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55. Thanatos
55. Thanatos
Ali leads down a sloping path to a spring pond of the snow’s melting. It is warmer, and the melting snow drip-drops from tree branches.
The path leads up a hill. At top to their left is a wire fence a little higher than body height and inside the fence they see a snow-covered Golf Course. They continue, with a crunching sound of their boots through the snow, coming to a thick toppled tree trunk that has fallen down across and crushed the wire fence.
Kimura stops to count the yearly rings of the tree trunk and says, “Some two hundred years old, sprouted in the Seventeen Hundreds.”
The path leads up a hill. At top to their left is a wire fence a little higher than body height and inside the fence they see a snow-covered Golf Course. They continue, with a crunching sound of their boots through the snow, coming to a thick toppled tree trunk that has fallen down across and crushed the wire fence.
Kimura stops to count the yearly rings of the tree trunk and says, “Some two hundred years old, sprouted in the Seventeen Hundreds.”
“C’est la Vie,” replies Ali in parody of Kimura's show-off French. “C’mon Kim, we an’t got all day; I want to show you the Van Cortlandt lake then we’ll retrace our steps and head home.”
They move forward but something catches Kimura’s eye ahead down a slope to his right – a patch of blue and, inside it, black with a small light area like a frozen face, all contrasting sharply with the snowy surroundings.
They move forward but something catches Kimura’s eye ahead down a slope to his right – a patch of blue and, inside it, black with a small light area like a frozen face, all contrasting sharply with the snowy surroundings.
Something in the snow catches Kimura's eye
They decide to check it. Several times Kimura slides and slips coming down the slope. Now he stands looking down at it. Ali comes up to him and exclaims: “Oh, my atheist goddess!”
The hair is frozen unnaturally black. Kimura kneels down and looks above the collar. What he sees is a frozen face, cheekbones prominent, of uncertain gender. Ali cannot resist reaching out. “Feels like stone, ice cold, dead!”
“I am guessing this is a homeless person who lay down to rest and got caught in the snowstorm.”
“Should we report it?”
“No, Ali-san. I
“One thing, Kim. I wanna do somepin’, not prayer, but acknowledgin’ a life’s end. I know it’s meaningless but if someone found me I’d want that.”
They kneel in the snow, bowing heads. Ali allows her body to totally relax as she empties her mind and thinks now of the individual consciousness ended forever, whose husk lies before them on an old rug in the snow.
To read next, click 2.56 Bronx Apartment in 1939 - Midst of Life
They kneel in the snow, bowing heads. Ali allows her body to totally relax as she empties her mind and thinks now of the individual consciousness ended forever, whose husk lies before them on an old rug in the snow.
To read next, click 2.56 Bronx Apartment in 1939 - Midst of Life
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