If Skies Would Weep

Once, there lived a people of lightness; their skin and their souls burned as bright as the colour in skies of sunshine. They bore a human resemblance in their body’s form but upon their backs grew pure, pearlescent wings, larger than their own bodies but as light as the air they lived in. Their feet, soft and free of markings, danced and walked upon the Clouds they took residence on. Innocence flooded their souls, creating them into beings so much lovelier than the humankind of the Earth beneath the cloudy skies.

Their thoughts were connected and yet, when they wished for privacy, they received it. They spent all their days dancing and spreading joy among the younger, but far less innocent, kind beneath them. The people of the Cloud’s emotions were interlaced with the people of the Earth’s; when humanity grieved, so did the Cloud dwellers; when humanity rejoiced, so did the Cloud dwellers.

Sometimes this was a burden upon the pure beings but mostly, it was a gift.

While their existence was monotonous and long, far longer than humanity’s, they appreciated every moment, spent every moment riding the whirlwind emotions that almost seemed to pour from the humans with an intense, but unspoken of, joy. For if there were no emotions, where would they be? Sitting on the Clouds in their perfect forms, longing for something they could not name.

They were there, this airy population, up above the human world, because, quite simply, emotions were powerful, destructive things. The Cloud dwellers, in all their innocence, absorbed the emotions from the humans when they became too much. Grief, happiness, anger, love…All of these, and more, were felt second-hand by the people of the Clouds. Humans continued to live on their emotions, without realising that when they started to feel exhausted, it was because the emotions were too much and the guardians above were draining them away slowly.

It was a system that had lived for many years, many centuries, that the Cloud dwellers forgot any existence from before the humans had existed. They forgot how they came to be. They forgot how much they relied on humans.

But one day, everything changed.

As the Cloud dwellers gazed upon the Earth, they saw, for days and months and maybe years, as it grew barren and dry. The Earth people’s numbers fell as they collapsed in great thirst, a feeling none of the Cloud dwellers were forced to experience first-hand, for they had no need for water. They watched as the deserts grew, plants died, rain stopped falling. It was a world-wide drought, lasting for years and years, causing the people so much pain.

When the Earth grew so dry, the ground cracked and the grass was no more, everything fell apart. It seemed as if each human were to fend for themselves, sometimes in small groups, but never as united as they were when money ruled. War broke out for water and so many more died because of it. The pure beings watched in horror as weapons brought more people down to their knees, as torture was carried out without regret, as adults fought like children but with hideous ways.

Eventually, a side won, the side that grew selfish with need; this side built a community that only the people they wanted could reside in. The people who were healthy, who were able to have children, who were heterosexual, who had no objection to rules or causing others pain. They had some water but of course there was a cost: The people inside this community payed with food or building shelters or possessions that had suddenly become precious or even their children, who were given up to be married off and used.

The other people were left in the desert of a land to die in thirst, or find the other communities spread amongst the desert, the ones that took in everyone despite it hurting their water supplies. Patrols guarded the community with selected people to kill others who tried desperately to get in for the needed water. The people outside this community began to dig under the earth or find mountains with springs, but water was rare and the heat almost unbearable. The Cloud dwellers could barely stand the grief and pain.

And so, the people of the Clouds began to despair. This emotion, this despair, was the only first-hand emotion they had ever really experienced, other than love, which was the emotion that kept them light. And despair weighted them.

Suddenly, it was all they could do to stay on their Clouds, on the heavens they had resided on since the beginning of time. The Clouds they stood upon were too wispy, not solid enough for the new weight. Their despair caused most of the younger ones to plunge straight through the wisps of white, down to their deaths, for their wings were broken also with despair. The elders wept with grief for their broken loved ones, disintegrating before they could endure the years-long Fall. And then, more Fell. It brought even more despair, heavy on their shoulders, breaking their wings, splintering them.

Hopelessness was present too now, as the Cloud dwellers wandered around with heavy, broken wings, and the young ones feared their almost-inevitable Fall. Soon, there were only babies left, the stronger ones, and the elders. Only a few bore unbroken wings and even less still glowed from within with joy – the babies mostly. Pain stabbed through both the no longer pure beings above the world and the racked with thirst ones down below. Both worlds crumbled, barely holding on.

It seemed as if all hope was gone; all that was left was the wait for the unavoidable destruction of everything they’d ever known. Tears were not uncommon at first but then they started walking around, dry-eyed, despairing but somehow empty at the same time.

Only the elders were the ones who kept their faces indifferent, though still sunken in despair. And Navon, who was the elder with the burden of naming the newborns, was the only one who looked after the babies anymore, for no one else could bring themselves to raise them for death. And so, it was Navon who watched in amazement one day as the Clouds gave birth yet again…