As The Sun Fell.

This piece is a little different in that inspiration for it came in two parts. Firstly, there was the urge to draw the picture, which I followed, not really knowing where it was headed. Then, having completed the image, it was some five days before the words for it came through. Sometimes, that's just the way it happens.

It was four days since the sun had begun to die. Four days since a piece of it had fallen from the sky.

The soldiers denied that the sun was dying, of course. They said that it was the Gaijin; that they had a new weapon. A bomb. Hisao wasn't really surprised that the soldiers reacted this way. It was in the nature of their job to think such things.

Besides, they hadn't been here when it happened. Not like Hisao. They hadn't seen the birds fall flaming to the ground. They hadn't seen the brilliant flash that had seared his pupils, and which he could still see every time he closed his eyes. A flash so intense it burned his shadow onto the wall he had been standing next to. They hadn't heard the wind screaming in exhultation as it rushed past, fuelling the firestorm that engulfed the centre of the city. And, two days later, hadn't the sky wept black tears at the death? No. Despite what the soldiers said, and no matter how devilish and cunning they were, Hisao didn't believe the Gaijin responsible. He knew the sun was dying.

Now, each day, it rose and sank in a pool of blood, dark and clotted.

As the sun sank below the horizon, Hisao sat on the hillside, looking down at his home. The city where he had been born, which had nurtured him for all his fourteen years. The city which had died along with his parents and his two brothers. His beloved Hiroshima.

A coughing fit siezed him. He lay on the ground, writhing until it passed. He sat up, gulping for air, and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. He stared at the blood there. It was the same colour as the sky.

Image"Sun Lies Bleeding" © Writing The Image/Peter Stone 2007

"As The Sun Fell" © Writing The Image/Peter Stone 2007

Nana.

Nana always had a piano in her living room and, like pianos the world over, it had photos of family members on top. However, I don't remember ever having heard her play it. I'm sure she did - there was always a music score sitting above the keyboard - I was just never around at the time. Our family wasn't one to stand around the piano at Christmas time enjoying a sing-along. To be honest, now that I'm older and wiser (?), I realise our family wasn't much for getting together at all.

Nana lived by herself - my grandfather had died long before I was born - and in those days it was expected that you accepted widowhood as a consequence of marriage, and didn't attempt to seek out another's comapany. She lived in Auckland, one-hundred and eight miles south of us, so visits to her were sporadic at best. And I only ever remember her coming to visit us just the once.

I think I was about twelve-years-old when I last saw her. It was Summer, in the middle of school holidays, and we had travelled to Auckland to spend a week there, visiting the zoo, etc. We all had lunch at her house, outside on the back lawn, and I remember the smell of freshly baked bread mingling with that of the cold meat and salad, and the aroma of freshly mowed grass. Being a kid, of course, my only true focus was on filling my stomach, and adult conversation held no appeal for me. At some time, during our week in Auckland, my mother organised for herself to be ostracised from the rest of the family, and we were bundled in with her by association. But I remember that day as being a good one, and always will.

We had other holidays in Auckland, but we never saw Nana again. Every now and then some news would filter through to us about how the rest of the family was doing, and that's how we learned that Nana had been placed in a care facility after being diagnosed with dementia. She died about ten years ago, aged eighty-something, her mind scoured by Alzheimers, some twenty-five years since I last saw her.

I never got to hear her play the piano.

You know, I reckon with all the devices available for restraining a person's freedom, nothing could be as cruel, nor as binding, as the shackles placed on us by our own family.

Photo © Herman Krieger (Featured in the M.I.L.K. Collection)

"Nana" © Writing The Image/Peter Stone 2007

Birthday Treat.

Amshula and her younger sister, Paravi, were more than familiar with the wildlife that lived in and around their village; the silent crocodile that lurked in the river; the egrets that nested on the river banks; the elegant sambhar deer and its speckled smaller cousin, the chital; the big, oafish water buffalo; the chattering, mischievous band of monkeys that lived in the forest, and which sometimes ran through the village at nighttime; the fearless mongoose. Once, their father had had to chase a cobra, which had been attracted by the warmth of the cooking fire, from their hut. They hadn't seen the elusive tiger, yet, although their father had told them about how he had once seen one lurking on the edge of the meadow where he was tending the cattle. And the village owed much of its existence to the working herd of elephants owned by the village headman, so those great lumbering creatures were as common a sight as the scavenging mynah.

But they had never seen an elephant that was drunk before.

Ganesh Chaturthi, the festival celebrating the birthday of Lord Ganesh, was only two days away, and their mother had sent the pair to the grove of mango trees to pick some of the fruit in preparation for the feast. The girls chattered away merrily on the way to the grove; both were excited about the coming festival. Their father had made the most remarkable idol of Ganesh, and they were certain it would be chosen as the idol of the year. And there would be lots of music and dancing, and Amshula was going to be one of the dancers. As they got closer to the mango grove, they heard a lot of snorting and blowing, accompanied by the sound of breaking wood and the occasional elephant trumpet.

They soon discovered the source of the commotion. A herd of wild elephants had invaded the grove and were gorging themselves on the overripe fruit which had fallen to the ground. They were having a great time, drunkenly bumping against the trees, grasping the brances with their trunks and shaking them vigourously, breaking some off in the process. Judging by the damage caused to the surrounding foliage, the party had been in full swing for some time. The girls stood and watched with bemusement, and they couldn't help but laugh as they watched the beasts staggering about on unsteady limbs.

Eventually, Amshula turned to her sister. "Come, Paravi," she said. "It seems Lord Ganesh has decided to celebrate his birthday early. We will come back tomorrow and see if he has left us any mangoes to pick." They turned back toward the village.

"Perhaps Mother will make something for his aching head."

Photo © Dilip Padhi (Featured in the M.I.L.K. Collection)

"Birthday Treat" © Writing The Image/Peter Stone 2007