Hello, I'm new - invited here by Chris. I admire the work of those who are here, and thought I'd share one of my own, still at the "first blurt" stage, but on its way. Thanks! RUIN by Frances Nicholson - Ashford Mill, Death Valley We stand together, peer through windows (or are they doors - rectangular spaces in a remnant of wall) at mauve hills, acrid crystaline expanses, wondering at the tenacity, perhaps idiocy, of men bent on civilizing wastelands. Why here? Far away they yanked reluctant ore from crags, brought it to this place to change it - amateur alchemists - to gold. Or it changed them. Shifted their focus slowly from greed to survival's abandon. Timbers lie silent that held up... something. Nobody took note, preserved their meaning for posterity. And in the absolute of a quiet born of absence - no engines, no voices, no human-borne vibration - whispering under the tickle of wind: a hum, almost a voice, almost a whir of wings. Thrum of blood in our own ears a hymn, a nod toward mortality. Continue reading