Tom Eicher : Iteration

    One step. Up to the peak of the hill. Let the wind blow through
your clothing. Cold fingers of frost probe tenderly into the gap
between your skin and the cloth. Directly in front of you, in
the non-distance of the dark sky, first traces of the rising sun
begin to show. It seems, as if single photons strive to outrace
their brothers.

    Pull the coat closer around your shoulders, raise the collar.
While you're fumbling with the fastener, golden fingers try to
escape the dark. More and more ambassadors of the new day come
shooting past, so now you can make out a centre. A centre, the sun.
Her heralds submit the promise to turn the cold dark into a
friendly warm, at least for some hours. Not yet are they able to
diminish the morning frost, but where they touch down, one is able
to foresee their message.

    A shiver, not unpleasant. The valley beneath you seems to come to
life, at least you now manage to make out some details. A chain of
hills stretch as far as your eye is able to follow them.

    You step back, against your will. Longer you would like to stay,
but a watch, on your arm, which does not belong to you; it says 04:55.
Your legs, but they don't belong to you; they take two more steps
backward, then the watch says 04:59.

    The sky changes color, in an instant. Just a second before, it had
been saturated with the burning gold of the rising sun, now it shows
the color of a television tuned to a dead channel.

    And the floor beneath your feet. And your feet. And you.

    Quickly you hit the FR-Key. You look at your fingers. Your real
fingers, this time. Dirty and swollen up. Covered with many smaller
and larger injuries. Impatiently, you tap the cheap pastic of the
playback unit. Your eyes glance around the dirty floor, for a second
caught by a lonely cockroach that had not been allowed the see another
day. The cheap neon tube emmits an unpleasant humming; it's pitch,
combined with the distant grumbling of the air recycling sings a
sad melodie.

    With a loud rumble, the unit reaches the beginning of the tape.

    It's 2 hours, till you have to return to the factory. Still a lot
of time, time for a lot of sunrises.

    Not that you had ever climbed a mountain. Or seen a sunrise.

    One step, and you reach the peak of the hill. The wind gently
touches your clothes...

    tom-05-01-95
    (c)opyright 1995, Thomas Eicher.
    translated 21-02-95