Ouroboros

It’s a Greek-flag of a day. White light from a blue sky dazzles blinding white snow. It is melting. And it smells like spring. And they are happy. But they don’t know that they are happy, because that it is what young love is. Ungrateful, existing without realizing the significance of its existence.

The purple of her shoes matches the purple of his action figure’s cape. A song, they run through the woods, plastic cape soaring against the sun, their feet faithful percussionists keeping time. Tree chasing tree, the forest is a snake eating its own tail, a self-contained infinity. They run so long and so far that their mouths taste like metal and their lungs forget themselves. At last the clearing consents to be found and opens to the children.

It is bright and familiar. They play there. For hours, it is their home. Day after day, the boy and girl return to their secret universe. A perfect universe because there is an apple tree whose red delicious apples never seem to rot, and there is a stream whose water never trickles, but flows blue, true and cold. Flowers reach for the sky. And nothing ever dies.

Until it does.

Time replaces purple shoes with violet hair and heroes with heartbreak. Now teens, they visit the clearing less often, but they still visit. In the fiery hand of summer between freshman and sophomore year, the young man and young woman decide to make a pilgrimage to their old home. They walk quickly through the warm, humid woods, cicadas humming them on. Once again, the clearing opens itself instinctually, in the way a mother says she loves her children. Splashing, the boy and girl find refuge in the stream. They fall in love that day. Real love. Under the apple tree, her hair spills across the grass like wine. It smells like lilac. And he kisses her as the sun kisses the dark purple sky for the last time until morning. Lightning glows, rain falling from a now pitch black sky. They run back through the woods, drenched, giggling with the thunder.

Slowly, though, they grow up. Married now, the man and woman build a life from the blueprints left by those before them. A kid or two, jobs, church, maybe. Something’s different, though. They don’t know when or where, but at some point their love rusted into greed. Life is about gaining, now. Barons, they eat the land; digest the rich, black earth and expel rotting death. They burn their children’s future for the sake of their children’s future, a Janus fuel source. To keep warm.

In fall, the sun is a spilled jar of honey that slowly traps the forest in amber. Black is the color of death. But yellow: rotting leaves, old teeth and nails, fading eyes, is the color of dying. Everything moves slower because it is dying. The man and woman have not returned to their secret universe for years. Today, though, they walk through the woods, cool air biting their faces, as they plan their next project. For the last time, the clearing appears. The cold has hardened the ground into a white aegean marble, ancient trees now pillars holding up a white-grey, clouded sky. It is a forgotten and holy place.

The stream trickles, and yellow apples fall, lifeless, to the ground. She pokes the softest flesh she can find with a stake. To remember. Where to bring the rigs. Deep below the surface, a starless lake waits to be burned. It is priceless, but not costless. The boy and girl scrape away the earth like wrapping paper; iron executioners, they slash trees that chase trees to the ground. They gut the forest, burn the discarded carcass and bathe in the black blood of their mother.

…

It’s a Greek-flag of a day. Swallowed by darkness, white snowflakes are whispered into visibility by the blue light from his phone. It is winter, but it smells like smoke. And they are lost, because that is what young love is. Forgotten rubble paved over for a promise of a better tomorrow that never comes.