Inspector

What so false as truth is,

False to thee?

Where the serpent's tooth is

Shun the tree---

Where the apple reddens

Never pry---

Lest we lose our Edens,

Eve and I.

~Robert Browning - A Woman's Last Word

The city bled an efflorescence, golden on the blur of night - a phoenix death, embers until the resurrection of morn, where new creation begins, and begins again. It was a strange thing, a death in undying lands, and the city's edenic appearance burned with a burr of color, a drop of poison dye in crystal water.

The inspector rolled into the city on a stagecoach hearse-black in the funereal palette of night. A land of shadows, everything flickering in surreal beauty: even in darkness the city emit an elegance, a face of perfection.  But the inspector was locked deep in thought, irregular in his introspective ignorance of the passing scene: dewy, white limestone streets; glass and rose-chalcedony architecture, purple saffron exuding a metallic honey scent. 

What were his thoughts, then, the dark-clad man in the long cloak and navy wool scarf, bundled, despite the balmy morning – what were his thoughts? He took a deep drag on a thin-brown cigarette, a relic of the distant past, and considered.

I haven't written a story for some weeks, and certainly not a longer story for some time. I'm excited to get back into the swing of things. I just finished the last of the Sylvia Plath I was given: Ariel. She's quite astounding, and I truly wish I could write half so well - a third so well. I started and finished one of Mary Oliver's poetry books, and wow! She's amazing, too! I guess there's a reason she won the pulitzer, huh? Maybe if I live to be as old, I could write such fascinating things. 



Shell
Still the ships passing, seas overhead
Here I hear no waves
Whine of whales, clamp of clams
Sunlight bleeds the deep sea red
Swim near, rescue me
I'm a man, not an oyster
Believe.
Bolstered are my emotions when
Strange though it seemed
Divers dove down closer
Rescue, rescue me!
I'm in truth a man, you see.
Their gentle hands brushed the sands
Lifting me from the deeps
Oh, you've come, I'm saved, I'm saved!
But lifting me from the sea,
they pried my mouth I'd clammed up tight
wresting, divesting my pride
lobbed me back into the deeps
I don't mind, though
my soul they keep
As long as they left
my humanity.