Shifting from side to side the boat bobbles and bobbles across the endless expanse.  The reigning storms shatter against its withered wood.    They unleash all hell against its merry, innocent soul.  Up they raise it to the clouds, down they pummel it into the abyss. It is a singing song, a merry tune that electrifies its soul as if it were gold… with riches, riches stronger than the sky.

 

It bounces and bounces along its shattered precipice, seeks to guide itself amongst the stars.  That is until the trumpet arrives to anoint its way forward.  Down it turns towards the tundra, above the heavens it seeks to call its cry.  But it is unbeknown at this point.  Its sacred scum stream turns only north, north until the onslaught can take it no further.

 

It cultivates what is at the heart of these brigands.  It seeks to know its welcomer first, pass idle small talk, before it announces its merry offerings… dancing figures as they were against the burgeoning fire.  But there it had climbed.  There it had climbed and it sought as much to gather the trifles falling from the sky.

 

So the feet were accustomed to peddle.  So the soft linen soles could pass amongst these quarters.  For they were etched in centuries of history.  They were softened by the tribal customs of flailing communities.  They took a compass from far away lands and directed it somewhere pointedly in all infinity.  It was somewhere where the reeds might grow.  It was somewhere where you might find beers being drunk and no one directing you to the blemishes of defamation a few hours later.

​

With hope they therefore trudged.  With beaming brows they awaited the daily obstacles in front of them.  Tooth-edged was their devotion to discipline, cataracted was their sense of defeat. Heart-felt was their irrevocable energy.  Muscular was their stringent might even, coiling darkly in the shadows.  It was like a group of goldfish, gathering themselves in a poetic dance.

     

And this is where we find our heroine, named Keira.  Amongst this conurbation was one of our greatest sparks.  Taking wisdom strictly from auspices and invisible, whispering totems, she didn’t have much appetite for vanity, nor aggression to become some far-flung leader.  She rather shoved a wooden pillar into the ground and pitched up a fence.  It was a fence keeping out her inner demons. 

Colliding from here to there in her life, she didn’t have much hope in her own existence.  She didn’t have the belief – as of yet – that the community would listen to someone so steeped in self-regret.   Butterflies and twisting moths, rather, were her greatest companions in this town.  They murmured sacred whispers to her gaping ears, tall tales of irrevocable wisdom.   That was enough, she told herself, that was enough to protect herself from the seeping darkness prevailing on the other side. 

 

But she turned and ruffled her hand through her hair once again.  It was a common tick, a rush of energy inside her.   It came across her at most instances these days, a fierce shot of adrenalin causing her into a frenzy.

 

She couldn’t handle the Buddhist service this morning, she conceded with a lackluster defeat.  The demons would be back within a moment.  The beguiling stares of the congregation would unnerve her into oblivion.   She felt as if there were a knife-edge, lurching above her.  Would It fall down upon her at any moment, she pondered to herself?  Would it crush the meagre vessel that incorporated her body?  Fretting liberally, she peered over to the sandy grove surrounding the wooden hut on which she perched.  The climbing bamboo tree trunks looked so subdued and harmonious in the backdrop to the palace walls.  A mere white edge of cracked paint beside the plant looked as if it were running up towards the sky in a race. The rivalry itself seemed to stretch to the palace walls.  There with a glance to her right, Keira could see a decrepit pile of earth that seemed to compete with the stone for muscular strength.

​

The sky was mostly clear of clouds and a gentle, fresh wind blew calmly across their citadel. Keira, as princess of China, was due to meet her spiritual teacher at 11am in one of the Dojos near to the citadel.  The Dojo was, in fact, on a second hill overlooking the citadel across the valley.  It was said that all wisdom emanated from this spot.  This barren mountaintop, it was said, was the closest location to the almighty gods.  The divine beings would usher down their wisdom against the courtyard.  It was a sacred courtyard that was behind and slightly higher above the Dojo temple.   This was the highest point of the whole city.  It was said that the gods’ wisdom would spring down like butterflies before being disseminated across the land.

​

Keira, rather, had seen many of her hopes fail and collapse throughout her life.  When she travelled up the sacred temple, neither blessed nor informed, she only felt disgruntled at the aching walk back down the mountain.  It all seemed trivial to her, as if the temple was constantly empty as others fought with swords or shouted out to the gods.

 

The wooden Dojo had a decorated façade, that seemed to Keira to be almost a tiger snarling back at her.  As she paced higher and higher up the steps, she could see the red wooden pillars and the mouth of the tiger as if it were about to engulf her.  Nonchalantly, two guards stood either side of the gateway, each armed with a long spear… a long spear and a hefty set of armor.  Yet they knew Keira well.  They knew her all too well.  For she was Princess of China, the greatest royal figure and darling of the nation.