(backyard)

(the curtain curtailing)

The distance which can never be traversed is that between you and I and me and you.

The curtain curtailing can never be seen through nor unwoven.  It is the model upon which all other models are built and is so transparent as be near to invisibility, and we all know that if it cannot be seen then it should be suspected, at least, of non-existence.  (If, that is, one can suspect the non-existence of a thing.)

the silky veils of ardor

eidola.

As sheets of rice-paper fresh-laid hanging to dry in the hermitage, the slow breeze flows through the interstices twixt propinquous pliable planes.

So, it is said, the Universes hang next to each other, separated by a tiny, near uncrossable, gulf.  So brane theorists would have us believe.  I say "near uncrossable" as there is one way of making the journey, at least theoretically (and there may be others), and that is by concentrating a sufficient mass into a very small space.  If the mass is sufficient the gravity can reach across one or more neighboring gulfs and be manifest in places where it cannot be explained.  By 'mass' of course I am, perhaps, obliquely referring to the Higgs Field or its superposed vector boson.  The Ancients, for this reason, thought of the Higgs as The Abomination, a view with which this writer has sympathy.

Because of this, though it is impossible to propel anything from eidolon to eidolon, it is possible to bring something from one to another.  The Ancients would have named this 'Calling.'

As the Universes hang or are stacked, so it is with people.

Nativity

Natur

temporary residence

At night, while there is still diffuse light, enough to see silhouettes and vague monochromes, the places where they shelter from the uncaring sun flap sometimes in the wind.  Each dwelling has a hearth and sometimes there is fire: it gets cold in the desert at night.  So cold, so quickly, that the ground itself cries out in pain.

They tell the few tourists that this nocturnal howl is "the sound of the sand singing."  People honeymoon here; I suppose to them the screaming stretched landscape becomes a magical, romantic thing.  Everything so huge and us here so small yet, the warmth of your hand is insurance against all of life's inevitable harm.

As the light fades and the endearments turn to murmurs the flapping canvasses seem ships upon a waterless sea of beach, sails full of wind yet powerless to propel.

the city of canvas sails

So, time for another?  Buy you a pint, swap you a joke, maybe shoot the breeze a while.  I'll get you another.


Did you hear the one about the town down the road aways?  Sprung up overnight, or so they say.  


But there's nothing but road, down the road?


Yeah.  There is nothing there.  Not that I've seen; not that I have heard.


Well, they say the people all go there to die.  Thousands upon thousands of them.  They speak a different language and most of us don't trust them, you know how these people can be?  But they tell of there being no food, no harvest, in the North-East, for two years.  Now they're coming here to die.  That's what they say.  It hasn't rained for two years; and we thought we had it hard.


Why journey to die, though?


Why not?  That's what they're doing though.  During the journey many lose children, many children lose parents.  Every night you can hear them, walking quietly; they always walk quietly, don't want people to hear them.  They know they are unwelcome here; they sense how we feel.  


      Here, let me get you another.  What's your poison today?


After a few days, you know, they all seem to have the same face.  Like it's one person -- always a woman -- walking in endless circles.


That seems most apt.  Where do they live assuming they make it through the journey?


They build lean-tos and bivouacs.  They manage.