‘Alien’
Vanguard Gallery
“One day I had high fever. I showered and went to bed early hoping to get better the next day. Experience taught me if I covered my body tightly with comforters, I could probably sweat the fever off, although I also remembered once in the hospital with persistent high fever, the doctor said this method was not good, and it would make the body temperature even higher. He advised taking showers to help keeping the temperature from rising. This time I did both methods. Every two hours I drank a cup of water, sweated in bed, went to the bathroom to urinate, took shower, and changed underwear. This procedure repeated about four times throughout the night; however, it didn’t interrupt my brain activities, which was hyperactive, obsessive, dark, impure, painful, and unstoppable.
I was in another world, characterized by grand ruins and wise people. For everyone inside, there was a task of upmost importance, almost religiously – to perfectly define “that thing.” At the beginning, around the first time I sweated in bed, almost nobody believed the task was possible. People whispered with doubt and complained. After I drank the second cup of water, people began to work on the definition, but without much luck succeeding. My underwear was soaked wet, I showered again. When I went back to bed, I could feel the bustling air among people. They defined it. Through many different terms, ways, lengths and individuals, they fulfilled the task. To me, it seemed the amount of words they used to define it was infinite. One word stacked on another, going high into the clouds. If an infinite amount of words were required to define “that thing,” I doubted the meaning of the task. People kept testing these words. They were so different, but they never failed. People even entertained themselves by actualizing these words, lives, lights, and objects. Beside all these, they showed me a pillar they claimed to be a perfect embodiment of “that thing” as an object. It was not very big, not as one would expect for something of such aptitude. It appeared to be made of lime, wood, and pigments. I recognized repeated structural patterns of squares on its surface, which seemed to make most sense why this pillar would also relate to infinity. Unfixed lime powder fell onto the ground every now and then.
In the morning my fever dropped a little. It felt like I went through a highly civilized hell to be reborn again. I tried to remember what “that thing” was that those people defined, but I could not think of it. At least I could not describe it with limited words or rational thoughts.” ———-Yi Xin Tong
