I P O M O E A
The stranger is framed in silver moonlight, wearing it like a gown as they step forward. A star explodes in the canopy overhead, silently, brightly, and its reflection is illuminated in her eyes, eyes that stare at him from a dark face.
Then the light vanishes, and only the glow from the canopy bathes them in soft, indistinct tones. Her voice is hushed and feminine, a mixture of awe and youth that brings a small, subdued smile to his lips.
”I think the island has a hold of you.”
“Oh, yes,” he says distractedly, returning his gaze to the canopy overhead. “It tends to do that.” The vines are thickening, winding their way about his fetlocks like ropes tightening into a noose. But they do not strangle him, nor drag him down to the earth; flowers bloom along their length instead. Blue and yellow, white and pink; each one is different, as if it doesn’t belong with the rest of the plant. We don’t, the creeping vines tell him, as they press into his skin. A steady trail of emotions and memories, memories that begin as suddenly as the island appeared, flow from the plants to Ipomoea. We are not ordinary.
More and more flowers appear, until his legs disappear beneath a blanket of petals. But when he looks down, and lifts his leg slowly, gently, so as not to tear the delicate flora, the vines release their hold on him. They fall back to the earth in slow motion, and he pulls his other leg from their grasp with the same exaggerated carefulness.
“That’s better.” The vines coil themselves into a pile across the ground, a few flowers bending towards him on long stalks still. “The plants and I have an understanding, of sorts.” He had never considered before how it might look to others, when the plants reached for him and followed him around like pigeons begging for food. Whenever a flower leaned over to brush his side as he passed, or when birds came down from the trees just to be near to him - it had all become second nature to him.
Only now did he pause to think how strange it might have looked to a stranger.
“I'm Po," he says now instead, and the smile spreading across his face feels like a flower blooming.
Then the light vanishes, and only the glow from the canopy bathes them in soft, indistinct tones. Her voice is hushed and feminine, a mixture of awe and youth that brings a small, subdued smile to his lips.
”I think the island has a hold of you.”
“Oh, yes,” he says distractedly, returning his gaze to the canopy overhead. “It tends to do that.” The vines are thickening, winding their way about his fetlocks like ropes tightening into a noose. But they do not strangle him, nor drag him down to the earth; flowers bloom along their length instead. Blue and yellow, white and pink; each one is different, as if it doesn’t belong with the rest of the plant. We don’t, the creeping vines tell him, as they press into his skin. A steady trail of emotions and memories, memories that begin as suddenly as the island appeared, flow from the plants to Ipomoea. We are not ordinary.
More and more flowers appear, until his legs disappear beneath a blanket of petals. But when he looks down, and lifts his leg slowly, gently, so as not to tear the delicate flora, the vines release their hold on him. They fall back to the earth in slow motion, and he pulls his other leg from their grasp with the same exaggerated carefulness.
“That’s better.” The vines coil themselves into a pile across the ground, a few flowers bending towards him on long stalks still. “The plants and I have an understanding, of sorts.” He had never considered before how it might look to others, when the plants reached for him and followed him around like pigeons begging for food. Whenever a flower leaned over to brush his side as he passed, or when birds came down from the trees just to be near to him - it had all become second nature to him.
Only now did he pause to think how strange it might have looked to a stranger.
“I'm Po," he says now instead, and the smile spreading across his face feels like a flower blooming.
@elif i love her <3
”here am i!“
”here am i!“
