A Way Through The Brambles
There’s a perfectly paved path. It began, as all things
must, once upon a time. And stretches forth toward the horizon to a place I
know not where. Many feet traverse this path. Black shoes, white shoes, shiny
shoes, shabby shoes, large shoes, baby shoes, backless slippers, high-heeled
shoes, bare feet with bells on their toes… They all pass across my eye-line.
For I am not on this path. I was discarded. Kicked from it by the differing yet
identical sets of feet.
This
path lays flat atop an embankment with a ditch either side. The side which I
inhabit is filled with brambles. Thorny devils woven together in a virtually
impregnable matrix taller than I can stretch. Presumably the other side is as
inhospitable.
Each
day I inch through the barbarous forest at one-hundredth the pace of the feet
above me marching to their soft rhythm. And as darkness descends my clothes are
torn, my skin is scarred, and my determination is less than the previous night.
Nevertheless, at sun-up I orchestrate another assault on the blockade… desperate
to reach the destination the feet eagerly head towards in streamlined fashion.
Is there a castle on the other side? Filled with riches. Or a beautiful maiden
betrothed to me. Will there be luxuries? Entertainment or tranquillity. Or will
I be too late?
Above
me the feet pass with veritable ease and eventually out of sight. Night will
shortly fall. And already exhaustion and futility have taken their toll.
Perspiration drips from my brow, stinging my eyes and magically blurring my
surroundings. Tomorrow would be my eleven thousandth, five hundredth and
sixteenth day battling these fiendish weeds. And I know not how near I am to my
prize.
I
need to rest. And decide to lie down upon the thorns… winding my limbs through
the loops and strangleholds surrounding me. They have provided me with bedding
for so long now, any discomfort I may have once felt has been replaced by a
sense of belonging.
There
probably isn’t any end to the brambles.
Best just to lie here… and
dream.
* Dave Early says “Life for me began at an early age… and a few things have happened since then.”