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The owl experience

February 1, 2017

It was a slow night, so when the call reported a great horned owl at a downtown construction site, the dispatcher acquiesced and let 10 cruisers and the helicopter report.

The owl tilted his head at the fan of cars below. He looked at the strange, hard beast above. The only way out, he knew, was between the metal on the ground and in the sky, and so he fled the scene on spectacular wings held parallel to the earth. Away from the searchlights, he banked into the dark.

The phalanx dispersed to normal duty, mourning wisdom and beauty’s departure.

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Complication

January 31, 2017

Sometimes, she specifically sought out locked doors, satisfied by the dissatisfaction of not being able to open something. She had spent so long sitting with opportunity, after all, and regretted not living a life of more strife, more challenge.

Now, it looked as if everything was about to change. As she stood up there, peering through the teleprompter screen at the cheering crowds below, her left hand twitched, craving complication at its muscular core.

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Heavy fog

January 30, 2017

She tried to remember what the landscape looked like before the heavy fog rendered it invisible. As she approached, looming shapes changed. A giant became a lamp post. A bear became a fir.

She kept driving, though she could barely see the road four feet in front of her headlights. She flipped her beams to high, then returned them to low after they overpowered the curtain that had fallen on her life.

In the absence of normal input, everything threatened. Every tenth of a mile brought her closer to a wreck. Every intersection presented a frightening, dubious choice.

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Homicidal

January 29, 2017

Are you suicidal, sir?

No, said the man writhing on the gurney. I’m homicidal.

Homicidal? asked the EMT.

Yeah, the man gasped. I want to destroy the universe.

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Step by step

January 28, 2017

We are walking in groves inhabited by crows, taking paths darkened by hanging moss. It is twilight, now, and we fear navigating when the last, small bit of light goes away.

I have matches, she says, but she only has three, and they are tucked inside a paper booklet, flimsy and quick to burn. We could light something, make a torch, but everything is soggy from the recent rains.

We will have to walk into the dark together, says another, and we join hands. Step by step by step we continue forward, because this is the only way through.

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The new days

January 27, 2017

2000 was the last year of the old days, he said into the camera. 2001 was the first year of the new days. That’s when 9/11 happened. That’s how you know everything changed.

He took a drag from his cigarette. He looked up, for a long time, at the brittle-cold night sky.

That’s how we got to this shit now, he continued. Cops always watching. Just know that. Y2K. Peace.

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What sort of thread

January 26, 2017

That night, she walked beneath a scrap of moon, Venus sparkling nearby like the brightest bauble. Strange, black clouds muffled the moon, then left it naked, then covered it thinly as if it hung behind a scrim.

The crescent looked like a curved needle, and she wondered if it could sew all that was torn asunder. She wondered what sort of thread it would take to hold everything fast again.

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