Wednesday, November 29, 2006

I Am the Stone


I usually post poetry on this blog but I am making an exception for this story because its a love story. Like most love stories it begins with a act of utter foolishness. I told someone that I loved them. Loving someone and telling them you love them are two very different things. Had I not said it, it would have haunted me for a long time, having said it it will haunt me forever. Those three words can destroy a relationship as easily as build it. Every man knows he will meet a woman who he can never stop loving and whom he can never love. Not because either lack the capacit but because to many people would be hurt or because it just can not be. This is my story about that woman. I could have had her as a friend forever had I said nothing. But my heart would haven been broken a thousand times and she would never have known. Telling her risks loosing her as a friend. But then not telling her means a life of cold and lonely what ifs for the one who remains silent. Either way it is the same for the Stone. But if the friendship survives, it could be that much sweeter. Maybe Im a coward for telling her. But then maybe the coward is the man who can not take that risk. Either way she will be my muse, my secret dream and hopefully she will be my friend.
This story is a metaphor about this relationship from the point of view of the a stone who has known nothing but the cold, until one day he meets a beautiful woman. A woman who gives him warmth. Because of the chance meeting of this woman, the stone loves the woman and is given hope. But because of everything else in the world, that will be the end of it and, the stone will be destroyed.

Dear Ms.

I am the Stone
As the earth cooled and the mists cleared, a giant stone loomed in the distance overshadowing the landscape for miles. Chilled by the snows, it stands unyielding as the cold winds blow up through the valley floor and against its face until the first small fissures appear at its base.
Shallow lines spreading and expanding through a thousand years, into millions of fissures spreading across the giant, like an intricate web, until one spring the first small chip falls free from the monolithic base and drops to the ground. With a single humble bounce the small stone lands on its edge and waits.
Far below man is introduced into the world and generations of seasonal snows come and go. And then, a second chip falls beside the first and as the first small stone feels the brief tremor, its balance is tipped and he falls from his edge to his side, beginning the journey to the floor below.
Through eons of time the small shards of granite become a great mound, slowly crawling down to the valley floor. Each hard little stone straining against the next. Each little shard, stiff and ridged and unyielding. Among them the little stone churns along towards a frozen lake of deep clear water that expands and contracts year after year as the winter winds blow.
The snows come again and again mounting at the base of the giant until the broken chips lie beneath the weight of a thousand bitter winters. The small bits of stone migrate, through the power of time, to the valley floor, and the small stone settles in to rests among his unkind brothers.
Lakes form and streams trickle, as a great wall of ice stands in the shadow of the giant stone. The flow of water from the frozen ground falls in its course to the people hundreds of miles below who eventually seek the source of the clear water.
As the expedition winds up the banks of the frozen river the first small stone clings to the bed it has settled in, with the help of the bitter frost that has been its life long companion.
The explorer’s boots grind and crunch against the simple stones and the sound carries through the crisp air until the group stops and stands at the waters edge marveling at the pristine stillness of the virgin lake.
The woman’s stoops and pries the jagged little stone from its frozen bed with a pop. For a brief moment the little stone is warmed in the woman’s hand. His mind rushes as her flesh, soft and yielding, bends around his edges capturing him completely. The frost melts and the tears from the small stone moistens her delicate hands ever so slightly and the stone presses against her skin with all of his might to caress the pads of the woman’s fingers.
With a simple flick of her thumb, the little stone rushes into the air and soars, until it plunges into the ice-cold waters of the lake.
The little stone is gone and forgotten in a moment, and the beautiful woman smiles as she watches the ripples expand across the surface of the black waters, unaware of the little stones fate.
The little stone tumbles through the dark and sullen waters rolling and twisting, confused and frightened by the sudden change. With a jolt he comes to rest on the smooth granite floor in a silken powder of thousands of finely ground stones.
Here and there remnants of his brothers with their bottoms ground flat and smooth rest. Their tops waiting to be encased in the frozen grip of ice to be drug back and forth against the floor through the tides of winter. Eventually to be pulverized by the weight of the shifting ice, and then to remain on the lakes bottom as simple silt.
Unaware of what his fate has brought him, the small granite stone, as old as time, dreams about the warmth of the woman’s hands and longs to be cradled there once again. And as the waters grow colder around him, the little stone waits for the woman.

Cordell Rich
Yes this is yours, like the rest.