Once upon a time there was a little boy. This little black haired boy, like all other little black-haired boys, liked playing outside. He liked paper animals and looking at the things around him. And this little boy had a mother, who, like all other mothers of little boys, used to sing to him before he went to sleep, and when he would cry out in the dark, afraid of the night, she would sit beside him, stroke his hair and sing to him. She sung to him of planets, of galaxies, of faraway lands. One night, she began to sing, ‘Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, never let it go away...’
When she sung this song to the little boy, he became no longer afraid of the night. Her voice, though shaky and provincial, made him see the stars, where before he had seen only darkness. He began to feel the wonder of a universe so much bigger and greater than he. And from a very early age, the age where most boys were still looking at the ground, he began to look up. He became captivated by the stars, and was no longer afraid.
After the little boy’s mother had sung that song to him one evening, he looked at her with all the wisdom of the worlds in his seven year old eyes and said to her, ‘You know what mama’,
To which she replied, ‘Yes baby’, as all little boy’s mamas do.
‘One day, I will catch a star. And... And I don’t really mind if I have to go up there to catch it, for it might be too shy to come to me.’
‘And why would anyone be too shy to come to you, my baby?’, she asked.
‘Well, mainly because it hasn’t met me yet.’ He replied, ‘And it must be a long way from its mama and papa. But I don’t mind. I’ll still catch one, one day.’
And the little boy’s mama simply nodded and kissed her baby on the forehead and sang about stars until his eyes grew droopy and sleep whisked him away to another galaxy.
And although that little boy then grew to be a man, he never forgot his dream. Though this dream stayed locked in those parts of the heart set aside for the dreams too precious to share. Locked up for fear they might materialise, and find no strength in this life to hold fast, to shatter into delicate shards in ones hands. Though not one word was whispered to another, this boy still knew that he would one day, somehow catch his falling star.
And once upon a time came a war, smaller than a glass bottle, which declared itself to be bigger than the oceans in which it floated, found its way to the shores of this boy’s home. The stories written in delicate script on the walls of his city, belonging to each person who had ever walked through the alleys, who had ever found love, lost love, created, laughed, cried. The stories worn into the cobbled pavement were wiped out, only to be replaced by the forty foot high letters of chaos and tyranny. The boy heard stories of stars falling from the heavens, tiny supernovas, holding their own ideals of what life is supposed to look like, dropping into towns and cities and deserts and oceans. And each time the boy, who liked looking up, who liked dreaming of galaxies and planets and spots of light in universal darkness, felt each act of violence as a blow to himself, to the things he loved best in the world.
And when the Americans came to drop their own stars over this little boy’s home, he looked up. Upwards to see not what he expected to see, not the image of blissful fantasy that he had created in a lifetime of dreaming, but falling stars all the same. And as he reached out his hands, fingers spread joyously to finally catch that falling star of his, to greet it with all the warm affection of a long lost friend, he became acquainted intimately with the supernova that fell not from the universe, but from a foreign laboratory, that when all he knew to be real had ceased to exist, would still remain as a symbol of sickening conquest. And at the moment when that long awaited star kissed the earth, the world around him turned to ash, and the little boy who liked looking up, who dreamed of bigger things and who grew to be a man still determined to meet that star – became no more.
It was as if everything at that moment was still, frozen into the positions our hearts, like mothers, once taught us. The acceptable behaviour, how ladies and gentlemen act, became filled with a silence that froze the feelings of living that had stopped each person from feeling the stars. In that moment, the moment of obliviation became the art of the greatest forgetting. The forgetting of passion, of the pain that births beauty. The glass heart, the glass soul that was once a delicate city was shattered. The words in stranger’s mouths were frozen, like glaciers, like ice. Slowly they could move, silently, even, but not in ways that any of the living could hear them.
And years later, after the mirror had shattered, the shards still pierce peoples skin and hearts and bind them to each other, to the promise to never forget people like the little boy, who liked paper animals and listening to his mother sing, who always looked up and finally caught his falling star.
When she sung this song to the little boy, he became no longer afraid of the night. Her voice, though shaky and provincial, made him see the stars, where before he had seen only darkness. He began to feel the wonder of a universe so much bigger and greater than he. And from a very early age, the age where most boys were still looking at the ground, he began to look up. He became captivated by the stars, and was no longer afraid.
After the little boy’s mother had sung that song to him one evening, he looked at her with all the wisdom of the worlds in his seven year old eyes and said to her, ‘You know what mama’,
To which she replied, ‘Yes baby’, as all little boy’s mamas do.
‘One day, I will catch a star. And... And I don’t really mind if I have to go up there to catch it, for it might be too shy to come to me.’
‘And why would anyone be too shy to come to you, my baby?’, she asked.
‘Well, mainly because it hasn’t met me yet.’ He replied, ‘And it must be a long way from its mama and papa. But I don’t mind. I’ll still catch one, one day.’
And the little boy’s mama simply nodded and kissed her baby on the forehead and sang about stars until his eyes grew droopy and sleep whisked him away to another galaxy.
And although that little boy then grew to be a man, he never forgot his dream. Though this dream stayed locked in those parts of the heart set aside for the dreams too precious to share. Locked up for fear they might materialise, and find no strength in this life to hold fast, to shatter into delicate shards in ones hands. Though not one word was whispered to another, this boy still knew that he would one day, somehow catch his falling star.
And once upon a time came a war, smaller than a glass bottle, which declared itself to be bigger than the oceans in which it floated, found its way to the shores of this boy’s home. The stories written in delicate script on the walls of his city, belonging to each person who had ever walked through the alleys, who had ever found love, lost love, created, laughed, cried. The stories worn into the cobbled pavement were wiped out, only to be replaced by the forty foot high letters of chaos and tyranny. The boy heard stories of stars falling from the heavens, tiny supernovas, holding their own ideals of what life is supposed to look like, dropping into towns and cities and deserts and oceans. And each time the boy, who liked looking up, who liked dreaming of galaxies and planets and spots of light in universal darkness, felt each act of violence as a blow to himself, to the things he loved best in the world.
And when the Americans came to drop their own stars over this little boy’s home, he looked up. Upwards to see not what he expected to see, not the image of blissful fantasy that he had created in a lifetime of dreaming, but falling stars all the same. And as he reached out his hands, fingers spread joyously to finally catch that falling star of his, to greet it with all the warm affection of a long lost friend, he became acquainted intimately with the supernova that fell not from the universe, but from a foreign laboratory, that when all he knew to be real had ceased to exist, would still remain as a symbol of sickening conquest. And at the moment when that long awaited star kissed the earth, the world around him turned to ash, and the little boy who liked looking up, who dreamed of bigger things and who grew to be a man still determined to meet that star – became no more.
It was as if everything at that moment was still, frozen into the positions our hearts, like mothers, once taught us. The acceptable behaviour, how ladies and gentlemen act, became filled with a silence that froze the feelings of living that had stopped each person from feeling the stars. In that moment, the moment of obliviation became the art of the greatest forgetting. The forgetting of passion, of the pain that births beauty. The glass heart, the glass soul that was once a delicate city was shattered. The words in stranger’s mouths were frozen, like glaciers, like ice. Slowly they could move, silently, even, but not in ways that any of the living could hear them.
And years later, after the mirror had shattered, the shards still pierce peoples skin and hearts and bind them to each other, to the promise to never forget people like the little boy, who liked paper animals and listening to his mother sing, who always looked up and finally caught his falling star.
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