Before she could accept my invitation she asked of me the solution to a riddle. Of course my life as a loner fashioned me with a knack for the puzzling so I obliged. Beyond understanding she riddled to me:

Forth not to run, but run It shall, will not to speak, but speak it comes, to cut the vessel to seal a whole, and to sully the centre to unsully its mould. To end the beginnings in hopes of beginning the ending, and waiting patiently for the cliff so you know how to brace yourself.

Surely I thought this lady rather mental. Her riddle seemed more like a death threat, and it made little to no sense but I stirred in it. As I felt the need to do. I tried hard to search for the answer. Months went by and the truth relentlessly evaded me. And so later that year I returned to her once again.

I know not what you ask, and I cannot ask of what you know. But I wish for the obvious primal reasons that you accept my invitation. She looked down on me with a bit of confusion and some concern, but like I figured she would, she accepted the invitation.

the piercing of debts through a hole we simply could not fashion an intentional shock to the already collapsing walls

calls of a truthful nature whispering into our tainted ears the spell has worn off and now we must gleen of each who we truly were underneath the fabricated shawls

the falls of strength giving in to the dying hopes of novelty coated with an abhorred chocolate addiction and fattened bodies felt on high

the lie to avoid the inevitable failure and sharking tips that throw our minds to the liquid kinds of a distant pine why not clone ourselves and flatten inevitably the relentless torture of time.

the line we crossed to reclaim a youth that fractured with every distant call from the clones. To manufacture wars bred from nothing and welcome kindly our tertiary problems into the front of our minds. To set fire to the clones to distract ourselves from the pursue that continues to pilfered with contempt

To exempt ourselves from chase bathed in the poisoned lace an escape through stupidity and back round the bend of life pathetically to attempt to save face. A few more clones to crown the space or simply to place the a barrier between the stranger in my bed. But no other way existed. This was simply the life of someone determined to fit the frame.

Though one day I walked into an ominously tranquil joint dwelling. The clones were at play somewhere years away, and I happened upon absolute silence. “Honey?” I called out yearningly for the first time in 20 years. She didn’t respond. I could only assume she was neck deep in a bath or brain deep in an erotic novel. So I scampered upstairs to meet her. To rejoin to her. “Honey?” I called again. I never figured, but I knew now that it wasn’t what, it was when. I walked closer and closer to our door that was ajar. I nudged it open and the blackness found my eyes. I fell to my knees in disgust. The salty water was now drained from my eyes.

There she was. From the ceiling fan was a 1500 TC Persian spread twirled up to resemble a rope. And from it the one who accepted my invitation. Face blue. Eyes bulging. Body white like a ghost. I tried to construct a mental damn, but i could not. The rivers came flowing as she hung there. She looked nothing like that one i had seen so long ago. So much it felt as if she was completely a new person. And maybe that was the best part. That the beautiful girl i had seen so long ago still was intact. That she didn’t have to deal with this fate. The salted water half blinded me but what I could see beneath was a piece of paper. A note. I crawled over to read it. I needed to see. See what has taken her away. And as I quickly unfolded it and brought my vision to the prophecy my mind went deeply back in time. To 21 years ago:

Forth not to run, but run It shall, will not to speak, but speak it comes …….

The White Cliff 30