1.
i woke up with no memory in a hospital bed, tucked in and wired up. a group of students approached my side. things were said that i didn't understand.
i fell asleep and when i woke i was outside. the wind chilled me to the bone and a man called for help from the edge of a cliff. without time to think, i reached over to lend him my strength.
what happened to me? i asked him, but he couldn't say. he just thanked me and watched as i walked away into the bogs. i seemed to me, to disappear.
2.
i woke up in a crowd of hysterical cries. a stampede of unfamiliar faces with very familiar expressions of fear all over their faces. so i ran until i saw her. a child, her legs mangled form a lifetime of injury. the chair beside her broken. so i lifted her small body. she was heavy for me, but the will to bring her with me, away from a danger i didn't know overruled the stinging in my arms.
though she couldn't understand, her mother still thanks the heavens for sending an angel to rescue her sick child from the wave.
3.
i must have looked like someone he knew because his eyes were set on me from the moment i appeared in the doorway to the night club. i wanted to leave, to figure out what had happened to me. have i died? this can't be heaven. i'm tired, starved.
before i could turn to leave, i felt his hand around my arm. gentle, but clammy.
"don't go yet" he shouted, competing with the dj.
"where am i?"
"heaven"
"what!?"
"club heaven"
"I’m leaving”
“can I come with you?”
we heard the ambulance just a few minutes later. 46 shot dead.
4.
i stood in a blood soaked field in the north. men screamed and i stood there. naked and crying like a child. the smell of death swirled up around me like a heavy fog. there was a clear-eyed man on the other side of the battle. he saw me and paused. he saw me and cried. men around him paused and stared at me, weeping. the fighting stopped, but the smell of death only thickened. and though i must be mystical, i felt the cold steel push its way through my back and my heart. the pain was so real.
5.
if i wasn't sure i'd died before, this time i knew. so when i woke again, i could do nothing by cry. the self-pity over came me.
yet in my sobs and fits of terror, i fulfilled another need.
a blue-haired old woman poked me with her cane outside the grocery store where i sat weeping on the sidewalk.
"get up, you're a disgrace," the granny blasphemed.
"i said, get up!" she stared me down and took me home, gave me food, drink, a place to sleep, and told me stories of the war and the boy she never married.
6.
reassured of my place, i woke up again. the frustration of unknowing buried beneath a sense of duty. what could it be this time? a subway train at Namba.
a boy across from me looked pale, down. "are you okay?" i asked in English.
he looked up, startled.
i asked, "you want to get a latte?"
on exchange from Texas, he just learned that his girlfriend committed suicide, and he didn't have enough money to fly home for the funeral.
he was trapped in Japan. i listened as he mourned. he thanked me and paid for my drink and left.
7.
i found an empty house in an empty field. i filled it with fresh food for whoever might come. cakes, pastas, salads, salsas, soups, breads, cookies, mouse, and hot drinks at the ready and the table set, waiting.
i heard them approaching, eight bright travelers. hardened by the mountains, they welcomed me and my feast with hugs and songs.
and though i could hear them singing, i spent that night in the woods of Siberia with a man detached from his group. the extra body heat kept him just a hand's length from death's grip.
he called me his angel.
8.
i shivered from the cold of the night to awake under the heat of the day. the sounds of swans protecting their ponds from playing dogs and the laughter of friends filled the air.
beneath all the joy that sounded there was a petite cry.
a little blond girl staggered from behind a tree.
"are you lost?" i asked her carefully.
she cried on, shaking her head up and down.
i took her hand and asked for her name.
we soon found her mother who thanked me with lunch and asked my advice on what to do about her boss.
9.
when i next woke, it was amidst the dying once again. beds filled with sad men, missing limbs and minds broken beyond repair.
i sat by the bed of a dying man in his military hospital bed. no one else seemed to have the time for him anymore.
his name was simon. he went to war to look after his brother. but his brother ended up looking after him.
he asked me if he was going crazy and laughed when i told him that i already had.
he too called me his angel, and thanked me for holding his hand.
10.
i took the bullet for a banker at an armed robbery. i convinced a waitress to serve a poor man his last meal without paying. i donated the pint of blood that saved a pregnant Somalia woman. i taught a young girl how to prepare a good cup of coffee to impress the British exchange student she liked. i made a man late for work on the day his office building was later hit by a terrorist in a plane. i answered the man when he asked me what numbers to play. but i never found out if he won.
i woke up with no memory in a hospital bed, tucked in and wired up. a group of students approached my side. things were said that i didn't understand.
i fell asleep and when i woke i was outside. the wind chilled me to the bone and a man called for help from the edge of a cliff. without time to think, i reached over to lend him my strength.
what happened to me? i asked him, but he couldn't say. he just thanked me and watched as i walked away into the bogs. i seemed to me, to disappear.
