Reading: "The Azimuth Principle" from EVENFALL OF THE HELICAL (A.Glass 2022).

“She can't stay down a year!”

“Ms Elva, your daughter didn't do well last year, her grades were behind the other students and the classroom for this year, Grade Four has all ready been allocated. There isn't enough desks.”

Anina Elva, sitting quietly on a seat, watching her mother arguing with two teachers and the school principle to avoid that she redo the year which has just finished.

“No! She does the same year as every other student. You can't stop time! It's cruel to have her go back over that year. She will be the oldest in the class. It's so wrong. I refuse to allow it. She does the same year as everyone! OK!”

Anina sees her mother walking towards her in a hurried and angry manner, reaching out her right hand, to which she grasps, as they both leave the principal's office. She looks up at her mother's heedful look, that is of disapproval at the administration of the school to which her daughter attends.

“You are not repeating a year. No way!” She says, walking towards the exit.

As they walk out into the school yard, Cynthia Elva crouches down, holding Anina gently by her shoulders, staring into her eyes.

“Don't you worry about a thing, you'll be with all the other kids in the same class for the coming year. Have no fears my darling.”

Anina looks into her mother's eyes, studying her face.

“I don't fear anything,” she replies, placing her small hands around Cynthia's wrists, to which they feel cold. Cynthia smiles, yet feels a presence from her daughter. Aware of her past, before Anina was born.

“Come on, I'll buy you an ice cream.”

They both leave the school yard.

Anina sits in the middle of the classroom, staring at a cardboard box that the school administration gave her, as they refused to give her desk like all the other kids. On her left side, children are screaming and throwing paper at each other as are the other children on the right, who are doing the same. The class, for the first week of the school term is in chaos, with Anina calm and absolute. She looks up from the box, eyeing the teacher screaming at the children to settle down, to which the class continues its pandemonium.

Anina begins to draw two pyramid shapes, with the points facing towards each other in a horizontal way, revealing the space between, the sliver world, her world. As the teacher in a fit of anger, lifts up Anina's box and throws it across the room. Anina remains quite, looking up at the woman staring at her, as she continues to yell frantically at the class, the children sitting left and right, remain frenetic and unruly.

Hear the sound, that piecing sound. The noise, the engines of chaos, your chaos, your pathetic world coming undone. No one will save you. No gods, no masters. Nothing. You're all alone in the cosmos, all alone. And it is that sound, let it in. Let it destroy you. She recites to her self, without vocalizing the chant. Anina stares at the woman standing in front of the classroom, as she yells, pointing at the children be quite. Anina calmly looks to her left and then to right as the children in their frenzied action maintain the bedlam around her.

Yet, there is a stillness, as Anina begins to meditate.

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Reading:  "The Azimuth Principle" from EVENFALL OF THE HELICAL (A.Glass 2022)