Firefly
night
As the first few thousand palm trees whizzed by, I fell
asleep, sticky and hot, and angled to benefit from the cool
of the air vents, occasionally there would be a little
dusty clearing with a rickety little bamboo house...
On and on and on... to a small collection of cafes and
restaurants perched on stilts over the muddy
river...strings of coloured lights swung gently in the
movement of air, and enticement of spices drifted
from the kitchens, promising food, freshly cooked,
delicate and wonderfully fragrant...a jumble of boats swung
on the sluggish current as we ate, watching life at a pace
we seem to have forgotten. my world seemed a lifetime
away...
As the sky slowly darkened, the river was lit by straggly
reflections across the murky surface, every line became
softened, and the crickets and frogs started their nightly
rock concert.. A quick adventure to the loo and we were off
in the now nearly dark, humid night...suddenly a car
park... we parked, we stumbled along an unlit track full of
holes and littered with stones, great in skimpy sandals,
which were the only thing I could wear, my feet, having
swollen three sizes...
emerging under lights hung haphazardly in trees, we were
given tickets, ancient life jackets, and hustled to a rocky
jetty which bent alarminly as disembarking passengers came
ashore...then it was our turn.
I found my self in a narrow boat, poled from the stern, we
swirled out of the pooling light into the deep darkness,
silence like a hot blanket enveloped us, the water was so
close I could feel it slip past, I could see tangled bushes
on the bank, the moon came out, and suddenly the call to
prayer floated over the air, the sweet rise and fall of
notes leaving me close to tears..the oars creaked and
dripped drops with every rhythmic stroke, lulling my
stunned senses,
round the next bend clouds of fireflies danced in the
blackness of the bushes, somehow intensifying the silence,
mesmerising, and unforgetable. I wanted to stay in
the boat, to dream, find space, and so it was, for a while,
but of course we had to turn back.
I don’t suppose one can ever repeat the thrill of a first
time, only keep the memory. Some nights when I stand on the
lawn and see the hugeness of my sky and listen to the
singing of the stars, I think of that swirling muddy river
on the other side of the world, where fireflies dance in
the dusk as the moon comes up, and the call to worship
fills the air....
pim claridge