Dr. Tarrec Saw One Third

My friend, Dr. Tarrec, is a strange old man. Just how old he is, I don’t know. From the things he’s said it sounds like he is, or that he thinks that he is, several hundred years old.  He sends me things-letters and books, sometimes scraps of his writing scribbled on the back of receipts.  He sent me the following, recorded on a microcassette tape.  It took me a while to find the appropriate equipment to play it, but I have finally been able to transcribe it.

***

I saw one third of the earth, the pawn shops, dance halls, and disco-dives, one third of the cheap night clubs and anarchist reading rooms swallowed up in that conflagration.  We sat perched in the alleyway and watched the ravens and the crows.

I saw one third of the trees destroyed. There is no more waiting.  The monoculture is established. Apple, cherry, orange, and lemon, all gone; Ginkgo, willow, pine, and cypress-they are no more.

I saw one third of the sea turned to blood: femoral arterial bleeding from the wound of the world, from the hollow center of the earth. 

I saw one third of sea monsters of the deep dying inside the dark, silenced before they could roar, snuffed out before they could speak. What ancient language would have rolled upon their tongues? What mysteries?

I saw one third of the ships upon the sea sunk and flushed away, spiraling down into the dark abyss.

I saw one third of the rivers and the streams contaminated with wormwood poison, with Chernobyl absinthe, filling underground aquifers.  I saw angels in the corner, helpless, and children in their beds.  I saw comets in the sky and strange lights upon the earth.  It took time for my eyes to readjust to the darkness.

I saw one third of the sunlight darkened.  I saw my daughter in the street, but she could not see me.

I saw one third of the stars and moon light fail.  This is why the killer hides in shadows, standing there, waiting as children pass.  He smokes a cigarette and throws the butt aside. It fizzles in the mud.

I saw one third of the day without light. We venture out for the sake of the children, but we find nothing.  They are missing.  Our light is gone.

I saw one third of the night fleeting, gone. Where are the missing case files?  It’s getting late, and there will never be another night like this, so full of desperate dreams, and rope, and wire.

I saw one third of mankind killed in the sixth trumpet war.  The devil appears in person, like a shadow stretching in shifting light. There are 1,000 days remaining.