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| Howard Pyle |
I am returned; my heroic last words reduced to nought.
I awoke once more in Cabin 13. My berth; my tomb; my box, with its crudely carved numbers upon the door, its timber walls now sprouting twisted shoots of green life as if even the trees that once begat this cursed vessel would mock my cruel fate.
I yelled at the knots that formed faces in the ceiling’s grain, every inch of wood as familiar as my name. I cursed my name; I cursed God’s name, His incompetence in leaving me here undeserving of such cruel punishment. I rose and in a blind rush fuelled by guilt and anguish, I exited my cabin and threw myself over the gunwale into the arms of the sea.
A quickly inhaled breath of tepid seawater returned me anon to my berth, unquenched by the sea, my bedding dry and the timbers groaning my name.
The stern windows are illuminated with visions of green. Once more at the Captain’s desk, my bloodless hand rustles the blood-dipped quill across these charts.
Everything has changed.
Some hours ago the rage that is my constant companion now that the hunger has left me, overflowed and in a fit of bright red I slammed my fist down on the desk, an act which, given the desiccation of my body, caused said hand to splinter and my descending arm to continue, leaving behind the hand on the desk. I stared as the hand twitched and attempted to drag itself across the desk using yellow fingernails as grapples.
And as it slowly began to disintegrate so there rose from my gut a strange choking sound, a sound and sensation long forgotten. A sound not heard on these decks since last landfall.
Laughter.
And as I laughed I felt weight lift from my mind; my lonely and demanding prison. My left arm emptied itself as dust from its tattered sleeve and the lessening of its burdensome duty made me laugh all the harder. The captain’s desk sprouted green tendrils that writhed their way up my so recently evacuated sleeve and bit hard into the dry flesh at my ghostly shoulder.
And at the core of my laughter a seed of truth was born, borne too on the waves of relief that shuddered in my chest.
The desire for all living things to return to their most vital state; to the purpose imprinted on their soul, their core, is what makes it all happen. It is a truth so bleak as be understood only by contrast to the hell inspired by the need to believe in the god of heaven & hell.
My laughter revealed that which my prison had so desperately tried to teach me: the hell I endured was a hell of my own creation.
Faith in God must by definition be unquestioning and absolute, for to question is to fall; to doubt. This pilgrim had believed his faith to be so, doubt he had hidden deep in his chest full of guilt.
And the spectral green life that shared my prison bubbled and laughed with me, even as roots bored into my dead flesh and filled my mind with visions.
I awoke once more in Cabin 13. My berth; my tomb; my box, with its crudely carved numbers upon the door, its timber walls now sprouting twisted shoots of green life as if even the trees that once begat this cursed vessel would mock my cruel fate.
I yelled at the knots that formed faces in the ceiling’s grain, every inch of wood as familiar as my name. I cursed my name; I cursed God’s name, His incompetence in leaving me here undeserving of such cruel punishment. I rose and in a blind rush fuelled by guilt and anguish, I exited my cabin and threw myself over the gunwale into the arms of the sea.
A quickly inhaled breath of tepid seawater returned me anon to my berth, unquenched by the sea, my bedding dry and the timbers groaning my name.
The stern windows are illuminated with visions of green. Once more at the Captain’s desk, my bloodless hand rustles the blood-dipped quill across these charts.
Everything has changed.
Some hours ago the rage that is my constant companion now that the hunger has left me, overflowed and in a fit of bright red I slammed my fist down on the desk, an act which, given the desiccation of my body, caused said hand to splinter and my descending arm to continue, leaving behind the hand on the desk. I stared as the hand twitched and attempted to drag itself across the desk using yellow fingernails as grapples.
And as it slowly began to disintegrate so there rose from my gut a strange choking sound, a sound and sensation long forgotten. A sound not heard on these decks since last landfall.
Laughter.
And as I laughed I felt weight lift from my mind; my lonely and demanding prison. My left arm emptied itself as dust from its tattered sleeve and the lessening of its burdensome duty made me laugh all the harder. The captain’s desk sprouted green tendrils that writhed their way up my so recently evacuated sleeve and bit hard into the dry flesh at my ghostly shoulder.
And at the core of my laughter a seed of truth was born, borne too on the waves of relief that shuddered in my chest.
The desire for all living things to return to their most vital state; to the purpose imprinted on their soul, their core, is what makes it all happen. It is a truth so bleak as be understood only by contrast to the hell inspired by the need to believe in the god of heaven & hell.
My laughter revealed that which my prison had so desperately tried to teach me: the hell I endured was a hell of my own creation.
Faith in God must by definition be unquestioning and absolute, for to question is to fall; to doubt. This pilgrim had believed his faith to be so, doubt he had hidden deep in his chest full of guilt.
And the spectral green life that shared my prison bubbled and laughed with me, even as roots bored into my dead flesh and filled my mind with visions.
11 comments:
It is a truth so bleak as be understood only by contrast to the hell inspired by the need to believe in the god of heaven & hell.
The captain's logarithm takes a bee line back to life when it's cycle propels him to the clarity of reality compared to his fearful beliefs.
Faces in knot holes'll do just that!
Best yet, Bro.
'Tis the knot holes that have seen his doubt, as they inform the green tedrils to over-take him, wot? He realises this in his dying vision and can't help but laugh...or perhaps I'm reading too deep, here....?
Beverly: OK!
Yodood: A couple of years ago I was living in a wooden house in New Zealand - the interior was unpainted wood (hundreds of knot-hole-faces) and the klever Kiwi's who had built the house had neglected to allow for heating/cooling expansion - the result being that the house would bang and creak loudly during the night. I suspect that the house had a strong influence on this story (which i wrote while living there)
subby: you can never read too deep. I doubt whether any coherent logic can be applied to this story tho' since Mr Fevre is already dead.
Sweet Christ alive! You've outdone yourself with this one pal. Get it published so everyone can inside your minds eye.
10 / 10 for the photie, 10 / 10 for the piece.
Probably the best post I will read this year.
Beware of Cabin 13.
I am overwhelmed by your thought pattern and smblolic arrangement words.
this was an amazing recursive rhysomatic spiral; the shape and rhythm are so intertwined with the story of a self interred...a languid ecstatic transformation
Jimmy: 10/10 for your comment
James: not supersticious are we?
Ronald: smelling salts for all!
Harlequin: I'm gonna have to look up one or two of those words :)
A bit. No point making new enemies. By the way, in Russian, he says, 'Ya vernulsa!'
James: I didn't realise you'de been away :)
I. friggin. love. this: "Some hours ago the rage that is my constant companion now that the hunger has left me, overflowed and in a fit of bright red I slammed my fist down on the desk, an act which, given the desiccation of my body, caused said hand to splinter and my descending arm to continue, leaving behind the hand on the desk. I stared as the hand twitched and attempted to drag itself across the desk using yellow fingernails as grapples."
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