011 "The Anguish Of Prometheus" by Abraxas 2009-12-27

I will not go blind into the abyss.

The street by the saloon is littered with flyers. Wanted. Lost & Found. Adverts - to a circus featuring delights of Asia. I search yet do not find a poster about my absence.

I cannot state the length of my exile. It seemed to be just a series of days and nights without count. Time - I was free of it and of those other enslavements limiting my civilization.

Gods am I grateful to have been given the privilege of tasting another way of life.

Into the establishment I stride careful not to seem like a stranger. Outside I am unchanged. Inside my perception is altered. And I cannot let the subtlety of my unconscious seep into my manner.

The piano plays a tune I do not recognize. The cattlemen go about their business. Bumi plays with Piandao - Jeong-Jeong's seat is empty. I cannot see Ty Lee and Mai.

My table is occupied but without fret I grab a chair - I settle into it and peek about while reading a journal. Sitting. Idling. I listen to chatter. It is the object of my mission.

I learn Zhao joined a cocky eastern general to rout the Lakota. Another raid into unceeded Indian country. And my father returned after the last cattle drive.

"So." It is Jeong-Jeong. He sits. He asks: "Find your uncle?"

"Yeah."

I shrug and watch the game of cards.

"Fire - what a burden to man! It made all of this, all of this, this...civilization. Stolen out of the grips of the gods we usurp. Yet how it consumes us!"

He rejoins the game only a few feet away - into the realm of another world.

I stand noting too late a pair of feathers had been drawn onto my uncle's image.

END