The fiberglass canoe cut swiftly and silently through the brackish water, sweeping invisibly past the chorus of frogs and insects of all imaginings inhabiting the swampy land portside. The sun was setting rapidly, basking the marshland in a crimson glow, one that, were we safely on land, would be comforting, the familiar visual knell of the day's end. Here on the water, an indeterminate distance from safety, it was the crimson of spilt blood, a portent of oncoming night. The wise take to land at night.
The fireflies flitted about, their warm glow a summons to deeper, darker places on the water. Neither of us said a word; we both felt the same apprehension. Novices, neophytes both. We would perhaps learn from this, learn to stick to familiar passageways, learn to estimate times, distances with greater accuracy. Perhaps learn to stay out of the water?
Small whirlpools, spirals within spirals glided past the oars, coalescing, reintegrating with the still, black water. Behind us lay only miles and hours, but our minds were convinced that we were being followed, that we needed hasten lest the imaginary swamp-goblins seize us as we heave the craft onto dry land. Our necks tingled, convinced of impending touch. I looked back. Only the gently roiling and receding water, only swiftly blackening foliage, a rapidly awakening ecosystem met my eyes through the gloaming.
Solitude and isolation, loneliness and barenness. These words all flitted past my eyes, fluttering like unwelcome butterflies, slow enough to see clearly, perhaps to reach out and touch, but too swift or too perhaps just to hardy to kill. To be alone at night can mean many things. In the city, it is the flickering glow of midnight television, the tequila haze and sweat-saturated once-white undershirts. In the suburbs, it is the low whine of automobile engines irregularly driving past as the hall clock ticks on interminably, the rest of the world asleep in cozy bubbles. Tick, tick, tick, tick. In the country, one cannot be alone, for the call and response chorus of insects, of toads and owls is forever company, the clanging of trash cans falling to the ground, defeated by raccoons irrecoverably dashes any hope of solitude. But in the forest and the swamp, the barren desert, solitude is genuine, it is real. Here there are no human comforts, no familiar late-night advertisements, no reassuring crunch of tires on gravel as a patrol car prowls past, not even the almost welcome dissonance of a garbage can, representative of our society's wastefulness, encroach here. No cellphones ring. No babies squeal. No automobile horns call out their querulous moans.
To some, this is relief, a welcome respite from the unending din of modern life. But here on the still water as darkness swells the shadows it is far from welcome, it is the resting place of boogeymen, of coiled pythons resting uneasily on a log, longing to drop into the boat. It is the snap of twigs in the distance, surely omens of mostrous creatures slinking through the trees. To stay on the water is to abandon hope, to admit defeat, to be lost for hours, days. To land on unfamiliar shores is to step into the domain of many-toothed beasts and invisible, fanged pests looking for their own kinds of warm comforts.
He sighed audibly, his uneven breath betraying his own anxiety.
Blackness.
The canoe cut through the water.
The fireflies flitted about, their warm glow a summons to deeper, darker places on the water. Neither of us said a word; we both felt the same apprehension. Novices, neophytes both. We would perhaps learn from this, learn to stick to familiar passageways, learn to estimate times, distances with greater accuracy. Perhaps learn to stay out of the water?
Small whirlpools, spirals within spirals glided past the oars, coalescing, reintegrating with the still, black water. Behind us lay only miles and hours, but our minds were convinced that we were being followed, that we needed hasten lest the imaginary swamp-goblins seize us as we heave the craft onto dry land. Our necks tingled, convinced of impending touch. I looked back. Only the gently roiling and receding water, only swiftly blackening foliage, a rapidly awakening ecosystem met my eyes through the gloaming.
Solitude and isolation, loneliness and barenness. These words all flitted past my eyes, fluttering like unwelcome butterflies, slow enough to see clearly, perhaps to reach out and touch, but too swift or too perhaps just to hardy to kill. To be alone at night can mean many things. In the city, it is the flickering glow of midnight television, the tequila haze and sweat-saturated once-white undershirts. In the suburbs, it is the low whine of automobile engines irregularly driving past as the hall clock ticks on interminably, the rest of the world asleep in cozy bubbles. Tick, tick, tick, tick. In the country, one cannot be alone, for the call and response chorus of insects, of toads and owls is forever company, the clanging of trash cans falling to the ground, defeated by raccoons irrecoverably dashes any hope of solitude. But in the forest and the swamp, the barren desert, solitude is genuine, it is real. Here there are no human comforts, no familiar late-night advertisements, no reassuring crunch of tires on gravel as a patrol car prowls past, not even the almost welcome dissonance of a garbage can, representative of our society's wastefulness, encroach here. No cellphones ring. No babies squeal. No automobile horns call out their querulous moans.
To some, this is relief, a welcome respite from the unending din of modern life. But here on the still water as darkness swells the shadows it is far from welcome, it is the resting place of boogeymen, of coiled pythons resting uneasily on a log, longing to drop into the boat. It is the snap of twigs in the distance, surely omens of mostrous creatures slinking through the trees. To stay on the water is to abandon hope, to admit defeat, to be lost for hours, days. To land on unfamiliar shores is to step into the domain of many-toothed beasts and invisible, fanged pests looking for their own kinds of warm comforts.
He sighed audibly, his uneven breath betraying his own anxiety.
Blackness.
The canoe cut through the water.
