The world, much like love, is an accident. Before there were cities, and before there were stars, there were two brothers. Perhaps there were more - perhaps there are unnamed mothers, fathers, and sisters that our collective imagination no longer remember. When I turn my eyes backwards through history, though, I can see clearly only two: Apollyn and Nochran. Theirs was an empty world - no skies or seas to distinguish from the pervasive, oppressive void.
Although: it seems that, for a time, the void was sufficient. The brothers were not ambitious, nor were they difficult to please. They spent no time in idle conversation with each other; if they had a language at this point - though I can not say for certain that they did, but if they had - there was nothing for that language to describe. Besides, the brothers' status did not change from day to day, and so they were content to merely exist as they always had.
There is no way of knowing now (and, given the tragedy that is about to ensue, it may be impossible to ever determine) whether it was Nochran or Apollyn who first decided to shape to formless detritus about him into a sphere and set it spinning through the void. The brother - and whether he acted from idle curiosity or genuine scientific interest is also never likely to be understood - gathered matter about his fingertips and, with both hands, compressed the matter until it heated and fused together in his palms. He released the mass he had created and watched it drift off, slowly, into the void, where it soon cooled and vanished from sight
The other brother - Apollyn or Nochran - saw his brother's actions and strove immediately to do likewise. Matter was found, shaped, and let loose to float in the ether, until the entirety of empty space about them was filled with the cold, lifeless flotsam of their lackadaisical creations.
With space so quickly crowded, the brothers could not help but bump into the products of their labors. And it is not inconceivable - indeed, it's very nearly likely - that one of the brothers would happen to, during a snooze, accidentally inhale one of the errant specks. And then, via a cough or a sneeze, the brother would shoot that speck back out and marvel at the change that had been wrought. For, you see, the brother's breath had a peculiar effect on these bizarre spheres. They somehow held on to the air that had wrapped around them, as well as the bits of spittle and phlegm from the giant's throats. They developed atmospheres, and soon thereafter mossy life appeared on the surface of these accidental planetoids.
Now the brothers had a reason to engage. Both Nochran and Apollyn began to experiment with the formerly lifeless and uninteresting crumbs they had created. What if, thought one brother, I compressed this matter with my armpit rather than my palms? And what if, thought the other, I warm this bit in my mouth before pressing it all together? For countless ages the brothers experimented, combining the formerly meaningless chunks of matter with their own bodily functions to create new and exciting planetoids.
And, dare I say it, something akin to people started to appear on the surface of these spheres.
Any artist will tell you that with creation comes jealousy, and so it was with the brother Apollyn. He saw a bit of his brother's creation, and he coveted. So he took the sphere without his brother's consent and added a touch of his own - a drip of saliva for an ocean, or an eyelash for shrubbery. Just a minor change, surely, but one of great significance to the original creator, who felt his masterpiece had been unjustly altered, even vandalized.
Was that the start of the feud? Or was it something even smaller, such as brother Nochran losing track of his surroundings, only for one of the celestial knick-knacks composed by brother Apollyn to collide carelessly with his head. Oh, the pain! Having lived so long in an empty void, brother Nochran had never experienced a sensation quite like pain, and he did not relish the experience. And so it was that he turned, in a fury, to confront his brother.
And the conflict began, and it soon turned physical - perhaps because language had still not been invented to allow the brothers to talk out their complaints, or perhaps because the brothers then were much like brothers now, who speak more fluently with slaps and kicks than with any composition of the tongue. Perhaps, to give the brothers some credit, they began with only those smallest, most misshapen barren planets. Maybe they possessed some innate, instinctual sense of the sanctity of the life they had created. Perhaps they did so, but even if they did their conflict soon escalated until every speck of dust the brothers had created was turned into the ammunition of revenge.
