Carrion

It came to me a long time ago.  A feather of cloth alighted upon the wind, riding the currents of autumns long since passed from lands unknown and unseen… What purpose it had in its travels, I still cannot say; I can merely imagine.  Perhaps it was looking for company amidst the fog, perhaps it was hunting for prey.  Regardless of its intentions, it soared, it stalled, and it fell, fluttering as if trying to grasp the air and ride again before it reached the ground’s embrace. 

And out of all of the people in the world, it was my feet that it fell ahead of. 

I remember it so: A filthy tatter of material, sighing against the dirt.  To the average person, no more than mere refuse, if noticed at all.  To the curious, however, such a thing is a trap.  Touch me, it invites, Pick me up, it wordlessly coos, Find out what I am, an unheard whisper, seeming as if it just might be a scrap of the night sky crumpled amongst the leaves.  The softness of cloth against fingertips, the grit of dirt, a brown burnt edge… It told tactile stories, yet it kept its secrets.  A moment’s curiosity wavered… I could drop it.  Leave it on the trail to rot.  Or carry it to the nearest trash can, and dispose of it properly, as all good folks should.

And that is how Carrion hitched a ride with me, tucked away in my breast pocket, trashcans and cloth soon forgotten. A companion sensed but rarely seen, a scrap of his tattered cloak tucked into my vest, (assuming that it, in fact, is a he, if it has any gender at all,). 

Carrion is a being that breathes in stinking rot but breathes out cold, clean fog… He now knows me, knew me from the moment my fingers brushed against cloth, and he followed me home.  And yet, I do not know him.  His intentions are hidden beneath a shroud of fallen leaves, enigmatic, threatening, yet harmless.

His eyes tell me nothing.  While a cat’s eyes will reflect moonlight, glinting green in the night, his eyes, if they can be called eyes at all, draw in the moonlight, twist it, and bend it into a wavelength all his own, casting the world in his own light.  His presence is that of an unexpected breeze,  his touch, a loving caress from dust-dry branches.  His movements are as silent as the rustling of shadows, and his voice, ah, his voice is full of spiderwebs, entrapping, and as quiet and dark as midnight.

He reminds me that sometimes people find it silly how I get so excited for the end of summer, how I revel when the sun begins to wane.  He explains that there is no way for them to truly understand.  Their souls aren’t constructed out of things like the rustling of leaves and flickers of candlelight, like mine is. 

I am one of the autumn people.

While most people revel in the sun, I find just as much joy in the moonlight’s silver cascade.

While others bask in the heat, I am rejuvenated by chill winds perfumed by forest.

While many delight in the arrival of summer flowers, the flames of changing leaves stirs in me awe and excitement that is usually only held in the sugary hearts of children.

The smell of nomadic woodsmoke in the crisp night air, the satisfying autumn’s-rattle crunch of fallen leaves, the windy caress of an approaching summer-lost thunder storm… These things and more nourish me in ways nothing else ever can. 

And so I find those who feel as I do, companions in autumn… Or rather, they, like Carrion, find me.