Nothing

In a world towards to an end, apocalypse does not present itself with grandeur. It does not come with a bang, it does not come with a planet colliding into the earth. It befalls on a Thursday, a Thursday afternoon that seems endless. With the grey sky covering the city like a heavy lid, with people in the metropolis strolling reluctantly and their face deadpan and expressionless.

“Finished. It’s finished. Nearly finished. It must be nearly finished,” uttered J, flipping another piece of pancake over. 

“And their only sense is senselessness,” J turned around and started crushing blueberries. 

“And what might become of them,” continued J, at the same time opening his fridge for some syrup and butter.

“Nothing. They shall all be devoured by nothingness.” He put the syrup and butter on the table and sat down.

“Do you really intend to end the world, once and for all?” asked a squeaky voice of a boy. J looked over to the windowsill. It was a skinny boy standing outside by the window, in his sailor shirt, possibly nine years of age. 

J did not answer.

“Do you really?” the boy asked again, almost begging.

“I am sorry dear, but sometimes things just have to end,” finally answered J apologetically.  

The boy seemed like he was about to cry, but he merely walked away.

J forced a poignant smile and looked away. When he finally looked back, the boy was already gone. The only thing left to be seen was the pots of mint on the windowsill, which had already started to wither.

J could hear the boy whimper from afar.

This is the way the world ends.

This is the way the world ends.

This is the way the world ends.

Not with a bang but a whimper.

***

indebted to:

T. S. Eliot, The Hollow Men

Samuel Beckett, Fin de Partie

Becoming

“Come to me, please. Come to me. Please, be coming.” I picked up a book from the thick pile of old books in the flea market. Why I chose this particular one to look at I did not know— maybe it was because of the hardcover, with the binding almost broken, and the gilding worn out. I always had a sentiment for old things. I longed for the golden age and was nostalgic for an era I was too young to have lived. I opened the book, and was somehow overwhelmed by the old German typeface—almost, illegible. As I was trying to decipher the genre of the book, a note fell off.

“Come to me, please. Come to me. Please, be coming.” For some reason it was written in English with a thin, spider-like handwriting. I immediately had this typical confined woman image in my head—sick, delicate woman-of-letters, sitting by the window in an attic. Daily recreation: looking over the marketplace and imagine herself to be part of the hustle and bustle. 


But to whom was she addressing? I could feel the intensity of her pining. In German there is this fine term Sehnsucht. I could feel her Sehnsucht by her use of present progressive to indicate future. It levels up the certainty. Her addressee would not only come but also be coming. Possibility ascertained. Appointment made. Promise pledged.

I did not know what become of her, or them. I just picked up this old book in a flea market and this old note fell off. I did not know if the addressee eventually received the note and kept it safe in memory of their union, or the note, sadly undelivered, simply stayed unread in this old book, a hopeless dead letter center, only to be discovered by a visitor in a transient flea market decades and decades after.

I shuddered at my thought of the second possibility. Ah, humanity!

***

indebted to:

Herman Melville, Bartleby, the Scrivener