The Visit

by Skylar Tucker

The trees sang with the harmonies of the wind, each emerald leaf tasting the breeze,

letting loose a new note from its nonexistent lips. Or perhaps it was these nonexistent lips giving

each leaf a nonexistent kiss. Perhaps it was not music the trees were making, but love. In that

case, I felt less like an eager listener to the pleasurable song of Nature and more of an intruder to

some private intimacy, or a desecrator of a sacred ritual. But nonetheless, I listen. I absorb. I

consume. I devour each tender moment, my cracked asphalt mouth begging for more, my

concrete eyes pleading with the gods of Nature to not strike me down where I stand. For I come

from the Greyland, where ash falls like snow, and people are merely skeletons in hungry, greedy

skins, devoid of Nature’s caress.

True, I too am one of hunger, but not greed. Never greed. I devour this moment, for I do

not know when I will ever feel this again. The loving sun holding my face, the soft grass beneath

my feet, the glorious song of the trees. Or the love-making. I am still trying to figure these things

out. But I digress. This is a moment worth devouring.

Pale feathers draw themselves across the blue ocean above. I can see them, through the

roof of this, what was it called, forest. White wisps of heaven pass by, nothing like the black

plumes of death that choke us in the Greyland. The black plumes come from machines, monsters

of steel and fire. These were not that. These were clouds, made up of water. Imagine that, water

in the sky. One could only dream of tasting those sweet waters. Surely it is better than the tainted

travesty from my land.

 I wish for it to rain, for Nature to cleanse me of my filth. I do not think Nature would let

me into this sanctuary if I were not thought to be clean, but I still feel disgusting. Sinful, even.

Ashamed. Who am I to have this? What makes me special? Deserving of the right to be here,

within this Natural temple of the very gods themselves? I do not know, nor do I truthfully want

to know. The more I think the less I devour.

The moon is not cold in this place. It is kind, loving, a cool smile illuminating my path. It

does not stare with jealousy, nor does it leer with grotesque familiarity. It simply just is. It is and

it always will be. There is nothing Unnatural about it. I, however, am Unnatural. And so are my

people. Nature knows this, as do the gods. They know I must continue my journey, my search to

listen, absorb, consume, devour. There is only so much I can devour here, before I ruin Nature. I

am not allowed to tell my people of this. They will not control themselves. They will manipulate,

taint, disease, destroy. I can not let them do that. I swore of it.

Someday, I will no longer devour. I will become. Just like the moon and the clouds, the

grass and the sun, the trees and their leaves and the breeze. I will become. I will be Natural. This

is the gods’ promise. Only if I protect the secrets of this place. I will not know when I become

Natural, but when I become Natural, I will know. Until then, onward with my journey. I will visit

again if I am ever back this way.