The sky is intoned with flecks of blue, and the golden hue of sunrise tints the white, greyish blocks with a pure amulet of colour. My soft-worn trainers brand the debris in caresses of amour, and the colossal wind strokes the ice-bites on my cheeks and the rush of breaths cool my glistening teeth and chilled lips. The night time is still a distant stranger, and the shadows in the alleyway slip out of the cars and arise on the path, in dark charcoals of art and despair and gloom. The hulking Library stands erect and still; and an ache of hesitation creaks in my bones, and I push open the door and walk inside. The faceless people gather round a brown desk liquidized with shoe polish and the librarians interact with their sunken eyes; and open, fish-like lips, and shout scattered letters out of their hollow eyes. I let my feet carry me to the huge, heavy shelves; and the texts wolf me into little pieces of verse and poetry and prose. The black, printed verbs and the allegoric symbols slither into my lank, dusky hair, and peek inside the treasure of my thoughts; the gold, and feeling and language; and I am filled with a fireplace of activity and movement and emotion. I finger the red-bound spines of the books, essays of philosophy and linguistics and literature, and bustle with my little feet to the desk, and exchange my blue card with volumes of papers.

I am transformed into the black streets and the rushing reflections of ghosts brush by me, as the light sleets of snow thaw out on the ground, and the flakes burn out on my tongue and create an illusion of landscape.

If it is winter yet I do not know, but my deep, red satchel swings across my back and hits me, hard, in the back; and if it is autumn, then the leaves do not turn amber or crimson and the grass does not dye itself lime; and the conkers do not touch the feet, and scuttle onto the road like footballs.

I still trace the inked pages that gleam with sea and mystic creatures and eclipses; as the scene darkens with shades of blue, and the buildings begin to take on shape and my eyes strain in the mist, and the crimson doormats appear on the rugs. A wild-eyed figure with pupils inflected with ire stumbles into my ray of vision, and spits into the spots of air with a musty-smelling jumper and a white shirt. Gruesome words coil out of her mouth, and distort the atmosphere with whisky, and deceit and might. The irises harden, and I hurry back, the texts smashing into my shoulder; and my footsteps sinking into the now sleeping snow and the mail box closing on my coat.

The curtained house floods with light and warmth, and I drop my little books onto the table top; and the jars of storks rest like a still life at the cliff face of the bench. My creased figure wanders into the front room and I place my satchel at the ground beneath the sofa, with the little old ladies with curled hair painted into the quilted material; and I sink into the silk, velvet cushions.

The sudden silence moves in the air in black, symphonic notes; writhing through the darkness and the candle goes out, leaving me to the gloomy contemplation of my bed, and the open desk with the blank sheet of paper and the vintage pen.

The quiet is the space I live in, the library of my writing, and the illustrations of friends who whisper paragraphs of narrative, and scribbled riddles, and conversations with a hint that when the curtains go down; you may find a red-stamped letter that returns your typed memoirs, with a note gifting you with the memo: “Published.”

THE END.