Time And Space
Winning Entry by jaguar
The Whirligig
He grabs my hand and says:
'Wife, we must squeeze each moment,
death’s our lifelong enemy
but every day together’s a win
against the whirligig of time.'
I try to close my eyelids on him
they flutter like dust motes
hanging, undecided things,
a pendency like me.
That day I ate with you
our teeth snatched the flesh
from globe artichoke leaves,
chins warmly goldened by butter,
our tongues sharing the taste
slow boiling delivers.
His nervous voice yaps on,
drilling a faith I don’t share
into every hole and corner
of my clenched senses.
He is more my enemy than time
because he can’t understand
lives are never lateral,
some moments imbed gold gleams
burning through years and years.
My prim and proper self
fleeing to the four winds, dispersed
to become the spinner, gee-haw, pinwheel.
It steals brief bits of time from him
for us to spend together,
it makes us space.
He grabs my hand and says:
'Wife, we must squeeze each moment,
death’s our lifelong enemy
but every day together’s a win
against the whirligig of time.'
I try to close my eyelids on him
they flutter like dust motes
hanging, undecided things,
a pendency like me.
That day I ate with you
our teeth snatched the flesh
from globe artichoke leaves,
chins warmly goldened by butter,
our tongues sharing the taste
slow boiling delivers.
His nervous voice yaps on,
drilling a faith I don’t share
into every hole and corner
of my clenched senses.
He is more my enemy than time
because he can’t understand
lives are never lateral,
some moments imbed gold gleams
burning through years and years.
My prim and proper self
fleeing to the four winds, dispersed
to become the spinner, gee-haw, pinwheel.
It steals brief bits of time from him
for us to spend together,
it makes us space.
Featured Entry by quietmandave
There is a special quality to the darkness here, a silver blue tinge to the black as if crystalline. Kaleidoscopic pinpricks of light spit the night sky, microscopic mica in black granite. From where I lie, it's not clear which bodies reflect light and which produce their own heat; which bodies are driving forward the relentless expansion of the universe and which are retelling the story. The latter are the ones slowly fading into their own darkness. Somewhere up there is another planet like our own, perhaps with people just like us, with the chance to make different decisions.
I feel the cooling earth on my back, but I know that the coldest part of the night is closer to dawn. I camped once and felt the cold rising very slowly along the shortest path through my torso before the sun rose. For now, the ground supports me. There is a symmetry to the sky, and I reach my arms out to both sides, hoping there is no symmetry to the ground, but of course there is, of a sort. Both hands stroke grass, but there are subtle differences in the length, the texture and the presence of foreign bodies. I see how the night sky reflects this subtle crack in the symmetry. As I search the brightest stars I make out constellations, patterns unique to a specific sector. They have names I do not know.
It's like when we lay in the summer sun in a flowered meadow, watching the clouds drift slowly across the sky, their movement imperceptible to the impatient observer. Lying there, we picked out clouds and named them for the animals and countries they imagined, tracing their path as they morphed into something different. And then it was dark. Where had the day gone?
I feel the cooling earth on my back, but I know that the coldest part of the night is closer to dawn. I camped once and felt the cold rising very slowly along the shortest path through my torso before the sun rose. For now, the ground supports me. There is a symmetry to the sky, and I reach my arms out to both sides, hoping there is no symmetry to the ground, but of course there is, of a sort. Both hands stroke grass, but there are subtle differences in the length, the texture and the presence of foreign bodies. I see how the night sky reflects this subtle crack in the symmetry. As I search the brightest stars I make out constellations, patterns unique to a specific sector. They have names I do not know.
It's like when we lay in the summer sun in a flowered meadow, watching the clouds drift slowly across the sky, their movement imperceptible to the impatient observer. Lying there, we picked out clouds and named them for the animals and countries they imagined, tracing their path as they morphed into something different. And then it was dark. Where had the day gone?
Featured Entry by Finnbar
The Sea that Launches Kites
Entropy has increased, and chaos reigns in the Sea that Launches Kites.
Nobody is alone, so everyone must suffer.
Try to drown your neighbour, please,
And ride their kite up, up,
Follow the arrow of time, so that we don´t break the fundamental rules.
Skirt the thermals, look down on the churning mass
Of vacant souls and would-be sweaty lobster backs,
Fighting for launch windows.
Up further, until it´s not up but away, your kite is a solar sail.
Traverse the solar system, and remember not to breathe
As you create the first delta-V and Hohmann Transfer out to Mars.
Optimal conditions, look out for perihelion and make it in five months.
Your body may atrophy, and muscles shrink without gravity. Combat this immediately.
Bring Sally up. Bring Sally down.
A quick stop on Mar is not worth the energy to break; do it anyway.
You deserve a rest. You can breathe again now. I hope you like your CO2 rare.
Remember the Sea the Launches Kites. Hang
Your head in shame. As you terraform the planet, think of the bloodlines you drowned.
Why didn´t you just swim and jump?
You could have made it hurting no-one, but instead
The next Einstein of Ghenghis Khan is providing nutrients to blobfish.
Never mind.
I told you to anyway, and blobfish need lunch too, ugly fuckers.
You forgot to bring a magnetosphere, so all of you plaints die in pain.
It´s your birthday, and your rebirth day. Think of boobs. Happy Birthday.
There is no Sea that Launches Kites on Mars, and since your terraforming failed you have to spend eternity alone, sorry.
Cry until you make puddles, streams, lakes. Think of all the Orangutans who died in pain, if you run out of crying fuel.
Eventually, see the early warning signs of the sun becoming a red giant.
You gotta get outta here man.
Trust your tears. Leap in the sea of tears. It may yet be one to launch your kite.
Man up. Everything is futile. We all die alone.
Start to swim. Maybe the butterfly can save you.
Entropy has increased, and chaos reigns in the Sea that Launches Kites.
Nobody is alone, so everyone must suffer.
Try to drown your neighbour, please,
And ride their kite up, up,
Follow the arrow of time, so that we don´t break the fundamental rules.
Skirt the thermals, look down on the churning mass
Of vacant souls and would-be sweaty lobster backs,
Fighting for launch windows.
Up further, until it´s not up but away, your kite is a solar sail.
Traverse the solar system, and remember not to breathe
As you create the first delta-V and Hohmann Transfer out to Mars.
Optimal conditions, look out for perihelion and make it in five months.
Your body may atrophy, and muscles shrink without gravity. Combat this immediately.
Bring Sally up. Bring Sally down.
A quick stop on Mar is not worth the energy to break; do it anyway.
You deserve a rest. You can breathe again now. I hope you like your CO2 rare.
Remember the Sea the Launches Kites. Hang
Your head in shame. As you terraform the planet, think of the bloodlines you drowned.
Why didn´t you just swim and jump?
You could have made it hurting no-one, but instead
The next Einstein of Ghenghis Khan is providing nutrients to blobfish.
Never mind.
I told you to anyway, and blobfish need lunch too, ugly fuckers.
You forgot to bring a magnetosphere, so all of you plaints die in pain.
It´s your birthday, and your rebirth day. Think of boobs. Happy Birthday.
There is no Sea that Launches Kites on Mars, and since your terraforming failed you have to spend eternity alone, sorry.
Cry until you make puddles, streams, lakes. Think of all the Orangutans who died in pain, if you run out of crying fuel.
Eventually, see the early warning signs of the sun becoming a red giant.
You gotta get outta here man.
Trust your tears. Leap in the sea of tears. It may yet be one to launch your kite.
Man up. Everything is futile. We all die alone.
Start to swim. Maybe the butterfly can save you.