2/14/13

Shangri-La
By David Edward Nell


Throughout the nerves in my body, there is a tide of awakening, and yet it is the ultimate sleep. What breath remains, goes, and so I lose my compass, and curiosity is reduced to its rawest, without the logic of an internal voice. By the wall, on which my mother once painted an abstraction of a sea shell in acrylic blue, the clock does a spin-wheel dance across the waves of concrete; my sight, it seems, has been tickled by a mirage, but one inescapable. That clock appears to beat its last as well, stops on twelve. Something is by the door, breaching atoms, material. I see an assortment of shards travel through and coalesce into a discernable shape, a human shape, and it bends its obscured consistency in approach, motioning for my acknowledgement. What an impossible idol, so benign and virtuous in aura. Who are you?

Standing right by the bed on which I lay, it observes with no semblance of judgment. It is of a sentimental charm. I try to assert what business it has here, why it's so persistent in its watchfulness, and finally, I know. It's him, that lost contact who went without a goodbye. The link that once was, is again. But I cannot reach out, nor can I wipe away these tears so black, nor can I think of anything beyond my sin. There it is, returning to haunt. Was I not selfish?

The burning brand of remembrance is stoked, not of my own volition. What I've done is unforgivable, it seems. This is how my penance is to be paid. A great sadness takes charge of my will. The strands of my ego are picked apart by unseen forces seeking the cause of my lack of existence before. My brain is set upside-down, drowning in the pits of fear. Then it's just that ever-consuming darkness, where the hurt dwells as a permanent dressing of regret and the divisions linger more strongly; it is an outpouring of acid on self. Is this all there is, all I'll know?

My ears fill with an inner hum, a warning bell programmed by some wise harvester. My fingers and toes furl painfully on instinct. A surge of electricity flows anew in my body, briefly, then secedes. There's a pressure at the back of my head, and it feels like a worm wriggling in my skull. It's an itch I cannot scratch, and it's inflating. I hear a pop. Those images, that final sin, trailing off in the form of nothingness. At last, I cease to fear, for he, the man who watches my hour, doesn't want me to; for those memories aren't important anymore, and he understands that life is the road to death, that it's just a ride for explorers of the vast paradigm. A dream in itself. Isn't all of it?

What happiness this is. What it is, is what we should've known. There's a light there behind him, bearing the mark of the brightest night star imaginable, so pure and welcoming it must be the most desired ecstasy of all. It's a part of him, our cherished memories, everything. From his heart there comes a tunnel, connecting through him, to the light. And the light to the tunnel, tying with it in natural synchronicity. I become a child again, torn from care. The adjoining of our beings triggers our transition to another place, time. We're standing together on a small, desolate harbour overlooked by oak trees, watching the sun wane its orange hind into the sparkling sea. This can't be. But it's so real, so real.

Dear Grandfather. With me again.

Do you remember when you used to hold my hand and take me to the park and push me in the swings; when you used to wait for me at the bus station every day and treat me to juice and chips in the afternoon; when we used to indulge in fun and games together in the passage; when every Sunday we'd go to Church and have roast for lunch; when you'd let me play in your backyard; when you gave me endless joy; when you passed that day and I never stopped crying?

He smiles in response. I'm home.


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David Edward Nell is still on the ride, and in his spare time he watches the skies and writes from Cape Town, South Africa.