From: Cat@yabbs
To: all@yabbs
Subject: something old i found
Date: Tue May 24 20:48:04 1994

i was looking through my writing folder, and i found this old story type 
thing that i wrote in 10th grade (ions ago :) ) when my teacher assigned 
us to write a "narrowing of focus story". i thought i;d post it just so 
you all wouldn't think all i ever write are sarcastic poems. :) this is 
more morbid that anything i've ever writen i think, but ah well. 
I've always has a facination for cemetaries. :)                    

       There is a tall iron fence surrounding the cemetery. A chain has 
been woven through the fence and fastened by a padlock, so that none may 
disturb the homes of the dead during the night hours. Silence hangs on 
this place like a veil, broken only by the howling of the lonely wind. A 
few paths can be seen through the grass, made earlier by loved ones who 
had come to pay their debts to the dead. A marble statue of Christ stands
in the center of the cemetary with it's open arms outstretched, as 
if to welcome in the spirits of the deceased.
        Within the cemetary lies a grave, alone, far apart from the 
rest. No paths lead up to this secluded spot. The tombstone is 
crumbling, and so grime-encrusted that the inscription can not be 
deciphered. The only "flowers" that decorate this stone are the 
weeds that grow high around it, embracing it.  
         Six feet beneath the matted grass lies a coffin, and old 
wooden coffin. The nails which hold the wood together are bent and 
rusty. The wood itself is rotting away, deteriorating. It is more like 
wet cardboard that wood. Maggots have burrowed deep into it, leaving 
vein-like paths in their wake.
         Inside the coffin lie some bones, the flesh had fallen from 
them years ago. They are weak and brittle. The arms and legs are long, 
the shoulders broad, indicating a man. Scraps of cloth, whose color 
has long since faded, cling to the bones. A hole can be seen in one 
scrap of cloth, a small round hole, and it continues on through one of 
the bones in the ribcage. Next to the bones sits an old rifle. It is 
useless, corroded, and covered with rust. But what would it's owner 
use it for now?
          There was no way of knowing that these bones belonged to a 
soldier, a young man of 18. Excited by fighting for freedom and 
liberty, and determined to change the world, he joined the war. He was 
pathetically inexperienced in fighting, his hands had never held a 
gun. He feel on his first day of battle, killed by a well-guided shot 
to the heart. 
          Now, all that remains of him are his bones, lying in a 
rotting coffin, under a lonely grave, in the cemetary.
   

(the persian gulf war was going on at the time i wrote this, so i 
think it inadvertently affected the story) anyhow, that's one of the 
very few serious/"dark" pieces i've ever written. satire is a much 
more comfortable medium for me to write in. ;)

-tammie