The Heavy Summer Oppresses Us

The heavy summer oppresses us, holding us down, making us sweat. Even the simplest act becomes a chore, more effort than it is worth. Each act becomes an ordeal.

We are not the people of the heavy hot summers. We are people of cool rain and green lands, of lush deep forests and verdant plains. People who huddle together against the cold and the mists and the darkness that always lies outside the reach of our flickering camp fires.

We have seen those darker shadows that lie beyond the reach of the dancing fingers of flame; we know what hides there, waiting for us. We do not go out into that darkness. We wait here, huddled close, for the dawn.

These hot days though, they make the night too hot for sleeping and the hours crawl and snarl like those dark shadow beasts, waiting; waiting for us to step beyond the fire’s protection. For even in these heavy hot days when the nights come we have to have the fire, even though the warmth of the day has not been chased away by the darkness, even though the night’s thick blankets lie heavy on us, still we need the protection of the fire to keep the night at bay. Still we huddle against what those shadows hold, knowing how easily they can reach out those dark claws and pluck us away, one by one until we are no more.