legs like the new branches on a spring tree, flimsy and weak,
bending and bowing,
My mind already replaying the moment
and bounding off to preplan the future of what it could mean,
My breath labored with the joy of it all,
sucking it's moments more and more quickly,
What a glorious extremity,
The opposite of tragedy, the opponent to despair,
Here is where we all should live, this is what we all should feel.
Found, Loved, Known, Seen.

The Creaking Wheel Part 2

Her feet pounded up the stairs, ringing with each step on the metal. She wore a wheelmen’s uniform that had been altered to fit her small frame and topped it off with an expression of determination. Her teeth sat tightly clenched in her cheeks, squaring her jawline. Her hands were balled into white knuckled fists and moved rigidly at her sides as she walked. She pushed the door open, and it banged loudly against the wall. A chorus of men chuckled and shouted, “New Guy!” and the chorus carried throughout the workroom. As the second round of jeers began, they turned to see the boss’s daughter standing there slowly pinking in the face. They stopped heckling, some mid-syllable, and the room fell silent except for the moaning of the machinery. She surveyed the work room and was met with darting glances and some sneers below the goggles on the men’s faces. She heard everyone clear their throat at least once and wondered if this was some kind of secret code the workers had to communicate dissatisfaction amongst each other. She lowered her eyes and made her way to the office to meet her father and husband. The heavy door swung open, creaking a warning to the workers. Her father stepped out the door of the office and looked at each worker, face by face. Most of them turned back to their work when he made eye contact, some did so after a very audible gulp. If she didn’t know better she would think that they were trying to be funny. Her father was well revered among the workers but also feared. She had seen him fly off the handle when a worker made a nearly fatal mistake; she had never seen the color that was upon his face that day anywhere else in nature before or since. She stepped in the office, and the door creaked shut behind her. “Are you sure you want to do this honey?” her father asked. He took a breath to say more, but she held up her hand and simply said, “I’m sure.” They spent the rest of the work day going over the schematics of the wheel, vital safety measures, and how the wheel was operated. After they were done, they made their way out of the office. Most of the workers had already left for the day, and the rest were in the lockers packing up. Her father led her to the wheel. He asked her to name off the safety rules with the exact wording and in the exact order in which he had taught them to her. She made it three-quarters of the way down the list and started to flounder. “You’re not ready,” he said sternly. She nodded dejectedly. Her husband tried to plead with her father for another chance. “Don’t worry darling, tomorrow morning I will be correcting him on the rules,” she said winking. “I don’t doubt it for a second honey,” her father said nodding. “If that’s the case,” he continued, “then tomorrow, you work the wheel.”

Resolution

As the fog of another year gone by is slowly lifted, A brand new year has now begun with which we have been gifted, More time to find our happiness, More time to ease our pain, More time to reinvent ourselves then go back to the same, For hope cannot survive alone, it must be reinforced, So little changes can be the stones upon our new found course, Don't paint an angel, paint it's wing, or even just a feather, With each new wisp of fluffy white the bigger piece gets better, One day you'll take a look around, in a year or maybe seven, And realize your tiny wisps have turned into your heaven.