PlaneShift
Fan Area => The Hydlaa Plaza => Topic started by: Rigwyn on April 16, 2013, 11:28:15 pm
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Describe a scene in 4 sentences or less ( In your native language or English).
I thought this would be a fun game. Describe a detailed scene of your choosing in 4 sentences or less giving as much detail as possible. Condensed writing like this is a good way to quickly stuff images into your reader's head without losing their attention.
Respectful discussion, questions and feedback on each other's work is encouraged.
Update: Please feel free to write it in either your native language and/or English. It would also be interesting to see and discuss how such writing is done in non-english languages and how its translated/transliterated to English.
I'll start:
Our farm resembled a desert and our crops, brittle, yellowed parchment. The air had suddenly cooled and the scent of rain lingered and teased like a sadistic bully bent on sowing denial and repressed rage. Slowly, its scent passed as did our hope, our cattle and loved ones. Those of us who remained were still fiercely divided on whether to stay or abandon four generations of hard work, pride, history, and buried kin.
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From this I get the impression of a crop failure on massive proportions. Maybe the rains came too late? I take it though that this was some sort of long term problem as everything has gone. Maybe cattle and people died from multiple crop failures?
Now whoever is left have hit rock bottom and there is just nothing left to tell themselves that the can save so they have to just walk away.
I miss anything?
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Yeap... that's exactly what I was going for in this particular example. I was trying to stuff in not only what it looked like, but how the drought was perceived, how the survivors felt about it, what compelled them to stay despite being in a seemingly hopeless predicament.
Some of the thought process that goes into this includes writing the basic idea down, eliminating unneeded or cliche phrases, replacing plain, boring words with more colorful, tasty words - or words that convey more than one intended meaning, erasing everything and starting over, replacing words so that they are not used more than once ( little connecting words being the exception), replacing klunky sounding words that make you trip over your own tongue with ones that feel smoother - or that simply sound better when you read through it. Optimizing the choice of words used to control the speed at which your progress as you read. Sometimes you want the words and images to spill out rapidly, sometimes you want things to slow down to a crawl.
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Burnt eyes the only guide, my body heaves itself into a tiled cave. Blistered foot slams splintered door, then snags on my shorts. Fall into the stall, and sweat smears the bowl. Plop, plop; aaahh.
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lol
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Nice idea, Rigwyn :) !
Ok, so:
A jongleur with a painted smile as big as deep are wrinkles around eyes, similar to what happen to the soil when it's dried by the sun. Funny or ironic on a tear-stained face, breathing the salt of the ocean brought by the wind. Sitting on a stool with long insect's legs once colored with a bright metallic green, now faded like the poor grass growing all around. The stool is on the left side of what once was a stage and now is just rubble: no more theater around it, the red curtain is aside, crumpled like vehicles involved in a car accident and the ceiling is a leaden sky.
(not an english native speaker here, but if I'm going to say/write something in english I try to avoid my native language's structure, so, not adding any translation - at least, for now - also because, if I did, these 4 sentences would probably become longer and much more twisted)
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I like this. :thumbup:
I remember seeing lots of paintings of sad, crying clowns when I was a kid. (So THAT's why Rig's so F-ed up!) This definitely reminds me of that - though instead of just making the jongleur cry or sulk, you made him/her look sad both directly AND indirectly. Nice.
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Immediately reminds me on "Otto di Catania (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZndcKJr2PY&hd=1)" by Yello. A song impersonating a sigh.
Expand the comments and scroll down, down, down for lyrics and a translation.
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Heh... nice video.
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Ignore the images. Only listen. ;)
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interesting thread!
Dark night, red fear. He's running in the unnaturally silent forest (of his mind's eye), his deep breath the only sound. In its ears his hearthbeats: one more steps and there's no escape. Dark cold wings of the endless night embraced the hopeless one... As he felt his hearthbeat fades away a trail of blood drags him into the abyss of the ethernal void: a prison, forever...
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Nice. I hope to write up some more later....
