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[matermali]

( cw; cannabis )

[ There is no softness to the voice that murmurs onto the network in the midst of the night when people should be sleeping. Those sweet souls are not her concern if they don't wish to hear. She offers no comfort, but a reminder of what's been lost—what can still be taken.

In doing so, the woman's raspy words creep out from beneath the shadows with a voice that drags—no, it crawls—over ceaselessly hot coals. In its shudder to whisper out a poem borrowed from home, there is a smolder always bordering on a choked gasp. But no hurry, no hurry. Where do you have to be? ]

Old Yew which graspeth at the stones...that name the under-lying dead; Thy fibres net the dreamless head, thy roots are wrapt about the bones.

[ To that, a pause that looms with omen. ]

The seasons bring the flower again, and bring the firstling to the flock; And in the dusk of thee, the clock beats out the little lives of men.

[ Now, a strange yearning nearly begins to dissipate the smoke that seems to scorch her throat.

Hush, take a moment. Take a breath; hold it. Feel the shiver of a fingernail at the nape of your neck, feel it trace the curve of your ear to borrow your attention. Only just. No, don't turn. Don't touch. Just listen; the whisper can still singe. ]

O not for thee the glow, the bloom...who changest not in any gale, nor branding summer suns avail, to touch thy thousand years of gloom.

And gazing on thee, sullen tree, sick for thy stubborn hardihood; I seem to fail from out my blood...and grow incorporate into thee.

[ For a time, it seems that may be all. Then, in the same hush she speaks with a more particular address: ]

I hear that we have been denied the ephemeral — to exist endlessly within a perverse mirror of God’s image. Here, nature should protest. Instead it menaces with its silence.

[ There is a silence of her own while Vanessa takes a drag to sigh out a thin stream of smoke into the evening air. Her voice now drops so low it grates and pinches too close, like gravel against tender feet. Tickling whispers are gone; they flee the weighted melancholy that persists. ]

We carry on within a dollhouse between worlds. Do not be tempted by its pretty trinkets, lest you truly be cursed to wander the demimonde forevermore.

[ Denial still rules paramount over the rumor of immortality, but the lack of bodies is an...unsettling implication. ]

...The graves lie empty.

Comments

[matermali]

[ Oh, she had been quite literal when speaking on the graves, and this is (unfortunately) a fairly standard poetry reading for her. ]

Nothing is right. Not for any of us. None are safe.

[ She feels she shouldn't need to explain. How are people sleeping for more than a few minutes at a time? Are they honestly curled up in beds? What's the matter with everyone? ]

Which poet would you favor?

[quietlypersistent]

I agree. [ Clarice had accidentally fallen asleep, she hadn't exactly kicked in the door and flopped on the bed care-free, but also: whoever was here still had to take care of themselves. If they didn't, they wouldn't need an external threat to reveal itself to secure their demise.

You want to talk about poetry at a time like this? She watches her tone, doing her best to not sound groggy and vaguely impatient. It takes Clarice a moment to recall a poet, and one she actually does like, since she was probably going to be judged upon her answer. ] ...I enjoy Robert Frost. I can't say I have a favorite that feels deeply personal to me.

[matermali]

I haven't heard of him. Would you care to share one of his works?

[ Please, feed her brain. It's starving. ]

Something that sounds pleasant to you, even if it isn't a favorite.