Leaves (Surely, God's Will Shall be Done) (824 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.56 on 10 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Id (View user info) at 2004-11-30 12:35:37 EST
What is it about the leaves?
No one seems to pay them any heed until they die.
Not until, while in their death throes, while their bodies' color distorts, do we find them.
Is it like that with people? Do most not become important until they die?
.....twas like that with my daughter it seems. I never really cared until she was taken from me.
Or had I never really received her to begin with?
Now, as the winter months approached me and the leaves, so began their time of appreciation.
Little children playing with their dead forms, making piles, jumping in them. Celebrating them.
Had they but once paused to admire them in their prime, to speak of the beautiful green they bore?
Had I ever paused to admire my daughter in her short life, to speak with a parent's pride of the beautiful offspring I bore?
No, the children didn't see the leaves, and so had I not seen my daughter.
But why then? Why do I stand here now, a lone sentinel at her gravestone? Why does she seem so important and dear to me now?
Why had I tried to change fate, to alter time itself, why had I beseeched God for her?
Why had I killed a child for my child?
What is it about the night?
Everything changes, including the leaves, especially the leaves.
Those amusements the children had played in hours ago were now the agents of worry and fear.
The faint breeze blowing the leaves past the ground, producing that rustling sound, that ever-present and all encompassing sound I so dreaded as I child.
For surely the leaves made the same noise during the day, for surely the breeze blew.
So why is it only at night that the sound of leaves so terrifies?
Why is it only that now, when all my child sees is darkness...do I so fear her absence?
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Once upon a time, I had been a teacher. A teacher of what?...well, does it really matter? I was popular, I was admired and respected by student and faculty alike, no child would have felt unwelcome, many a child confided in me, many a family listened to my sage advice. Perhaps many a life I changed.
But my daughter....many a moment with her I missed, many a time my absence she felt, many a time did I say "I'm sorry, but surely next time...."
Committed was the word I used in those times. Committed to my job, and "kids" at school. High school I taught. Changing times for my "kids". Vulnerable times too. I was there for them through it all, be it pregnancy or parental dispute, bad grade or bad Christmas, failed grade or failed family. No problem too big, no problem too big.
Because there were never really any "small" problems with my "kids" at school.
My daughter had had small problems. Monster under the bed, a knack for tying shoelaces wrong or not at all, an uncanny ability to spill any liquid-containing object in existence. You know, normal stuff.
Maybe that's why she never really caught my eye. She had never been on the brink, never about ready to swallow a bottle of prescription drugs and wait to die. Nor had she once considered bringing a gun to school with a prepared list of names. Nothing really all that exciting.
My child. Not exciting. Every time I run that line through my mind now, it sickens me to no end. But it was the truth after all. I wouldn't be saving any lives if I had stayed home and read her a story every night. I wouldn't have stopped pain and ended misery in young lives had I sat on my couch with her watching Sesame Street. So I told myself anyway. The lives of many versus the life of one.
The lives of my "kids" over the life of my daughter.
The lives of thousands who died that day....over the life of young Osama.
Twice now I have sacrificed a child for my greater good. Twice now God seems to have made me suffer.
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What is it about a cemetery/graveyard?
Or for that matter...why two names?
For those with those they care for residing within, this place is a cemetery.
For those who come here for the privacy of it all, for the silent discreet comfort only the dead can provide, this place is a graveyard.
A gathering of ordered pits for rotting corpses.
Is that what the couple I'm watching make out think?
Is this place they choose to display their affections just a graveyard?
This place my daughter's rotting corpse resides?
Is her silent discreetness comforting to them? Do they enjoy her lack of life as a convenience to their tongue wrestling? Would it really be that hard for them to just explain to their parents that they are young and in love and will do as loving young couples do?
Instead of thinking this place a graveyard?
Stop.
I have no right to rage like this. For did I enjoy her abundance of life when she had it?
No. Yes.....no....surely I did. Though surely I didn't act like I did.
But then again, God doesn't seem to care much either. Three times I tried to save thousands, maybe millions of lives. Three times had God made the towers fall. For what purpose does God have ending so many lives? For what purpose did they live for? Where they merely created unto this world to serve a name on a list that had to be avenged by America? So many lives brought about just so we had impetus to wage our war?
Was that my daughter's role in life? To fuel my desire to change time?
And for that matter, what of those who fell along with the towers? Were they all loved in life as much as they were now loved in death? Were they shiny stars of light for others or just beautiful memories of people that weren't even truly known in life? Was that God's will, that they fuel America's desire to change the world?
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So here I stand, before my daughter's gravestone. Wondering why I stand before my daughter's gravestone.
So here I stand, a murderer of a defenseless child, wondering why I murdered a defenseless child in the name of an unknown daughter.
So here I wonder, if God's will of Freedom and Choice he so plainly declared to me is true.
So here I wonder, if the root of all evil is God's will of "Freedom and Choice."
"What is it about the leaves?"
I turned sharply toward the author of that sentence. I young man was seated on the gravestone next to me. He wasn't looking at me, but at the leaves being blown lightly in the dark twilight that had descended when I wasn't looking.
"No one really seems to pay them any heed, till they die anyway" said he.
This was creepy.
"Not until they turn all pretty do people notice them it seems. Wonder if it's the same with people too" said he.
This was impossible.
"But then again, so is time travel" said he.
This was true.
"Yes it is" said he.
I turned to the young man, who was still not looking at me, still so intent on the dead, vibrant leaves wafting in the wind.
"Who are you?"
"I'm Gryme" said Gryme.
User Reviews
Submitted by Davros (user info) at 2004-12-01 12:54:14 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Makes me think a lot, which is good.
-Davros
PS
'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance'
ID, who wrote this?
Submitted by darko (user info) at 2004-12-01 12:51:39 EST (#)
Ranking: 1
Submitted by darko (user info) at 2004-11-24 01:04:03 (#)
Ranking: 1
frankly, i just wasn't feeling this one so much.
Submitted by Impassive-Digressive (user info) at 2004-11-30 19:24:39 EST (#)
Ranking: 1
This, for some reason, reminded me of 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance'. Not so much in the content, more in the way it was written.
Good stuff. Keep it up.
Submitted by Durae (user info) at 2004-11-30 17:06:41 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
the language was a little melodramatic - I notice because I'm usually guilty of doing the same thing.
The cemetary part is funny.
Oh, and I prefer (and appreciate) green leaves, so I think your premise sucks. =P
Submitted by BillsSBChamps (user info) at 2004-11-30 15:37:54 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I printed this one out and had my way with it.
Don't worry Lojo the post said ok.
Submitted by tinactin (user info) at 2004-11-30 15:30:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This has given me an idea.
By the way, you didn't really lose a daughter, did you?
Submitted by lojope (user info) at 2004-11-30 15:17:29 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I am continuously blown away with each installment.
Submitted by Id (user info) at 2004-11-30 14:37:08 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Yeah, it would help if I mentioned that this is part three of a series I'm writing.
Here are the first two parts:
http://www.ubersite.com/m/52480
http://www.ubersite.com/m/51685
sorry bout that.
Submitted by AshK (user info) at 2004-11-30 12:54:29 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
You've got the perfect blend of a surreal and disturbing tone going with this.
Submitted by Jeanneee (user info) at 2004-11-30 12:44:21 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
I don't get it.