Truly, if any man living today had seen the calamity that had befallen the world of creation so early on, that man (or woman - let's not be discriminatory) would be brought to the most painful of sobs, even if it were a creature of singleminded malevolence towards his fellows, for who could watch without emotion the complete eradication of all life by beings no more cognizant of its existence than you or I are of the insect we so inconsiderately swallow during our nightly slumbers?
Now, the brothers' feud had an additional consequence, one neither party could anticipate. The rage with which they fought, the petty anger, caused many of the small fragments of their once glorious creations to ignite. They burned and spun out into the beyond, creating light where there had been none. At length, the brothers could see the extent of the damage they had done, and they lamented it.
No, that can't be true. There was no sorrow, nor even introspection, as with the cessation of their brawl the brothers each scooped armfuls of their raw working material and separated to different sides of space, each pursuing from that point on their own projects without interference or input from the other.
Now, their feud wasn't entirely fruitless, for it allowed them to experiment with a new material - fire, the likes of which neither brother had before beheld. And so it was that life was created anew, with light to guide and warm by day and dark to cool and lull into repose. Thus also was the warm center of the earth created, which radiates with a heat capable of nurturing a variety of creatures and plants neither brother could have dreamed of before the brawl.
And do those sparks of heat still contain the anger of the brothers' fight? Is there some residual flicker of rage smouldering at the center of the planet? Does that heat emanate outward, filling in the hearts of the men and beasts that walk on that planet's surface? And is the brothers' war continued today? Well you ask, my friend, but who can find the answer to such questions?
Perhaps a better question would be this: What great coldness, what unendurable inhospitality would remain we're those fires extinguished?
A couple of weeks ago, I got the idea to write a creation myth. At the time, it seemed like that would be a fun prompt. When I decided to make that prompt my starting place for this week, I just wasn't feeling it. The story would not come together.
Hover, that changed when I switched up the narrative voice. I've been reading a lot of Salman Rushdie lately (specifically Midnight's Children, with its unabashedly unreliable narrator), and I found that voice was a lot of fun to write.
The picture isn't much to write home about. I started working it in color, and then I realized it was just taking me too long, and I really wasn't into how it was turning out. So I slapped this one together and called it a day. I'll put more effort into the next pic. Promise.
Although: it seems that, for a time, the void was sufficient. The brothers were not ambitious, nor were they difficult to please. They spent no time in idle conversation with each other; if they had a language at this point - though I can not say for certain that they did, but if they had - there was nothing for that language to describe. Besides, the brothers' status did not change from day to day, and so they were content to merely exist as they always had.
There is no way of knowing now (and, given the tragedy that is about to ensue, it may be impossible to ever determine) whether it was Nochran or Apollyn who first decided to shape to formless detritus about him into a sphere and set it spinning through the void. The brother - and whether he acted from idle curiosity or genuine scientific interest is also never likely to be understood - gathered matter about his fingertips and, with both hands, compressed the matter until it heated and fused together in his palms. He released the mass he had created and watched it drift off, slowly, into the void, where it soon cooled and vanished from sight
The other brother - Apollyn or Nochran - saw his brother's actions and strove immediately to do likewise. Matter was found, shaped, and let loose to float in the ether, until the entirety of empty space about them was filled with the cold, lifeless flotsam of their lackadaisical creations.
With space so quickly crowded, the brothers could not help but bump into the products of their labors. And it is not inconceivable - indeed, it's very nearly likely - that one of the brothers would happen to, during a snooze, accidentally inhale one of the errant specks. And then, via a cough or a sneeze, the brother would shoot that speck back out and marvel at the change that had been wrought. For, you see, the brother's breath had a peculiar effect on these bizarre spheres. They somehow held on to the air that had wrapped around them, as well as the bits of spittle and phlegm from the giant's throats. They developed atmospheres, and soon thereafter mossy life appeared on the surface of these accidental planetoids.
