sjsprWriting

He did not know how long he had been floating. It must have been a little less than two years now. The ocean felt loose, more comfortable than the entirety of his own body. The wind kept hitting the top of his head. Almost like a reminder.

He was thinking of his favorite painting: Paul Signac’s Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde (La Bonne-Mère). He thought of the countless dots- each a microcosm of color and life made in sacrifice for a greater beauty. He thought of the care needed to stroke an ocean and sky into the same entity- each itself as a reflection of the other. He imagined himself floating along that reflection, the synergy of it all caressing him between the current. The water slowly began to wax over him as the last of his dry hair was soaked. The sky looked beautiful underwater- light shattering against particles, diffusing in dance. This is where he belonged; a dot amongst others.

He surfaced as the moon bulged over him in a black sky. The stars hovered around it like chandeliers in orbit. He was lying on his back when he saw the first star shoot past the moon. Then another. And another. They were crystal dots falling right out of the sky, and yet, the snow-laden moon continued to glow; resplendently without a fault. The division grew into silence, and a thought had occurred to him. How much was a dot sacrificing for the beauty of another? Is it not possible that a singular dot can offer the same amount, if not more, grandeur than a collection? What if one of these selfless beings had suddenly decided to become selfish, or what if they were to fall in love- fall out of the whole and float away in an ocean to become part of something else?

The wind kept hitting the top of his head, Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde no longer in sight.