2.
i woke up in a crowd of hysterical cries. a stampede of unfamiliar faces with very familiar expressions of fear all over their faces. so i ran until i saw her. a child, her legs mangled form a lifetime of injury. the chair beside her broken. so i lifted her small body. she was heavy for me, but the will to bring her with me, away from a danger i didn't know overruled the stinging in my arms.
though she couldn't understand, her mother still thanks the heavens for sending an angel to rescue her sick child from the wave.
3.
i must have looked like someone he knew because his eyes were set on me from the moment i appeared in the doorway to the night club. i wanted to leave, to figure out what had happened to me. have i died? this can't be heaven. i'm tired, starved.
before i could turn to leave, i felt his hand around my arm. gentle, but clammy.
"don't go yet" he shouted, competing with the dj.
"where am i?"
"heaven"
"what!?"
"club heaven"
"I’m leaving”
“can I come with you?”
we heard the ambulance just a few minutes later. 46 shot dead.
4.
i stood in a blood soaked field in the north. men screamed and i stood there. naked and crying like a child. the smell of death swirled up around me like a heavy fog. there was a clear-eyed man on the other side of the battle. he saw me and paused. he saw me and cried. men around him paused and stared at me, weeping. the fighting stopped, but the smell of death only thickened. and though i must be mystical, i felt the cold steel push its way through my back and my heart. the pain was so real.
5.
if i wasn't sure i'd died before, this time i knew. so when i woke again, i could do nothing by cry. the self-pity over came me.
yet in my sobs and fits of terror, i fulfilled another need.
a blue-haired old woman poked me with her cane outside the grocery store where i sat weeping on the sidewalk.
"get up, you're a disgrace," the granny blasphemed.
"i said, get up!" she stared me down and took me home, gave me food, drink, a place to sleep, and told me stories of the war and the boy she never married.
6.
reassured of my place, i woke up again. the frustration of unknowing buried beneath a sense of duty. what could it be this time? a subway train at Namba.
a boy across from me looked pale, down. "are you okay?" i asked in English.
he looked up, startled.
i asked, "you want to get a latte?"
on exchange from Texas, he just learned that his girlfriend committed suicide, and he didn't have enough money to fly home for the funeral.
he was trapped in Japan. i listened as he mourned. he thanked me and paid for my drink and left.
7.
i found an empty house in an empty field. i filled it with fresh food for whoever might come. cakes, pastas, salads, salsas, soups, breads, cookies, mouse, and hot drinks at the ready and the table set, waiting.
i heard them approaching, eight bright travelers. hardened by the mountains, they welcomed me and my feast with hugs and songs.
and though i could hear them singing, i spent that night in the woods of Siberia with a man detached from his group. the extra body heat kept him just a hand's length from death's grip.
he called me his angel.
8.
i shivered from the cold of the night to awake under the heat of the day. the sounds of swans protecting their ponds from playing dogs and the laughter of friends filled the air.
beneath all the joy that sounded there was a petite cry.
a little blond girl staggered from behind a tree.
"are you lost?" i asked her carefully.
she cried on, shaking her head up and down.
i took her hand and asked for her name.
we soon found her mother who thanked me with lunch and asked my advice on what to do about her boss.
9.
when i next woke, it was amidst the dying once again. beds filled with sad men, missing limbs and minds broken beyond repair.
i sat by the bed of a dying man in his military hospital bed. no one else seemed to have the time for him anymore.
his name was simon. he went to war to look after his brother. but his brother ended up looking after him.
he asked me if he was going crazy and laughed when i told him that i already had.
he too called me his angel, and thanked me for holding his hand.
10.
i took the bullet for a banker at an armed robbery. i convinced a waitress to serve a poor man his last meal without paying. i donated the pint of blood that saved a pregnant Somalia woman. i taught a young girl how to prepare a good cup of coffee to impress the British exchange student she liked. i made a man late for work on the day his office building was later hit by a terrorist in a plane. i answered the man when he asked me what numbers to play. but i never found out if he won.
2 comments:
This entry is very neat.
this just sounds amazing, and works well as a narrative, have you thought about expanding it?
also, you should make comics with me and reed ;)
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