SEVERAL EXPERIMENTS WITH DESCRIPTIVE LANGUAGE

Timmy Zhang

The silence, a weight most intangible but heavy, permeates the forest, its trees dead and barren and the ground thick with mud as incorporeal shadows sway and merge with the ghastly trees. I tread forward, with a sticky buzzing whisper breathing damply upon my neck—the mud, grasping my feet like half-hardened cement. Even my sweat, soaked into my overcoat, drags me down as, I grit my teeth, bite my lips, and strive one step at a time.Go on, go on, don’t stop, must not stop... Something sinister hangs above me, its hidden gaze triggering anxiety and despair—but I mustn’tfall,not yet. I shall not; I will not succumb to—a rapid darting movement speeds past me as a shadow bends those trees and carries a piercingly- cold wind that blasts me awake; butitis awakening, too, and hunting. My eyes wander frantically before hesitating at a bush, where a pair of wide, yellow, hungry eyes now glare at me. The ground sucking at my feet, my energy all swallowed by the forest’s malice and mystery, and soon this creature. I breathe and give up—but I can’t. I must go on; go on, don’t stop, must not stop, won’t stop, don’t

I gaze outside and see a tiny butterfly enjoying a temporary rest. The butterfly gracefully perches on the ledge, with two giant, round orbs protruding from its puny body and a pair of long, thin antennas stretching toward me as if hugging me. Then, its wings shiver and glimmer glamorously. The colorful orbs on the rings are comprised of thousands of tiny eyes, never blinking but dancing as the wings flutter. As the sun rises, the sun’s ray pass through the wings' seemingly transparent layers, and the orbs shine with a glamorous spectrum of glistening light. Suddenly, its antennas bend and point toward me. The color on the orbs slightly fades away as something shifts in the wings ’veins. Its wings, along with the soft breeze, swiftly flap and lift its body up. The butterfly's legs twitch, and it leaves the ledge. Its colorful body moves on top of the air wherein its vibrant colors grow more intense, and then it departs from my view. In the end, the butterfly leaves nothing to see but the slightly vibrating ledge, so I return to my work.