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you made him/her look sad both directly AND indirectly.
thanks: this human being was supposed to look that way, 'glad' (s)he did :).Immediately reminds me on "Otto di Catania (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZndcKJr2PY&hd=1)" by Yello. A song impersonating a sigh.
teacher, teacher… I didn't copy my homeworks! really :)! (I had no idea this song existed, and, by the way, it made think about a someone sitting on the step out of an old cafe with lanky, gloomy, metallic chairs and tables, staring at an old open suitcase on the ground… another 4 sentences scene, maybe :p . also, I wasn't thinking of good old sad clowns: it was just Rigwyn's crop failure which made me 'see' dried soil, so 'earth's wrinkles', so…)
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Two short sentences, one scribble, a majestic creature.
http://www.hydlaaplaza.com/smf/index.php?topic=36403.msg462374#msg462374
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Mueffel Bueffel ... nice :)
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Eyes closed, sweet face both serene and radiant; her lips quiver slightly reciting words of love still dear. A warm breeze careens and caresses through the leaves brushing them aside making the sound of many waves, the waves that carry him home. Hands at her heart remembering sweet days gone past, the wind is her messenger singing sweet whispers as it brings him home to her. She waits for him.
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She sits in her room, the ocean across the way, the shining lights of the cell towers sparkled against the water in the bay, making the sea look like it is filled with stars all faintly glowing. She sits inside, ignoring all the beauty of the outside world, the shades rolled down, her mind racing like tiny little hamsters are running circles in her brain, trying to help her come up with the longest run on sentences in the world; she wonders if semi-colons count as real sentences, if they do, they will allow her to run on almost infinitely, going deeper and deeper into madness as she desperately tries to write the best sentences though she fears she has already been shown up by some of the other expert writers on the forum. If they do not, than this would be her last sentience, her doom, her last thought before being cut off by the ridged confines of the forum game, forever locked in the turmoil that is the end of a sentience; No! she thinks, those semicolons can keep me alive through this; but alas, they can not, for her impulsive use of an exclamation point hath condemned her four sentences, and put her out of the race once and for all. Darn.
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;D good one.
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There was a hill. A grassy hill. All the grass on the hill was green except for the dirt, which wasn't grass; that was brown. The sky was blue.
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*places a red ball on the hill just for the sake of putting a different color into play*
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*Kicks the ball because its fun.*
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The scene was wholly nondescript.
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I personally found it quite stirring. It stirred in me emotions of a hill.
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Yellow blue and purple hills.
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* Moja Aere clearly sees Boni's Mueffel Bueffel running over Ebonwumon's hill... and... oh, nice he stopped... oh: some more new dirt, now, down there...
anyway, another one (post and, perhaps, hill):
A so small crowd gathered, coiled around a campfire: scraps placed in a circle by a very meticulous wind, a sitting cat's tail. Variously and differently aged and gendered voices, tales and stories, turns and overlaps, tones and intonations, eyes and ears. The scent of cut wood, of burning wood wanders through the golden fire's light, through the pale moon's shade. Shy habitations and dens scattered around, multi-fingered and multi-arms trees, noises and rustles, stunted paths sketched by everyday steps of different beasts.
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Ok, at least I am not the only one that thought that the hill would somehow get some "new dirt" on it. :whistling:
A night time campfire. Nice. I could do that in game if I could ever get enough tag alongs.
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Nice game, this..
I have tried a couple of times to include a campfire/ storytelling portion of in game events, but no luck so far. For the Parade of Guilds we tried to have an overnight campout in Gug so folks could visit each other's fires and hear stories.. at the MagCon we didn't have takers sign up for storytelling campfires so that didn't happen.. YET!
I think getting some of the oldbies in game to tell lore stories would be great continuity... somehow I can hear Yahh telling his tales about 'growing old' in the guild... anyway I am :offtopic: sorry.
Good concise, atmospheric writing, you guys! way to go.
RR
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:D I want to go camping with illy!
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She sits alone, a speck in the massive cave, black like the darkness, save for her tattoos, which are purple like the rocks. Humming softly she tries to invoke Dakkru's presence, but there is only dimness and cold and the jagged stone that feels like it's sapping the heat from her very bones. Memories of passers-through chase through her mind but she ignores them, focusing on the illusion of safety this big, empty space offers - and then the drip of water catches her attention. Steady like a beat to her song, it feels eternal, more solid than diamond despite its liquid form, and she's found herself the company she sought.
