A Garden of Stone
My name had long since faded away, melted away in the sweltering heat of the sun, washed away by the pounding rain. No one knew my name, no one remembered. I barely remembered it myself. What was a name? What was its use? People passed me by, everyday, everyday, walking, laughing, calling each other by name, but eventually they would die. Everyone did. Eventually they would end up as nameless slabs of rock in a garden of graves. A garden of stone, of overgrown weeds, of cold whispers and dark, empty air. Empty air filled with empty thoughts and hollow feelings and loneliness. The loneliness in the air of the stone garden was palpable, it was tangible, it was crushing.
I was old, so old, so lonely and cold. I couldn’t remember anyone I had known, but I was sure they were dead anyways. Dead like me, dead and trapped and always watching, just watching and staring. Watching the world change around me, the buildings built and crumbled, the trees grown and withered, the strangers, the friends, the people, the people. The people walked and they talked and laughed and passed me by. They weren’t ignoring me, they just didn’t see me.
What was there to see? A lonely, blank slab of stone, an empty grave covered in vines and weeds and desolation. My name had long since faded away.
Maybe that was the importance of a name. A name was a person and there was always a person attached to a name. Without a name, a person was worthless, insubstantial, nonexistent in the eyes of the unobservant observer.
This was meaningless, then, whatever I was doing here. No one cared, no one cares about a nameless grave. I was alone in this, in this state, in this suspension of perpetuity, always alone. There was nothing to look forward to, no life, no death, no company, just loneliness forever, alone for eternity, cold and empty and dark eternity, whispers and chills and a rainbow of grayscale inanity. Rain and sun and sun and rain, melting me, washing me away, the same thing forever forever forever and I was alone.
laura caldwell
Laura is a writer who likes most things and people except for things and people she doesn’t. Any type of nonfiction falls under the second category. Not terrible music falls under the first.