The Ziz
The knot is tied.
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There are these clouds floating in the sky. They're naive, harmless, pure. They aren't menacing rain clouds, or acid basins waiting to release, they're just plain old clouds living their simple lives in their simple sky. Their passive demeanour is envied by those of the ground. They gaze upward at the pearly white deities dreaming to one day join their ranks.
The Ziz, on the other hand, is blessed with the gift of flight. This eternal beast takes departs into the world above; it wants to meet these clouds. It soars and flaps its cumbersome, clunky wings. It gets close. Closer. Closer. Closer. He meets them. They engulf him. In sheer ecstasy the bird flaps its mighty wings and the clouds are split asunder. The clouds - so naive - reduced to nothing but dust.
The city folk gaze upward at the destruction. They watch as the Ziz accidentally destroys all it admires. In horrified sympathy, they gesture that the beast land. The city is a maze and there is no opening and yet, he still tries to fit his way in. He's reluctant but these people droning and he’s tired, tired of flight, tired of being up in this massive sky- tired of having no direction. He lands; he crashes, and with this, the town transforms into a towering inferno. Families run, screaming and shrilling in all directions as every goddamn possession is dissipated into the tiniest of ash.
The Ziz was a sentient being from another time- a simpler time- a time of belief and hope. The people weren't envious of the clouds- they tried to please them, and the Ziz lived amongst them. As time progressed, so did the people. Before long, those notions grew old and died, like parents of this healthy mentality. The Ziz hasn't spoken a damn word since. There's nothing to fucking say. There never was.
And yet, everyone wants a fucking speech and they're all staring right at him- the focal point of decimation. Families torn, hearts broken, and they're all staring at him waiting for some pointless justification, as if some form of syntax can bring peace to everyone. So they all stare, jaws wide, tears drawn, all staring at this ancient bird.
They’re peering into the Ziz. At first, they see its golden and crimson feathers. They see them falsely glisten in the fire. Then there are his eyes- just black pits in the front of his head. The Ziz is nothing but a vessel of darkness and sorrow- the physical embodiment of melancholy. At one time, there may have been more, but after decades of constant destruction, he has been reduced to this. His feathers, frail and greasy, begin to shed on the ignited town, and still more people gather, and more people stare. And then there’s his beak- so crooked and frail, and covered in dust. They want it to open; they beg and scream and he just fucking sits there staring.
The ground begins to tremor, and the whole world goes silent. The sound of a spine cracking echoes into the distance. He’s writhing now. The wings, the legs, the feathers all moving in the most jarring of ways, and everyone is silent - silent as this bird tangos with death.
And then, there was no movement. He just lays there. No one is sobbing- no fire is burning. They’re all just staring.
And his crackled beak breaks open, and he spews his first and last sentiments.
“ B r e a k m y f u c k i n g w i n g s.
Break them so I won’t have to fly again.
I a m
t i r e d
o f
t h i s, I a l w a y s w a s.
Everything I h a v e e v e r l o v e d is fucking dead.”
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And with that, the fucking rope breaks and I topple to the floor. I'm coughing. I can't breathe. They're going to find me curled up in a ball sobbing. What a pitiful sight - clenched and choking in a pile of my own shit. I'm naked, with my red shirt just cast to the side covered in vomit. This is how I want it. This is how I've always wanted it. I'm tired of flying.
I grab another rope, I prop up a chair and
the knot is tied.
