THIS SHINING SEA
G. Phillies
87-6 Park Avenue
Worcester, Massachusetts 01605
When moon-notched suns to ashes die,
So shadows weep pale crescent tears
Beneath soon chill and darkling sky,
Through eldritch rites priests quell old fears:
Eclipse bodes doom! warned ancient seers.
Across this shining sea of suns
I flee on blackened, limping wings...
...excerpted from the Sacred Ode to the Most Glorious Namestone
...as translated from the High Atlanticean by Alfred Lord Tennyson
Light. Silver-blue light. Light from a hundred years' full moons, beams scattered by rolling wave and foaming surf, flooded vision in every direction, so all was transmuted to shimmering curtains of coldest brightness. Through the glow passed a tangerine ball, its steady brilliance in stark contrast to its flickering surroundings.
*Shall I spell you on flying?*
*No need. You did plenty. Catch your breath.*
*I ought to do my share, oughtn't I? The others have different gifts. But I could spell you, so I should.*
*Really! There's absolutely positively conceivably no reason at all for you not to join the three sleepyheads.*
*There is too a reason! I could be using my gifts.*
*Oh, really! What would I do? Please, let me? You do so many things, and all I do is fly fast. Join Brian asleep!* Her listener yielded to slumber.
*I'm not sleepy, sis. Only resting the eyes.* came a third voice.
*Well, don't let me stop you,* answered the second speaker.
*Aren't we there yet?* queried the third voice.
*It's a long way. Why don't you rest your eyes again?* the second speaker answered, slightly tense at another repetition of the same question.
**She says she's okay.** A fourth voice. **She's not. She was hurt back there. Enough to kill you or me. Don't let her do anything.**
**She got hurt? When?**
**Before we left the Tunnels. You see she's so quiet?**
**She never said a word! She insists she'll do what's right, no matter how it hurts her. But it's not much farther and we'll be home. Why don't you doze off, too, sister?**
Cloaked again in silence, a solitary pastel-orange gleam soared amidst the shining sea.