Blink

The scales of balance were heavy. Golden, lined with silver, covered with diamonds, jewels of all sorts, shapes, sizes. A rainbow of jewels, glittering and glimmering. If you closed your eyes, just by your nose, you would think you were in an orchard lined with apple trees, and cinnamon trees. The land was empty aside from the scale. It stood towering, taller than any man made skyscraper. The sun shone heavy and harshly on it. A tree appeared, looming larger and larger. It did not seem to be moving, yet it was growing closer. A cool breeze swept through the plain. The tree was ancient, thick girdle, branches heavy under the weight of the life that they bore. The tree emanated with the glow of life, the miracle of birth. It had witnessed many a birth, many a life, many a death. Thousands, the memory held of each held by a singular leaf. It had billions of leaves upon its branches. It was the scribe to all of creation. The Book of Life. Every idea men have ever had has come from nature, paper from the original scribes of life, the holders of history, mighty trees, fire stolen from the furnaces of Hephaestus, from the thunderbolts of Zeus as he struck lightning upon the mighty wood nymphs. All ideas are sourced and stolen from nature. This was the first book, this mighty tree. The breeze screamed and stopped. Blinked out of existence. A scorch rose through the plain, the monotony of peace and silence broken by an inexplicable trepidation. The sun was covered by thick clouds. Darkness fell throughout the plain. The crackle came before the light. The roar followed. The tree burst into golden flames, every fiber of wood screaming and creaking as the Memory of Life was being charred to a crisp. A crawl fell through the spine. Without the memory of our existence, we are nothing. Without the memories of our lives, we have nothing. When all of existence burns into anonymity, into forgetfulness, we will be left with nothing, we will become like the animals we claim to have sovereignty over. The sky fell dark, the sun creeping away, unwilling to witness the horror fallen under its gaze. A star flew across the sky, taking an account of all below so it could spread the news throughout the galaxy. To what end? When the burning was done, all beings would forget. Not just on this planet, but on all others as well. The leaves began to fall off, crisps falling to the earth, not oscillating, lightless feathers as they fell, but rather heavy with the weight of loss. As they fell, they were swallowed up not by the ground, but vanished with a click in the air, gobbled by the hungry air, gobbled by nonexistence, by non-eternity, starving for immortality. What immortality can one have if not in the annals of history, which was slowly fading from reality. As they were swallowed, they gave glimpses of the lives which they contained. A plane falling downwards, thousands of lives screaming. Blink. Vanished from existence. A keyhole through which a boy was peering, and seeing dozens of rotting corpses, he screamed. A hand grabbed him by the neck, the murderer returning to his lair. Blink, forgotten. A detective, restless in the middle of the night, gone back to the scene of the crime, examining a clue with his pocket magnifier shot by the goon. Blink. The moon as it was destroyed by the end of days. Blink. A reptile smiling lazily as it licked its tongue, finishing a heavy meal of rat. Blink. Life. blink. Lives. Blink. Existence. Blink. Eternity. blink.