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silentrain
Broken guitar - Subscribe
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A broken guitar. Abandoned on the streets, left on the curb dismembered and dirty; grime covering it's once shining hollow body. Steel strings are snapped at the bottom of the neck, the neck itself only be connected to the body by the lonesome high E string wanting more than anything to vibrate it's sweet sound once more. But as person after person pass the weeping guitar, it can only grow more depressed as it no longer cares when cars narrowly miss it, sending waves of intoxicated water caressing over it, impurifying it even more; life doesn't matter. Pushed up against the curb, washed out, hope lost, the broken guitar utters not one sound. It can't. The magic is lost. The soul is shattered into sharp silver pieces in the middle of the street as car after car runs over it, leaving tire tracks with no concern for what they left behind. More grime plasters over it's surface. The strings flap lifelessly in the burning wind; the lowly high E trying not to cry when another wave of slicing pain tells it to let go and break along with all the others. A pitiful scream escapes the intact string, knowing that the end is near, but just when it thinks all living is pointless, a pair of strong hands pick up the two broken pieces. Eyes scan over it as fingers trace along the body, cleaning off layers of the past in one swipe, allowing the original warm color of the wood to peek through once more. Darkness. When consciousness comes once again, purity flows in under the name of light; warmness clinging to fanged icicles. For a brief second, the E string notices something- that's it's whole again. The neck and body are joined together, and the whole guitar has been cleaned to surpass it's former glory. But there's a problem. It's is just sitting there, placed on a stand under a plate of bullet proof glass. What good can something be when it can't bring happiness to others? Depression sets in once more. You're alive but you're dead at the same time. You sit there with your brain functioning, but limbs wont move and mouth wont speak; deaf, blind, mute, numb. But before the knife can be pulled out, the same pair of strong hands picks up the guitar, moving it around in the warm air until it is handed to a pair of smaller hands that instantly hold the instrument as if it were made of glass. A converse all star shoe counts out the beats against a warm wooded floor and with one slow strum down the strings, life begins again. Suddenly a cool, jazzy solo erupts from the small fingers, hands running up and down the neck, strings vibrating with a sense of loving one can only receive from a musical instrument. Life flows through the guitar, the hands giving it new hopes, dreams, and a reason to keep on giving- happiness. As the E string is played at different frets, making new notes, it realizes that the strings above it are not the ones from before. The broken original strings that chose to give up are not part of the new soul of the ancient guitar. Because those strings chose to give up, they didn't have the chance to see what greatness awaited them if they had just held on a bit longer. They didn't get the chance to see what they really meant to people; what the gift of life really means. Now only one original string of the guitar sings sweetly, the lovely mix of sound pleasing even the pickiest of ears. The duct tape is off the muted mouth, blood is out of the deaf ears, closed eyes are now opened, and feeling is restored to the once emotionless piece of lost history. Music reflects off mirrors and into the soul, instantly capturing something everyone can love. Life flows like rushing water running through closed fingers; we never expect it to make it through, but somehow the water slips through the invisible openings of our hands- free- like we can become. A broken guitar no more. |
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silentrain
Shadows of memories Dec 13th, 2005 3:15:42 pm - Subscribe
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Today I missed something I've gone to every year. Tonight I'm missing something I've never been to. It's strange. One moment seems to be dripping by like chinese water torture and then the next it goes by so fast you're spun around with your hair stuck out to one side like a bottle of spiking gel has exploded all over your head. I guess time is like that. It loves to fool around with it's speeds; going from super sonic to extra slow motion at any point it sees fit, dragging out the horrible moments; snatching away the best days of your life. I sit on the roof or on my bed, staring at the night cloak surrounding the earth like a cupped hand. The full moon shines overhead with a galaxy of stars dangling like shards of hope, each one the wish of a person who needed something to believe in. The clouds sometimes come to cover them. Thick and black they are, full of despair and doubt, choking and blinding the dreams of all who choose to let them. Strange how the cloud cover seems to be thicker than usual these days and if you look around you can tell whose letting it effect them and whose not. Guess the wind isn't as strong as it once was. But, I wonder if they notice the bit of pale moonlight shining through the mess of seemingly impenetrable doom. It's there, leaving shadows of hope on the ground below. See? One just danced towards you. Wont you pick it up? Or will you just let it die at your feet? Hm. Yes. There are a lot more clouds than usual tonight. Ah, but the moon seems to be making it's way through anyway. Guess it still doesn't want to miss it's big scene. Leafing through an old black and white yearbook brings back memories that linger in the back of your mind, swimming around aimlessly- wondering when they'll be found once more. Each new crackling page causes more powerful waves of lost documents to flood back to your conscious mind. You remember some with a grin. You push others back with tears and fire. Yesterday I looked through photo albums of the past, the dust flying away like speckles of sun through the window shades with every turn. Stories unfolded that had been pushed away by the daily stresses of life; scattered pieces of my mind finally coming together, allowing me to see my full reflection once again, if only for a moment. With each page and caption I felt as though my life was flashing before my eyes, but I wasn't dying- I was living- through the pictures. Once in a while my eyes would flash to something that no matter how hard I tried I couldn't remember, like a fog had rolled across an already misty night; like a styrofoam dagger trying to penetrate into an iron heart-impossible to recall, when it should have been impossible to forget. I carefully turn another page and stare intensely at one picture, trying to recall why I had been smiling like that, or posed in that certain way when the flash sent me seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Was that my famous forced smile that everyone could tell was fake? The way my lips try to find a reason to pull in that direction so when person behind the camera presses down the shutter button, I actually look like I'm enjoying myself instead of appearing like some skeleton that doesn't belong in the land of the living. And why am I posed like that? Like a statue of my former self, cold and waiting- the thoughts going through my head not reflecting how I am captured in that one moment. Hm. My mask works better than I thought. But it might have to be cleaned very soon- it's been a while since I've had my picture taken. |
