Chips

Opposites collapse onto opposites.

Monsters born of sparks melt into children of the cold, crystalline beads of glass.

The plants, corn and beans and squash, blackened and curled back into the salted earth. The sun cloaked herself in shadow, crept along the low-hanging clouds, fading away from whatever beauty she may have posessed.

And these ghosts, they eat away at my skin, killing me slowly, sand pouring viscously into the bottom of the hourglass. My mind is dead, but my body clings to existence.

I am hungry.

I've learned to starve over stretches of weeks, they are empty times, times for me to think. To ponder my loneliness.

I don't go outside anymore. I'm too afraid. I see dark forms swoop the alleyways, not exactly human, when I gaze through the frosty glass of the second story.

One day, my stock, this castle, will only contain dust. But until that day, we are both infinite.

I check the desks, peruse the drawers and slam them shut. Just papers, fragments of other lives. But they aren't mine. So, they shall be forgotten, they shall dissipate.

I should be ash, turned back into the form that my lifeline began at. While the city sits silently, my footsteps clatter along the stairs. It feels so wrong, echoes through these drafty halls like a sour note.

There are four vending machines, two of them stripped skeletons. The third is drained, but houses scattered reamins

This is the present. The present is immune, blind, to consequence.

The plasticine glass is shattered. I claw around inside, my ragged nails scraping against the metallic shells, settling on a dulling yellow one, contrasting with all the grey.

I've almost forgotten how to open it, to split it apart.

It's been a long time since the last time.

I tear it apart, and the tang of a churning ocean wafts into the icy air.

One day, this forced habit will cease. But for now, I must endure this taste.

Stale.

Bitter.