The Internatron

Just Enough ( Black Rain )

Licorice through the veins of the unknown god. The unknown god. It was like a summer rain to the heart of snow and ice. The unknown god sat and melted away. Licorice rain melting the voices of all the soft sizzling flowers.

Black rain. Wretched cursed rain.

Dark rolling clouds dumped foul smelling garbage over the land like the black plastic that could be found under the soul of this rotting earth.

It was better when it rained. The earth could sizzle and let out its sigh of disappointment. The rain forced the weaker plants under the ground - sizzling and burning as they pulled back down into the solid hard cocoon of chitinous mass that surrounded the base of their stem.

Some days it was hard to tell a plant from an insect. The insects crawled so frequently over the land. When it rained… it fell quiet. Quiet and sizzling.

Sizzling. There were few animals that would forage for food in the black sizzle.

Black rain. Wretched cursed rain.

Some animals knew the insects would stop. Pull in there legs and sit - waiting for the rain to stop. They ate over and over and over and over through the sizzle of rain smattering against thick hide.

What creatures lived out in this wasteland. The rain fell with a progressive sense of equality. Burning and sizzling in each drop. Licorice burning through the veins of an unknown god. Burning - Melted the snow and the water and the leaves away - before i was born.

We used to be told about the above ground - like it was some kind of paradise. Color beyond that of black and grey and blue and deep red. Color beyond that of orange and purple and white.

Color like the eyes of the oracle. Colors like blue and green.

The oracle had one of each. Blue and Green. The faded pictures of the old learning books had these colors too. Had all of the colors.

What we would do for color.

I always came out into the black rain. Licorice root sizzling against my tongue. Rain sizzling against the ground - sizzling against my hide. Sizzling against the dead beast - trapped with it’s head in a beetle hole. A beetle hole that clamps shut with locking magnetic force.

It was my job to carve the beast into hide. The meat was poison. The Skin was durable - protective - pliable - proof against the burning licorice that flowed through the unknown god. The rain crashed into it and rolled away - black obsidian beads.

It didn’t always rain. Just mostly. Just when the moon was out. Just when we were hungry and starving for roots, beetle flesh, moisture.

Long ago someone had understood that the water that pooled on the roof of the caverns wouldn’t twist the stomach into a knot. It wouldn’t make the piss burn or our shit glow like a fire coal in our bowels. Roof water changed something in the dark pools of rain that gathered under the soil.

The roots could change it too. Long ago someone had understood that the dark thick burning licorice root could transform the rain into thick ropey stems.. and soft white fleshy cores.

We ate roots and we ate beetle flesh. We sucked water off the tops of the cave and caught it
in the hides of the beast.

The beast that lay before me.

I needed to take off it’s skin while the rain still came down. The secret was to split it in the right spot - flip the heavy body and let the rain into the wound. Let the rain sizzle. Wretched burning smell and then the hide would start to curl back from the bones of the creature. I used a bone knife to slip the hide off of the beast. Bone knife.. sizzling rain - my arms worked smooth with practice and care. My arms and hands covered in grey black leathers. This beast served us life - We served it only death.

It was a careful understanding.