I Dream of Death

I died into a bed of a small cabin. When I wake I already know what has happened to me. The cell is reminiscent of changing rooms in swimming pool facilities; the walls are bare with pale colours. I can come up with no expression for their warm hues. I'm not familiar with the capacity of this place − it seems I haven't been dead for a while. I look down to my body and there is no corporal confusion or any other post-traumatic effects that bodies are supposed to endure after a physiological change. This leads me to believe that the laws of nature my reasoning got to instinctively know are now gone.

I get up and go to the door, but my reflection in its mirroring surface stops me. Is this how I looked like before I died? I don't recognise myself, and yet I remember my former life so clearly. Shrugging, I open the door. The corridor outside reveals what seem to be cabins like the one I died into. Their entrances are reflective on the front, too. There is someone waiting for me outside and I notice the same face that looked back at me from the mirror. I stare at myself silently, knowing inexplicably that I am here to guide myself, according to the principles that shape this place into order. So I turn back to the entrance in order to look at myself again, to shake off the feeling of irrationality. I look a bit chubby and ageing.

Paranimalia: Deer Witch

If it wasn't obvious by now: I love writing. This pleasure exceeds the pages of Asylum for Thoughts. One of my ongoing writing projects is entitled Paranimalia. As I see it now, it will contain short stories, all of which tell tales by forging motives of animals and mythological creatures into the fabric of the wording, but with a specific twist each. The animals will never be directly depicted as They are usually imagined. Rather, Their symbols are to be used as stepping stones for hopefully enjoyable plots.

Until recently, I thought of these series as a project only to be publicized once it is finished. I changed my mind. In order to one day finish the whole collection, I'm proceeding in smaller steps. A neat element to this approach is that I can also tell the story of each story (i.e. what inspired me, and how the writing evolved until its ripeness). These descriptions will follow after each of the texts.

Dear Reader, I present You the first narrative of Paranimalia I penned, the: Deer Witch.