Now the brothers had a reason to engage. Both Nochran and Apollyn began to experiment with the formerly lifeless and uninteresting crumbs they had created. What if, thought one brother, I compressed this matter with my armpit rather than my palms? And what if, thought the other, I warm this bit in my mouth before pressing it all together? For countless ages the brothers experimented, combining the formerly meaningless chunks of matter with their own bodily functions to create new and exciting planetoids.
And, dare I say it, something akin to people started to appear on the surface of these spheres.
Any artist will tell you that with creation comes jealousy, and so it was with the brother Apollyn. He saw a bit of his brother's creation, and he coveted. So he took the sphere without his brother's consent and added a touch of his own - a drip of saliva for an ocean, or an eyelash for shrubbery. Just a minor change, surely, but one of great significance to the original creator, who felt his masterpiece had been unjustly altered, even vandalized.
Was that the start of the feud? Or was it something even smaller, such as brother Nochran losing track of his surroundings, only for one of the celestial knick-knacks composed by brother Apollyn to collide carelessly with his head. Oh, the pain! Having lived so long in an empty void, brother Nochran had never experienced a sensation quite like pain, and he did not relish the experience. And so it was that he turned, in a fury, to confront his brother.
And the conflict began, and it soon turned physical - perhaps because language had still not been invented to allow the brothers to talk out their complaints, or perhaps because the brothers then were much like brothers now, who speak more fluently with slaps and kicks than with any composition of the tongue. Perhaps, to give the brothers some credit, they began with only those smallest, most misshapen barren planets. Maybe they possessed some innate, instinctual sense of the sanctity of the life they had created. Perhaps they did so, but even if they did their conflict soon escalated until every speck of dust the brothers had created was turned into the ammunition of revenge.
Truly, if any man living today had seen the calamity that had befallen the world of creation so early on, that man (or woman - let's not be discriminatory) would be brought to the most painful of sobs, even if it were a creature of singleminded malevolence towards his fellows, for who could watch without emotion the complete eradication of all life by beings no more cognizant of its existence than you or I are of the insect we so inconsiderately swallow during our nightly slumbers?
Now, the brothers' feud had an additional consequence, one neither party could anticipate. The rage with which they fought, the petty anger, caused many of the small fragments of their once glorious creations to ignite. They burned and spun out into the beyond, creating light where there had been none. At length, the brothers could see the extent of the damage they had done, and they lamented it.
No, that can't be true. There was no sorrow, nor even introspection, as with the cessation of their brawl the brothers each scooped armfuls of their raw working material and separated to different sides of space, each pursuing from that point on their own projects without interference or input from the other.
Now, their feud wasn't entirely fruitless, for it allowed them to experiment with a new material - fire, the likes of which neither brother had before beheld. And so it was that life was created anew, with light to guide and warm by day and dark to cool and lull into repose. Thus also was the warm center of the earth created, which radiates with a heat capable of nurturing a variety of creatures and plants neither brother could have dreamed of before the brawl.
And do those sparks of heat still contain the anger of the brothers' fight? Is there some residual flicker of rage smouldering at the center of the planet? Does that heat emanate outward, filling in the hearts of the men and beasts that walk on that planet's surface? And is the brothers' war continued today? Well you ask, my friend, but who can find the answer to such questions?
Perhaps a better question would be this: What great coldness, what unendurable inhospitality would remain we're those fires extinguished?
A couple of weeks ago, I got the idea to write a creation myth. At the time, it seemed like that would be a fun prompt. When I decided to make that prompt my starting place for this week, I just wasn't feeling it. The story would not come together.
Hover, that changed when I switched up the narrative voice. I've been reading a lot of Salman Rushdie lately (specifically Midnight's Children, with its unabashedly unreliable narrator), and I found that voice was a lot of fun to write.
The picture isn't much to write home about. I started working it in color, and then I realized it was just taking me too long, and I really wasn't into how it was turning out. So I slapped this one together and called it a day. I'll put more effort into the next pic. Promise.
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