9-19-13\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The prompt:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0“Once in a lifetime, if one is lucky, one so merges with sunlight and air and running water that whole eons, the eons that mountains and deserts know, might pass in a single afternoon.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Henry David Thoreau<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The hillside lay cool under the weight of my body.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t too concerned about crushing the blades of grass, but the thought did enter my mind that they may be uncomfortable.\u00a0 My stare was out across the valley and over the hills opposite.\u00a0 Beyond the green hills were bluer peaks far off in the distance.\u00a0 I suspected that they were in another county, and that I would never see them again or climb them.\u00a0 The hill I lay upon was world enough.\u00a0 A hawk soared across my view, wheeling about as it sought dinner in the high grass and brush below me.<\/p>\n
My purpose here was to stop being purposeful.\u00a0 I had had enough, and the world was something I was about to leave behind.\u00a0 The location had been chosen months before, recovered from a memory of love and early passion.\u00a0 For me, life had begun here, and it was fitting that this would be the last sight.<\/p>\n
I had no tears for the position I was in.\u00a0 It was life that had brought me here, and life flowing through me that kept me still and aware.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not dead yet, and every second is as precious as the one before and the one after.\u00a0 This was just the tapering off of all the wild expressions of self that had filled the last ninety years.\u00a0 I have all my teeth, my eyes work well so far, and the body pressed against the ground has served me well.\u00a0 Surrendering it at the end of my hitch just seems logical.<\/p>\n
In the later part of my life, I had the experience of being taught about death.\u00a0 Not directly, but from folks I knew who had a young daughter who couldn\u2019t live any longer.\u00a0 Her spirit was willing.\u00a0 The body refused.\u00a0 There was no fear in her life.\u00a0 She hadn\u2019t developed that at her age.\u00a0 There also wasn\u2019t fear in her parents.\u00a0 Regret, maybe, but no fear.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s like stepping behind a curtain,\u201d they said.\u00a0 \u201cYou can still hear us, and we can hear you.\u00a0 We know you\u2019re there; we just can\u2019t see you.\u00a0 And one day, we\u2019ll come back around the curtain and be with you forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
I remembered that deep down in my core for all of my life.\u00a0 The grace of the gesture was the deepest of gifts.\u00a0 And here, now, I was about to step behind that curtain and be reunited with all who had gone before.<\/p>\n
I was grateful that I had kept quiet and still.\u00a0 No hysteria would be welcome here, and the world would keep on spinning as I turned the corner.\u00a0 I was aware of the consequences of sharing.\u00a0 It would surely lead toward beeping instruments and bright lights, fussing bodies and stark smelling spaces.\u00a0 No, surely silence is golden.<\/p>\n
The hawk sailed across my view once again, still searching for something to make it happy.\u00a0 A slight breeze picked up, and a blade of grass blew against my ear.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t tickle.\u00a0 It comforted and cradled.\u00a0 I breathed in the scent of the valley blowing up the hill from far down below.\u00a0 The scent was a deep green, and mixed with the blue and white of the sky.\u00a0 The colors swirled in the breeze.<\/p>\n
I felt the breath flow into my body, and out again.\u00a0 I had the strength and foresight to turn my head slightly to the right, and was not surprised to see my love lying beside me, gazing into my eyes, and then up into the sky to follow the hawk.\u00a0 My hand was filled with the warmth of her touch.\u00a0 I smiled, closed my eyes, and slept forever.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
9-19-13\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The prompt:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0“Once in a lifetime, if one is lucky, one so merges with sunlight and air and running water that whole eons, the eons that mountains and deserts know, might pass in a single afternoon.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Henry David Thoreau The hillside lay cool under the weight of my body.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t too concerned […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-promptedwriting"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=300"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":302,"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300\/revisions\/302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mainlyprompts.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}