Preface: really surprised/appreciated the response to Oils. I'm not in an environment that has any reason to encourage creative writing; that said, when I get my bits of inspiration I tend to dismiss them. Until next time, here's one from an old college essay.
Gravity is a joke. In one quick burst, I glide off the ground; my powerful forearms generate just enough torque on the roof rack to adjust my trajectory toward the car’s roof. Efficient as a tiger on the hunt, silent as the prowling lioness, my toes tickle the roof as I land. One leap, one bound, one stride left. Target acquired. Feet shift, tendons ripple, and my shadow, now flickering atop the house roof, transcends the car’s roof.
Donned in dirt-speckled beige garb, my coat boasts a perfect camouflage. I move like a puma in the tall grasses of the summer-time mountains. There really is no need to conceal myself. An ocean of emerald green protects my island of a home preventing even my neighbors’ view of the roof. Flitting southwest, I tread lightly over a shingled hill onto a tiled plain toward the all-seeing sun above my roof.
The sun douses itself in royal lavender and bathes itself with the blood of yet another dying day concurrently varnishing the land I behold in gold. These sights serve as inspiration for my best pastel landscapes. Great winds fall from the heavens in envy while the sea of lush bows in the sun’s eluding presence. Sparrows and hawks dance in rising thermals while life in the thick jade miasma below rejoices, and my eyes praise the hallowed image before me in human solitude. There is not a single place I would rather be.
The roof is my kingdom. Here is my realm where the superficial chains wrought of a man-governed world fall back into bottomless oblivion; where all that is left before me is forsaken beauty named Earth. Here, I can breathe. I can shed the trivialities of life, whether it be the routine in school, the responsibilities of a Battalion Commander in JROTC, or my brother’s squabbling about his fickle future as I try to find my own.
Perched surveying dusk, I finally have the luxury of just listening, thinking, or even neither. All that needs attending to is the rise and fall of cicadas’ hymns, countless as the awakening stars, which clears my mind of the week’s activities. Yet the bliss begins when the hymns blend into a chorus, beckoning the moon to bless its psalm with her milky-silver façade. Soon enough, my body is entirely relaxed. Finally, when the solar-lunar ritual exchange is complete and the warm silver light flows over the Earth, a softly played symphony drifts lethargically from the meadow below. In that moment on the roof, I experience content in its fullest.