In the Mouth of the River of Death

photo originally posted by Yanec


March 22, 2000
Cotonou, Benin

The air hung like a thick blanket over the city, slowing down everything and everyone until time itself labored from second to second. The heavy atmosphere caught in the lungs, making even the simplest of tasks laborious and difficult. One questioned the very need to breathe, as even that became strained and exhausting in the tepid air.

Above the concrete maze, the air seemed to dance and ripple to an unheard song, as if taunting the denizens who wallowed in laziness below, and flaunting its own freedom. The sun seemed to betray its own motives as it twisted and turned the air into a masterful work of invisible art, done only for the torture of the many pairs of hollow eyes that occasionally glanced skyward in hopes of finding relief and shelter from a misguided cloud. Not even the clouds questioned the stern gaze of the sun this day, and they all found folly elsewhere, departing from the angry gaze, like so many children fleeing the tirade of a cross mother.

The eyes that hopefully glanced upward soon drew themselves back to the steaming ground, as sweat made its stinging welcome into those peering eyes. It was as if the air, the thick, hot air, had become a second skin, laying heavy upon humanity. All are soon drenched and thoughts of solace, comfort and sleep drip away as beads of sweat. For there is no sleep this night, as even sleep becomes a hard and strenuous labor amidst the torrent of the sun's coarse waves. Choking life from every pore, the sun has left me defeated.