| LICENSE |
| PREFACE |
| OUTRUN THE SUN |
This work is licensed under CC BY 4.0.
On a westbound train home I imagined a boy in contest with the sun. I could see the boy running alongside the train, keeping pace.
I think the idea came from the stew of Dana Schutz's Beat Out the Sun, which I saw in the Lousiana in Denmark, twisted with The Myth of Sisyphus. I didn't know what would become of the idea but, after a year and half of stewing, it has become this. The idea was old but my work only began this past September.
I don't know why the boy is racing the sun. The boy is not seeking revenge on the sun for something it did. It's Sisyphean but the boy's labour is voluntary, unlike Sisyphus'. I thought the boy was grieving and that this tournament was an expression of that grief but, when writing about the boy, that wasn't it either. Perhaps he is doing it because it is impossible. The struggle towards the heights is enough to numb a man's heart but I'm not convinced it is enough to fill it. All in all, I reached a dead end but still the boy ran.
I am sorry for the mess that follows. Nowadays, for better or worse, everything I produce feels like the last thing I will ever do. Years have a way of slipping by unnoticed. My only ask is that you don't look too closely into anything. Simply see it in the same endearing way as my family, friends and dates see me - as crazy.
Braeden Kloke
Ottawa, ON
December 21, 2024
| A FEW WORDS |
| MARATHON |
| ON PROGRESS |
| MORNING COMES QUICKLY |
| ONE IN A MILLION |
| WHEN YOUR SUN GOES OUT |
| DAVID |
Never underestimate the good
A few words can do.
Lace your shoes before the dawn
And let your starting gun be first light
Everyday's a marathon
Outrun the sun, hold back the night!
Progress on one thing or nothing
Slowly or not at all
Most days not some days
In it for the long haul.
Everytime I wake I think
Morning comes quickly
I greet my grandson and remark
Morning comes quickly
Grundlage, my foundation
Every hour morning comes
Morning comes quickly
Lest I forget who I was.
So many ones in a million
But none for me
Staring up at a blanket of stars
Envious of the night
Holding all I need
My candescent light wrapped in another's arms.
When your sun goes out
All that's left are stars
Small and bright
But no constellation
Could replace the One
You would need the whole night sky
There's no supernova
No final loving blast
Of radiation to bathe your skin
When your sun goes out
You are found grasping
At every ember growing cold and dim.
Don daydreamed out the backseat window. His parents were driving him through the parts of Ontario where the road goes through the Canadian Shield. Rock walls whizzed past, dynamited long ago. He imagined the car was stationary and that the landscape was an endless canvas being pulled away.
He was ten and had with him a copy of Captain Underpants. He sat there "reading", which involved him rapidly flipping pages back and forth to create a movie of his hero pummelling some nameless villain. This was their life, the characters on the pages, to be pummelled relentlessly until the interest of a child wained. Don set the book aside to give his paper companions temporary relief.
* * *
"So what's the point of the story?" The teacher asked.
A boring silence. Greek mythology doesn't always interest fourth graders.
"Was Sisyphus happy?" A boy questioned.
"He was condemned to push a boulder up a mountain for eternity only to have it roll back down again. This was his prison. No, he was not happy."
"But could he have been happy?"
"It's not the emotions of the characters we are concerned about." The teacher said annoyed. "There are bigger lessons to be learned, morals. What moral is the story of Sisyphus trying to teach us?"
Don approached the boy after class and showed him Captain Underpants in fierce combat.
"Do you think they are happy?" Don asked.
A pause.
"Yes." The boy said smiling.
Don smiled back.
"My name is David." The boy said.
* * *
Don and David stood in a field poking a dead snake.
"I'm going to do it." Don said.
"When?"
"Tomorrow."
The snake's tail was shoved down its throat. Don was curious why it would do that. David, evidently more curious, crouched and whispered into the snake's ear.
"What did you tell it?" Don asked.
"That there is only ever one question."
David rarely made eye contact.
"What's the only question?" Don asked.
* * *
Exhausted, Don settled down at the top of the hill watching the sun set in the early hours of the morning. His digital wristwatch blinked "I AM".
"How long did you last today?" David said approaching.
"Longer than before," Don replied smiling. "I could feel the sun directly above me! My shadow was beneath me for an hour at least! Tomorrow will be better."
David sat next to him and stared across the valley. Don reached over and set his hand on David's thigh, grazing his thumb back and forth. David shifted and Don let go, but only after a moment.
"I'm leaving." David said. "My parents are moving."
"When?"
"Today."
"Where?"
"You can't come with me."
The summer air was warm, Don leaned his head against it and became stone.
"What are you thinking?" David asked.
"That there is only ever one question." Don muttered to his feet.
"Yes," David replied as the sun tucked itself behind the horizon. "But you don't have to answer it right now."
Stars travelled on their way as they sat on their rock.
"What are you thinking?" David persisted.