Villia

by J.R. Blackwell
October 29th, 2005

Outside the dome, the earth was sealed with cement; the towers of processed plastic, retrieved from the treasure chests of ancient dumps, grew, broke and branched like mad metal trees. The glimmering city sang in a constant low thrum, tiny machines building additions, remodeling for the new and the better, ever evolving, unfinished. The man made cold swept over the hard city, sending citizens running for manufactured warmth and longing for a past that never was.

Inside the dome, the wild Villia embraced herself under thousands of watching eyes who longed for her natural paradise. The constructed environment bore her food and cradled her in eternal summer. Villia thrilled before her invisible admirers, stretched herself in the gaze of the gods of her wide Eden. On neon screens she, natural goddess, worshipped by the clicking of tiny insecticide cameras, smiled at a field of tiny yellow flowers, imagining them as her followers, faces rising, bright and delicate.