IV.
I met this man. He spoke only in dog-eared pages and recycled stories. You know the type; the eclectic garbage man that collects his job and creates something out of rusted words long forgotten and long ago lofted to the landfill. He conjures the sun to shine brighter on the dust in the room than on the window itself. (I find myself begging the sun just to rise, having no control over the direction in which it flashes. Neither I or the man would call the sun a fool. I, because I would never dare, and He, because there is no need for him to bully a friend.) This man shows the souls of leaves and the souls of man as sharing the same genetic recipes.

I met this man, and he told me stories and stories and stories of planets and ghosts. A pharmacy stocked with potions for sublime sadness, love, forgetfulness, and most wondrously, travel for the unmovable and the unstoppable.
And as the days race to the finish-line and keep going—I remember fewer words of his, I no longer read his pages, but I roll in the autumn-marked pages and feel his soul blow breezes on my fingers—bringing them to life. And I remember

Learning. Like braille, his words interrupted the uncomplicated smoothness of my fingertips and said- live thoughtfully, imaginatively. My fingers bled, and began to dance.


Bradbury.

06/30/2004

Author's Note: thanks for reading, comments welcome :)

Posted on 07/08/2004
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