What A Strange Time Is Alive, Among The Stars

I’ve always felt a strange connection to the stars, one that I have never fully understood. I used to believe that it was simply the night itself that appealed to me. There is something so incredibly compelling about it. It’s not the silence, necessarily, but the way that every breath is amplified; it’s not so much the darkness, but the way that the stars light it up. There is an unparalleled magic to them, to the way that they swirl and writhe and explode of their own accord. Although the moon will orbit for eternity and the stars will eventually fade into submission, it is the latter that I admire the most. I would rather die at the hands of my own power and light than live infinitely off of the nectar of somebody else’s.

1. “The magical time of childhood stood still, and the pulse of the living earth pressed its mystery into my living blood” (1.1).

Some nights the sky wept stars that quickly floated and disappeared into the darkness before our wishes could meet them. Under these stars and sky I used to hear stories, but now it seemed as if it was the sky that was telling us a story as its stars fell, violently colliding with each other. The moon hid behind clouds to avoid seeing what was happening” (Beah 80).

Lee’s writing is littered with descriptive and flowery visuals that truly capture both the environment and his emotions. In one such case, he recalls an evening where he “[stared] at the brightest star, viewing it not so much on this night as a beacon, something [he] wanted to believe would lead [he] out of this dark tunnel, but instead as a place [he’d] rather be” (155). His juvenile wistfulness is tangible in the words and the reader can almost feel the chill of the night air. He continues, wishing to be “anywhere but here…[wishing to have] been born anywhere but here.” (155). His yearning twists the heart with sympathy for his lonesome and pitiable plight. This moment is but a minute fraction of the incredibly intimate tale that Lee

He knows the impending death. He knows his name will be omitted

Looking back out of the small window, I catch a final glimpse of corn fields and lonely railroad crossings before they dip below the horizon. For my first time on a plane, the excitement of adventure meets me as I depart from the comfort of home and enter a world unknown outside of Nebraska. Seeing the world in God’s view as the landscape evolves below, I fall in love with flying. Looking down from 30,000 feet and seeing earth on such a vast scale, I realize how much there is to discover.

I had woken up extra early that morning to watch it all happen. To watch part of my life that had been ever so dominant disappear in a small gold 96’ Saturn. I watched it carefully, not thinking that these few moments would be our last, but that they would be the last that we were in some way equal.

As she hastily made her way through the long-winded hallway, the realisation of her husband being away at war suddenly hit her. The delight evident on her face swiftly turned into an expression of extreme woe. Heartbroken by the fact that he was missing this major milestone, her eyes were a waterfall, dripped with salty tears down her

The loss of his humanity, faith, and identity seemed to be his greatest loss. Because Death is not just physical, but figurative in Night,

Memories of the night before became a vivid memory in the recesses of his dimly lit mind, underneath the sunlight's intruding yet blissful gaze and the sensation of silk against his bare skin felt like a euphoria, a river of midnight encased his slender figure and with the scrunch of his refined nose and furrowed knit of his thin eyebrows, he rose from his slumber. Delicate fingertips leisurely danced across the silken sheets which lost its assuaging warmth only to discern that he was gone, Padding through the spacious house far too big for two alone to fill, and too much of a burden for one to find comfort in. To see his lover, clad in a suit that managed to take his breath away immediately

He waited until the night’s 11th hour. By now the Princess rested in the highest tower of the castle, locked away from the dangerous world, yet so oblivious to the dangers that which fated the rest of her life. Silently the peasant journeyed outside, where he stopped at the wall of the tower where she lay. He watched her in the darkness from below, lifting his face to her, letting the light rest on his every surface of darkness. The night was cloudless. The winds wailed between the motionless oak trees as its thin branches clawed out, ever so slightly disturbing the leaves with its hostile screeches. Not the thick moss of the trees nor the damp leaves squirming in his toes could distract the peasant from so enticing a scent. All that encircled him was the sweetness of lavender and rosewood, filling his entire being as he sunk into the grass, like sand washed over by the water, with every breeze passing

The stars are bright and radiant-- their numbers are vast beyond all imagination. They shine in the dark sky, like billions of little lights hanging from nonexistent threads. It is a reality that not many people stop to admire. In the city people sink down into their couches at night and drift away, eventually, to the slumber that most people crave. But the stars, shining endlessly, are there night after night, in the rain and even in the snow. If you just stop for a moment, on a night with no clouds, and look up, you will see this magnificent

is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and

“Hello” I shout. “Anybody there” I yell into the darkness. My voice echoes far into the darkness of the world beyond. I don’t know where I am, and I don’t know who I am. Each day I sit here calling out into the dark hoping to see the light. I am trapped. I travel each and every hour searching for light or a means to escape this perilous abyss. I wait for the light to reappear each day, small slivers of light at first. But, eventually the bright gleaming rays of light pierce the abyss.

One character in the novel Station Eleven, by Emily St. John Mandel, has wrapped his head around the idea that there is more to the world than what’s in front of our faces. “‘After