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nice :)
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The scene was wholly nondescript.
I personally found it quite stirring. It stirred in me emotions of a hill.
Nonono, that wasn't a comment on you scene; it was my own wonderful description of a scene. Here, I'll make a better one:
I made a scene. It was a funny scene. In what appeared to be enigmatically unembellished yet supple tawny size 12 Helvetica, the scene stretched across the otherwise desolate expanse of umber before it. Its arrant pulchritude, remarkably, was curtailed merely by the appellation of this thread adjunct to a tetrad of pixels constituting miniscule quadrilateral.
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[...] El viento ululaba en mis oídos mientras escuchaba el sonido atronador del batir de sus alas, fue en ese momento cuando unas centelleantes lagrimas de emoción resbalaron por mi mejilla. ¿Cuanto tiempo había pasado trabajando; recolectando flores; preparando zumos? eso ahora no importaba, ni las heridas en mis manos; ni el dolor de pies puesto que por fin lo había logrado.... estaba volando en Pteosaurio. [...]
Espero que os guste, saludos.
Elhorien
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Oh, yummy!
lets see... google translate shows this: ( detected as Spanish )
The wind was howling in my ears while listening to the thundering sound of their beating wings, was at this time that a sparkling tears of excitement ran down my cheek. How much time was spent working, collecting flowers, preparing juices? now that did not matter, nor the wounds in my hands, or foot pain since I had finally achieved .... Pteosaurio was flying.
Hope you like it, greetings.
Elhorien
I'm surprised at how well google translate worked, to be honest. I would have expected it to sound a little choppy going from one language to another. You definitely got me curious here. ::)
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Perhaps he was working as an herbalist to make money so that he could afford a pterosaur ride? It is an interesting scene though and I'm pretty sure it sounds better read in Spanish than in English. ;)
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Oh, yummy!
lets see... google translate shows this: ( detected as Spanish )
The wind was howling in my ears while listening to the thundering sound of their beating wings, was at this time that a sparkling tears of excitement ran down my cheek. How much time was spent working, collecting flowers, preparing juices? now that did not matter, nor the wounds in my hands, or foot pain since I had finally achieved .... Pteosaurio was flying.
Hope you like it, greetings.
Elhorien
I'm surprised at how well google translate worked, to be honest. I would have expected it to sound a little choppy going from one language to another. You definitely got me curious here. ::)
Well I used a spanish thtat google can understand. Is easy to know how it works and what towrite for it. Also trying to make so cute.
:D
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Perhaps he was working as an herbalist to make money so that he could afford a pterosaur ride? It is an interesting scene though and I'm pretty sure it sounds better read in Spanish than in English. ;)
This is, is a bit of Story life of Elhorien. And yes, sounds a bit better in spanish :D
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Fan art:
Rhateru machte eine Szene. Es war eine komische Szene. Sie erstreckte sich in scheinbar rätselhaft schmucklosem, doch samtlohfarbenem Helvetica Größe 12 über die ansonsten trostlosen Weiten Umbrabraun, die ihr vorangingen. Ihre durchtriebene Schönheit wurde beachtlicherweise einzig durch die Benennung dieses Threads geschmälert, welche an ein unbedeutendes Viereck angrenzte, das seinerseits aus einem Vierklang an Pixeln errichtet worden war.
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:)
samtlohfarbenem?
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The evil dark lord stared at the hero, only thinking of ways to compel and kill him. The hero reaches for his sword, but is too late. The evil lord shot a fire bolt into the hero, he was dying. Out of breath he spoke "no..." and died.
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samtlohfarbenem?
My attempt at translating "supple tawny." To figure out its meaning, you'll probably have to translate / look up "samt" and "lohfarben" individually; the latter is so rare / old I wouldn't even have recognized it had it not been offered by my dictionary as a translation for tawny.
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Ahh, ok. Sometimes I like to make an analogy when there's isn't a good word to describe something.
