And then one day, the sun never set. In the middle of China, it got right to that golden hour and paused there in the sky like the mechanic in charge of the gears of the sun died on the job and no one replaced him. Of course, this was different everywhere — the hour that life had settled into and stayed in. Somewhere on the far side of the world, it was the moon that seemed to freeze, and all of the stars too. Just stuck, interrupted from the motion they had known for so long.
The scientists took to their research, studying the complex logistics of the universe and desperately trying to sort out what went wrong, or rather what had shifted. Some spent countless days and what used to be perceived as nights digging into journal after journal of everything from meteorology to astronomy to quantum physics just trying to deduce the why of it all, not to mention what was to come after. They asked questions, and questions about their questions, and they questioned those questions as well.
The spiritual among us took to their own time and ways, pending carefully on the blessing of this all and perhaps what warnings was the Sun and the Moon and Stars, this great God and Goddess of humankind for so long trying to tell us? What was indicated by their unending presence? What healing was being done, and what healing had yet to be?
The nihilists, they thought nothing of it, for many of them didn’t think much of anything at all. If it’s all just a dream we’ve yet to wake up from, then what consistency was there ever to hang onto? Everything dies in its time and so will they, they thought, sipping gas station coffee, walking in circles around a lake, sleeping too much or too little.
The businessmen asked where was the opportunity in it all? What great market would this huge sociological shift create and what needs could they be the first to fill? They watched the climb and fall of the green line of the stock market like a meteor dancing with the idea of destroying their world. Some rose and some fell, and there was no time still to mourn anybody.
The skeptics and contrarians asked if we were so sure that the Sun and Moon and Stars had stopped, or if maybe we were just moving with them now, or if maybe we had not ever seen them as they truly are, and then they questioned themselves and each other and fought about fighting and were quite occupied in their time.
The mothers held their children and when they asked them “what does this mean?” they told them I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know.
The dreamers didn’t waste any of their time with things and stuff and quickly swan dove into the heartbeat of prophecy, of what the world was writing and where they could be to hear it. The dreamers slept in parks whenever they were tired in the endless day and most definitely the dreamers slept in the endless night dreaming of walking to the other side of the world.
Some flowers died, some flowers blossomed for the first time, some flowers just did whatever they damn well felt like, some super dramatic and some demure. Some flowers cast shadows that they had the time to get to know, and some shadows grew to loathe their flowers for never reaching more towards them. Some flowers were carried away on the back of the wind, which somehow still moved as it always maybe had.
The mail carriers carried their mail to where it needed to be carried, and left it where it needed to be left. They traversed the city in patterns while above their heads the pigeons swayed to the same songs.
The Moon, she waited, as if she saw this all coming, and the Sun he waited too. Neither the Sun, the Moon, nor the Stars had lungs or legs, but if they did they would have breathed in, sat down, and watched it all moving so quickly, when for the first time in maybe forever they were able to stand still.
©2020 by Brice Maiurro. All rights reserved.