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Mood: Trying to find my wishing star amongst everyone else\'s... Music: \'What a Wonderful World\'- Louis Armstrong |
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silentrain
Lost wondering... Dec 18th, 2005 1:05:19 am - Subscribe
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It's dark. It's dim. It's engulfing. It's bleak. It's silent. It's frightening. It's- "Beautiful." Falling down an endless hole, you land hard on the prime seat of a strange movie theater you've never seen before; front and center, the screen a mess of silent, staring blue as if you two were having some sort of contest. Breaking away, you look around, hoping for a comforting soul that had fallen along with you, but only the dark velvet seats, propped up in their emptiness, meet your disappointed gaze. You're alone in the theater. The thought hits you like an arrow shot from the sky to spite you as you try to stand up, only to find you can't- as though gravity had it's hands pushing down on your shoulders. You struggle some more, but no matter what you do, you're stuck; stuck watching the blank screen that suddenly flashes, calling your attention. A voice speaks, but it sounds like a tape being played in slow motion and backwards at the same time. Mumbled and low, your gut tells you that whatever it's saying is important, but just like you've turned the volume of what enters your ears down to zero, nothing makes sense. Part of you wonders if that's what your mind wanted all along. Maybe it would be easier not to understand it. Maybe that way, things would make more sense. Suddenly, the screen flashes black, leaving you alone in the darkness that is crawling around your skin like snakes, pure muscle containing neither arms or legs slithering around the exposed parts of you body, hugging around your neck, causing you to stiffen in fear though if you had only relaxed, maybe the experience would have been enjoyable. The snakes turn electric, a bone tingling feeling shooting through your body like thin wine, causing you to straighten up as if you were put in a straight jacket. "Welcome to the asylum." You pause, the only words you had been able to understand the whole time gripping you like steel claws around your fast beating heart. The screen flashes black and white so fast you feel as though this is some kind of modern torture devise meant to drive you to the place with padded walls. A screeching sound of vinyl crossing diamond makes you try and reach hands to ears, but your hands are duct taped tight to the arms of the chair. A wind tunnel seems to come out of nowhere, causing your hair to fly up in violent swirls- a bad hair day was in your future once this was over as it seems with every passing second, you're drawing nearer and nearer to the end. A piercing pain rushes through your index finger followed by that numbing sensation that comes right after pain. You force yourself to look down, only to see a flat, dull disk, that seemed to be an earring of some sort penetrating the underside of your index finger, the skin slowly allowing crimson to drip from it. You open your mouth to scream, but sound is never able to pass your lips. You're trapped in silence and everyone else is screaming at you. Eyes shut, too bloody to be of any help, furious wind prevents you from hearing anything else but the screaming inside your head. Silence. You pause, the silence almost as bad as the screaming still ringing in your ears. By the time it's completely died away and hearing is once again a sense, the calm dripping of water in the distance becomes your friend. So sweet and pure it sounds, as light moisture mists around you, clinging to your skin; purifying your heart. "Is it safe?" Opening your eyes, you find yourself in a room you can't recognize, the soft wooden floor warm under your bare feet. Not a light is on except for the natural slightly blue morning rays streaming gently through an open sliding window door. As if possessed, you gravitate towards it, arm coming up to protect your dilating pupils as you slowly step out onto a small wooden balcony. Eyes fully adjusted, hands fall onto the railing of the balcony; old, rickety railings somehow supporting your weight. To the left below you see a decline, a trevor filled to the brim with water so level and calm that it looks as though you could walk right across it. A weathered rope bridge hangs over it, not moving at all in it's serenity even when a caressing breeze passes by. Farther in the distance, the bridge seems to a disappear, but a hazy end is in sight, complementing the frosty, misty water below. Spellbound, you look to the right, a long forest bountiful of trees as well as a damp dirt path meeting your bright eyes. You rush off the balcony down a flight of, to your surprise, steel stairs. But you barely notice as you rush down into the light, toasted brown earth, sand caressing around every step. Slowly walking through the forest, avoiding some lonesome twigs as you do so, a thin puddle of water that seems to cover the whole path doesn't make even the slightest splash underneath your feet. You look around at the long trees that seem to touch the heavens, some of their long branches folded slightly, allowing a little bit of hope to shine through from above, though the majority of it comes from the beginning and the end of the path. Green, red, and some brown hues of leaves hang on only the topmost of branches; nothing adorning the lower half, not ever bare, bony fingers to reach out and snag you. You continue at your slow pace, eyes down, as if the ground was the most fascinating thing rippling along the clear water. You become smaller and smaller as you walk further into the forest. Soon, you're nothing but a shadow in the distance, eyes on the ground as the lights fade and the screen turns black. Lost wondering in a dream world all your own. My dream world. |