He woke up late one morning into an unfamiliar darkness. The sun had left him the dusk before, but neither he nor she knew it would be for ever. The moon never brought such solace, holding darkly in the black sky, a hollow brightness, one that, now, he searched for frantically. He breathed. Bringing his hands to his eyes, he softly touched his right pupil, making sure they were bare. Moving his hands, he tried to clear the darkness around him, and when it was no use, lay back down to sleep.
That night, he sprouted plants, all along his body, and became a large caterpillar, several thousands of stories tall. A fire approached. As it spread to his roots, he felt the flame's touch, licking his petals, igniting his nerves, calmly burning and consuming. From his ashes, he rose as a bird (za za za), a blue-green sparrow, with feathers the color of ocean waves--its eyes the color of rolling foam. He flew toward the sun, pruning himself with anticipation when he stopped to rest, racing for where the ocean met the sky, where he would meet the sun. His wings caught fire. As his roasted corpse fell into the sea, he became a single seed. For years and years, he lay in wait at the bottom of the ocean, catching the faintest rays of light, building, growing. He was a great tree, living on brine and sunlight, and the day he touched the sun, he died.
He died one foggy summer night, hands grasping molded sheets, for what he saw and felt and heard were only in his dreams. Yet I will ever remember him as that salt-fed ocean tree, for though he lost his vision, he never ceased to see.