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The evil dark lord stared at the hero, only thinking of ways to compel and kill him. The hero reaches for his sword, but is too late. The evil lord shot a fire bolt into the hero, he was dying. Out of breath he spoke "no..." and died.
These days, the bad guy loses in RP but wins in writing. So, if you want a baddie character to win, write a story for them. ;)
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As long as the story is good, I'm not too concerned with who wins, loses, dies, or gets skinned and roasted over a small, portable camp fire.
/me pulls a campfire out of his ridiculous sack, tosses it onto the stone pavement, and begins to roast elf ears on a stick.
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Der Plaza rund um den Brunnen mit der ehrerbietigen Statue der dualistischen Gottheit Laanx füllte sich mit den Einwohnern von Hydlaa und der umliegenden Gebiete. Einige Leute erklommen die höchsten Punkte dieses Bauwerkes, das in vielerlei Hinsicht einen Mittelpunkt im Leben des Domes von Yliakum darstellte. Die Flammentürme schossen in die Höhe, mischten sich mit heilendem Regen und tauchten den Platz in ein unwirkliches Farbenspiel. Als es versiegte, wurde es still für einige Minuten, und dutzende Gedanken wurden zu einem.
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Neat :)
Lets see.... google translate says:
The plaza around the fountain with the statue of the deferential dualistic deity Laanx filled with the inhabitants of the dungeon somewhere and the surrounding areas. Some people climbed the highest points of this building, which was a focus in the life of the Cathedral of Yliakum in many ways. The flames shot up towers, mingled with healing rain and plunged the place into an unreal colors. When it dried up, there was silence for some minutes, and dozens were thought to.
Hmm.... I like it \o/
I'm curious about this phrase: "The flames shot up towers"
Does this mean that flames rose up alonglide the tower, or is it a phrase of some sort .. like "flames shot up like towers" or as we might as say in the US, "It was raining cats and dogs"
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I see it as saying "the flames shot up high".
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After poking around with google translate a little.....
Die Flammentürme schossen in die Höhe
Flammentürme = flame tower ( I'm guessing the two words were simply concatenated to form a compound word )
It looks like it means literally, "The flametower shot in the height"
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The "flame spires" were addressed, as magic spell effects. Sometimes the dictionaries provide dubious translations (spire = Turm / Spitze).
The plaza around the fountain with the statue of the deferential dualistic deity Laanx filled with the citizen of Hydlaa and the surrounding areas. Some people climbed the highest points of this building, which was a center of life of the Dome of Yliakum in many ways. The flame spires rose up high, mixed with the healing rain, and immerged the place in an unreal iridescence. When it subsided, it became silence for several minutes, and dozens of thoughts became one.
I hope you remember the scene...
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I woke up feeling dizzy, and itchy. The strange combination of feelings told me exactly where I was - rather than being comfortable in my warm silk sheets at home, I was still at the house where the party took place, still in sweaty clothes from last night. The world stopped wobbling long enough for me to take a look at the sun-lit room, and then it hit me: I was without a vehicle, thirty miles from work, and too hung over to show up anyway. So, uh, do you know anyone that's hiring?
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He was a special dog - the kind you would cradle and rock with in the dark as the sound of broken glass and toppled tables made you cringe, and the walls shook with thunderous thuds. You could whisper just about anything to him from within the confines of your closet - so long as you were quiet enough and held his yap shut each time your name was called and those ominous foot steps cast an extra shadow beneath the door. No matter how loudly dad's friends screamed and swore before they left, no matter how wretched and pathetic momma's cries were in the wake of their destruction, he always seemed to have a dopey little smile on his face like nothing really mattered to him except for the present moment. It was a shame to hear him whimper, and to see his happy little face contort as he was torn away.
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The plaza around the fountain with the statue of the deferential dualistic deity Laanx filled with the citizen of Hydlaa and the surrounding areas. Some people climbed the highest points of this building, which was a center of life of the Dome of Yliakum in many ways. The flame spires rose up high, mixed with the healing rain, and immerged the place in an unreal iridescence. When it subsided, it became silence for several minutes, and dozens of thoughts became one.
