The Tale of the Man and the Sun

I actually wrote this several months ago but never posted it. I didn't think it meant anything. I saved it but didn't re-read it until recently. I'm posting it now because it has some significance to me now. Hopefully there are others who can see something in it as well. Otherwise, enjoy it for what it is- a story!

The Tale of the Man and the Sun

There once was a man who lived in the Land of the Dawn. Every morning as he awoke, the sky would already be shading from grey to purple and then to bright orange. He would watch as the Sun crawled over the distant hills and into the sky and as he did so he would be filled with the hope and promise that comes with each new day. The Sun would travel its path upward, but before it reached its zenith, the man would fall into a blissful slumber; this was part of the magic of the Land of the Dawn. The man never knew darkness or the night sky.

Every morning, also, the man would be awoken by the three-note trill of the Morning Bird. The Morning Bird would sit outside the man’s window and its song would be carried over the land and beyond the distant hills, where it would call the Sun up from the ground and into the sky. The Morning Bird was an ancient and magical creature, the man knew, but he never understood the bird. He would merely rise to its call and take in the those pregnant moments at the start of the day. The Sun, the Bird, and the light over the hills were all the man knew of life.

One morning, however, the man awoke to a new song. It was still a three-note trill, but it was different from the song he had heard every other day of his life. The man rushed to his window and saw that there was indeed a new bird perched in the tree outside his window. This new bird’s call reached out of the distant hills as well, and called the Sun upward. The man watched as the great orb rose above the hills. Afterward he dressed quickly and approached the new bird.

“Who are you?” asked the man. “Where is the Morning Bird?”

“I am the Morning Bird,” was the creature’s reply.

“There was another, though,” said the man, confused. “Where has it gone?”

“That other bird was old and frail. He has passed into Night, and there he must stay. I have come to take his place.”

The man was more confused than ever now. Furrowing his brow he asked, “Night? What is this?”

“Why, Night is where the Sun goes after the day is done.”

At this man laughed. He knew that this new Morning Bird must be a trickster or a fool. “Nobody knows where the Sun goes!” he cried.

The Morning Bird, tired of explaining everything to the ignorant man, simply said, “There is much of this world you do not know,” and flew away.

This troubled the man, and it stayed with him for several days. He would watch every Sunrise, just as before, and would be filled with all of the hope that they contained. But the Bird’s words echoed inside his mind, and soon the hope of each new day was not enough. It was blind hope, hope unfulfilled. He had to know if there was more. After many days he approached the Bird again.

“I would like to know where the Sun goes,” he told the Bird.

“Then you must follow the Sun on its westward journey. It will be a guide across the lands. But be warned,” said the Morning Bird, “the lands beyond your own are very different.”

The man noted the Bird’s warning but ran to pack his things. The next morning, as the Sun crested over the distant hills, the man was filled with a new kind of hope. This hope was not blind but focused on the task ahead. Today, he told himself, he would follow the Sun.

The Sun rose ever higher in the morning sky, and soon was as high as the man had ever seen it. Drawing a deep breath, he took one last look at the distant hills before turning and heading west. The man traveled for hours and was amazed how the Sun seemed to shrink as it crossed the sky. His shadow, too, was shrinking, as if being pulled closer to his feet. Soon his shadow was nothing more than a dot beneath him and the Sun was beating down harshly upon him. He did not like this burning, relentless Sun. How could this be the same Sun that caressed him in the Land of the Dawn?

The man came upon a small village whose residents were taking shelter under their patios and inside their houses. The man, sweating heavily and feeling his skin begin to burn, called to one of the people under the patios. “Pardon me, but may I sit in the shade with you until the Sun passes?”

One of the men under the patios beckoned him over. “Come, get out of the heat! Where are you from, stranger?”

“Thank you. I’m from the Land of the Dawn,” he explained.

“The Land of the Dawn? Where is this? I’ve never heard of it.”

“It’s far east of here,” the man explained. “It’s where the Sun rises from behind the hills.”

His new companion looked at him for a moment in disbelief, and finally let out a great big laugh.

“Oh, stranger, you must have been in the heat for longer than I thought!”

“What do you mean?” asked the man.

“Illusions of the Sun rising from the ground . . . Listen, my poor friend, the Sun does not rise from the ground. It sits high above us forever, blasting down its heat. We in the Land of Noon must all do our best to avoid it and stay cool. That is simply the way life is.”

Now it was the man’s turn to look upon his companion disbelievingly. “No no,” he insisted, “I’m afraid you’re wrong. Before the Sun arrives here, it rises from the hills at the Dawn. Its rays warm us and give us hope- it’s not a thing to be avoided.”

“You still sound mad, my odd friend. Every day I have lived, the Sun has poured itself on us from on high. This is all I have ever known the be true.”

The man was about to argue again, but then recalled the words of the Morning Bird. He said to the man from the Land of Noon, “There is much of this world you do not know.”

The man noticed that the Sun was indeed continuing on its westward journey. He bid his new friend, who still thought him crazy or ill, goodbye. The heat persisted after Noon, but the Sun fell even further down toward the ground. It was the strangest thing the man had ever seen, watching the Sun fall downward instead of rising higher. The sky even began to change color, from bright blue to moody purples mixed with orange. Eventually, the man came upon more people; these were the inhabitants of Evening.

The mood in this town was still, the man noted. Not energetic and hopeful as in his own Land of the Dawn, nor was it oppressed and stagnant like the Land of Noon, and the he was glad to see that the people did not avoid the Sun. Here, the people were gathered quietly on a hillside, watching silently as the Sun sank further and faster toward the Earth. They all sat staring into the beautiful colors swirling in the sky, as if they were all sharing the same, deep thought.

