She crouches. Surrounded by candles and us, her knees to her chest, her feet flat on the floor, her arms wrapped about her, she crouches. And her teeth are silver sharp. Again and again as she left that fetid, stagnant place, how did she breathe in there, do parts breathe, she pushed off our efforts to wrap and comfort. We hosed the blood away, we warm showered her with cloths soft and her arms swung and she covered her face as the washed off slime revealed it, that one blue eye. And when she was clean we tried to give her blankets. We tried different colours until silver and green seemed to settle on her back as she lowered to the ground, curled in tears and anger, they are frightened of me. Because her teeth flashed and she was frightening, sharp as razor’s edge, all of her silver, even beneath the blonde wig she used to emanate something close to human but she wasn’t and she tore it off and revealed her silver hair. She isn’t. I don’t know who she is or where she’s from but have I asked that of the others? The Griffin with blue blood dripping whose beak clack-clacks and tail slaps? The Fairy Sprite whose table, quill and candle hover with her? The Angel so large we only ever see its feet? Except yesterday as I sat and watched it crouched with her, huge and gentle, its face came into view and I had to look away. So we sat about her with candles, the blue-eyed silver woman, her razor sharp teeth, her arms wrapped around legs bent and she cried and shook and was angry and frightened, and as she shivered the Green Woman tried again with a blanket of green and silver and this time she let it settle. We are all still in the hall of the tall, white house in London, gathered in a superimposition across stairwell and carpet, walls ignored. That house of ghosts and fracture, of stultifying heat and shame and terrible cold, I called it the morgue, where portraits lined the stairs and this silver woman was trapped among so many others. I will watch and she will stand and one day she will speak again and when she does I’ll tell you what she has to say. I hope she leaves that place soon and we can follow her. I’m tired of it. I never want to go back there again.
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So visceral. The sounds and images are described in a fresh way and yet they were resonating in my head. Your writing reminds me of when I write using my "magic eye" theory. So you know those magic eye images we were obsessed with in the late 90s, early 00s? You unfocus and look through the image until the hidden image appears. And that's what your writing reminds me of, I can feel that you were in that flow state they talk about, where you barely know how the words are getting from your mind to the page. I'm not sure if that makes sense but it's the only way I know to describe it. Thank you.
Oh! I was right there, trapped in the the hall with them... "I don’t know who she is or where she’s from but have I asked that of the others? The Griffin with blue blood dripping whose beak clack-clacks and tail slaps? The Fairy Sprite whose table, quill and candle hover with her? The Angel so large we only ever see its feet? Except yesterday as I sat and watched it crouched with her, huge and gentle, its face came into view and I had to look away." I love this one,Eleanor.