I hope you remember the scene...
This one, right?
http://psps.psde.de/node/132
Btw, quite amazing that "Hydlaa" was auto-translated as "dungeon", and "dome" (not "Dom") as "cathedral".
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Indeed. And indeed... :D
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I noticed that too and had to wonder if that was intentional or just some coincidence or odd combination of words.... ::|
If you just type Hydlaa into google translate, it just gives you back Hydlaa.
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Rigwyn, your dog's scene is, I don't know, maybe similar to a heavy iron bar in the face... ::|
Anyway...
Again: chills, blood tumbling/jumping/hiccuping so close to the spine and the stomach curls up like a half-frozen stiff pet who's trying to survive lost in the middle of some nasty winter.
Eyes glued to the billboard, following dark and tiny signs which are composing words on the parchment and inside the head.
But new thoughts overlap memories and memories of old thoughts, and they all beat each others down and jostle each others like disgruntled/unsteady/astonished drunkards at a pointless/sad/already-over party.
If justice isn't allowed to come in, then time isn't allowed to stitch up wounds and it can barely attempt to cheat, clumsily, covering them with dust and it all ends in a sigh that can't be a relief's one because relief can't originate from resignation.
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Rigwyn, your dog's scene is, I don't know, maybe similar to a heavy iron bar in the face... ::|
As intended. Thanks :)
As the Hydlaa guards lead us into the small, but strangely familiar hallway, my eyes raced about compulsively as I desperately tried to take everything in. There was something inexplicably familiar about this whole scene. It was as if I was recovering a lost portion of my life - the sound of our shoes shuffling against the stone floor, the filthy windows from which sparkling streams of light streamed, that noxious rubbery smell followed by a hissing bout of choking gas that eventually killed us.
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There is silence on the streets. Martial law has been declared. The voting booths are empty and closed. Social media bubbles with revolution.
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Once a upon a time, the Internet was abuz with wild discussion and collaboration which bridged people of all nations young and old together. Big brother got greedy and instilled a New World Order which brought all nations to their knees. All forms of social media have gone silent since then and internet behemoths have been dwarfed. People creep around candles in the presumed privacy of their darkly lit homes - whispering in made up languages of their own for fear of being overheard, misunderstood, and tortured in Gitmo-esce jails where they would be force fed though their noses, dragged up and down concrete stairs and forced to watch "The View" 24/7.
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The View? Lol.
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I didn't preview this clip. I could only take about 1 or 2 minutes of it before stopped it. This is painful stuff.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrgVWeXlOBM (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrgVWeXlOBM)
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I watched The View once. Couldn't understand a word that was said because they constantly talked over each other so much. It kinda gave off brainwashing-tape vibes.
Anyway, back on topic:
Soft candlelight flickers across the features of an aging Dermorian in the crowded tavern. He turns his green eyes to the walls, wondering if the weapons and shields that decorate the place have ever seen real use, whether the young men, women, and kran that merrily drink know what's ahead of them. Someone starts playing their lute, and he almost can't believe the sight of the gorgeous young lady's hand extended to him in an invitation to dance, not seeing her sticky-fingered friend sneaking close to his table. In the morning he leaves with little more than a tattered, empty rucksack and a broken heart.
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Piled up beside a wall like firewood beside the fireplace, folded like trousers inside a wardrobe, this entity looks at the nothing ahead with weary grey eyes.
Grey eyes, while a grey shadow extends, cannibalizing thoughts that were strong and well contoured until just a moment before.
This grey shadow has a decent strength, and personality too: similar to a rubber, it absorbs and erases thoughts, cleaning the brain, making it as dry as the scorched earth of a battlefield.
So the entity now knows that it is time to sleep, until the sun will rekindle these grey eyes, until the sun will tear again everything out of the grey.
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Large green valley.
Single big tree.
A goat is staring.
The apple still doesn't fall.
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Snow flakes pile up.
Slowly falling like silver.
Chrysanthemum.
(Attempt at haiku)
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30 days for public drunkenness.
6 months for gross indecency.
$10,000 fine for befouling the judges car.