The man took a place next to an old woman. He, too, stared into the sky, for it was the most beautiful pageant he had ever seen. The Sun had turned to a deep orange, as it looked in the morning, but here it was swirled by layers and layers of wispy, dark-hued clouds. Orange and blue and purple mixed like a dream.

He leaned over and whispered to the woman, “What’s this we’re watching?”

“Why,” she whispered back, “this is the Sunset. How can you not know that?”

“I’m not from here,” the man explained. “I’m from the Land of the Dawn.”

“The Land of the Dawn?” she asked. The whole time she spoke she never took here eyes of the sky.

The man nodded, knowing that this pensive, wise old woman would not laugh at him as the man in the Land of Noon had. “Yes, where the Sun rises from the hills. I’ve followed it here, through the Land of Noon where it sits high up sending down scorching heat.”

At this the woman took a moment to look away from the Sunset, but only a moment. She said, “There are no such places, young man. The Sun sinks softly into the Earth, here at Evening. Life here is about reflection and watching the end of the light. That is all there is.”

The sun was sinking even faster now. The peaks of the distant hills- hills that mirrored his own back home- were outlined against the great orange orb. The light was dying quickly, and as it did so the man whispered to the woman, “There is much of this world you do not know.” The Sun sank further, until it was a sliver over the horizon. Then as its final rays reached out and caressed the man’s face, the Sun disappeared completely.

The man looked about him and saw that everyone on the hillside, the inhabitants of Evening, had fallen into a deep sleep, as he had done in his own land when the Sun passed him by. That was the spell of this land, and he was not a part of it.

He was suddenly gripped by a great fear. He had wanted to follow the Sun, but never imagined that it was disappear completely! The man suddenly remembered that there was another land, the land of which the Morning Bird had spoken. The man would have to go the Land of Night. There he would again take up his journey, following the Sun.

Fearing the darkness that had enveloped him at the Sun’s setting, the man sprinted westward. His chest hurt as he drew in air, which grew colder and colder. He crossed the hills the Sun had fallen behind, but instead of finding the great orb waiting for him, came upon something quite different.

Everything was still dark and the air was still very cool, and there was no Sun. Instead, a billion tiny points of light were scattered across and ink-black sky. The sight overwhelmed the man and he fell to his knees. There must have been an infinity of tiny dots above him. They didn’t move, as the Sun did, but instead were stationary, twinkling down like diamonds on black velvet.

Slowly, the man gathered himself and stood up again. This, then, was the Land of Night. No Sun, only a billion tiny replicas. The man tried to look around for someone to talk to, but the inhabitants of this land did not make themselves easily seen. They slinked around in the shadows silently.

Listening carefully, the man heard something vaguely familiar. Three notes, faintly calling into the Night. They were weaker and sadder than he remembered, but these were indeed the notes of the Morning Bird that had so recently been replaced. The man ran to the Bird, who was perched on dark and gnarled tree.

“My friend! My friend!” called the man, excited to have found a familiar face in this strange and frightening land.

The Bird lifted its head weakly. “You? It can’t be! From the Dawn?”

“Yes,” said the man. “I’ve followed the Sun to find out where it goes.”

“You won’t find it here, I’m afraid. I’ve been calling it since I got here, but instead there are only Stars.”

“Stars? The dots in the sky?”

The Bird nodded. “They glow weakly, and give no warmth.”

“Where has the Sun gone?”

“I don’t know. I doubt we’ll ever see it again.”

“No,” said the man, “that can’t be right. The Sun will come again.”

“There is no hope of such things here,” explained the Bird. “We here walk in darkness forever.”

The Bird suddenly looked fiercely at the man, “You must go! Quickly! Go back the way you came!”

“No,” shouted the man, “there’s nothing back there. I will go forward! I will find the Sun!” With that he began to run again, desperate to find those bright rays of light he had always known. The Stars seemed to pass him in a blur, offering neither guidance nor hope. Instead they twinkled distantly, as if the man did not matter to them.

The man ran into the darkness but found only more darkness. He ran up and down hills but at the crest of each one there was only more ink-black sky and Stars. Finally he passed the hills and was running across a flat plain. Still, there was only Night.

The man collapsed in a heap in the middle of the field. He looked back up toward the sky and cried openly, for he had lost any hope of seeing the Sun again. His crying turned into deep sobs. Over the sobs, though, there was another sound.

A note.

Another note.

A third note.

All called across the field, toward the hills the man had just crossed. The man rose instantly. From the distance the trill rang out again: the call of the Morning Bird. A feeling rose up inside the man, a feeling he had not ever thought he would feel again: hope. His hope only increased as the sky turned from black to murky grey. The call continued, and the grey shaded into purple and then strips of orange appeared above the hills.

And then it happened: the Sun rose again, as the man had seen it a million times before, but now it was different. The light stretched over the hills and warmed the man’s tear-stained cheeks. It wrapped around him like a blanket and the air he drew now was warm and refreshing. He had never seen a Dawn like this.

When the Sun was well over the hills (the man made sure of this, for he was afraid it might fall back down behind them as it had done in Evening) he walked back toward his home, where the Morning Bird sat in its tree.

“I have seen where the Sun goes,” said the man.

The Bird’s eyes seemed to smile. “And?”

“All I have seen . . . it has only made the Dawn more beautiful.”