November / December 2012 Lite Challenge: City of Okktor
Okay, first I thought of my kids' rhyme:
Roses are BLACK,
Violets are BLACK,
Everything is BLAAACK,
'Cause I'm BLIIIIIND...
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Black.gif
But then a map of that garden makes pretty bland fare. Okay fuggetaboutit with the
mapword Black.
Then there's Broken. Well, same exquisite .gif serves to illustrate a broken CRT
displaying a view of the Notorious Broken Coast.
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Black.gif
Oh-Kaaaaay, that lacks something. Contrast, maybe. Lousy palette. The mountain
symbols stink and I don't like the way I did the wave lines. Yuck.
That leaves "eight" . I suppose I can do something with Eight. Octo, 8, ocho,
huit, okto, VIII, eight, eight, eight... Hmmmmmmmmm.
The City of Okktor
Eight ways to reach the city on high,
Eight routes get there, amid all the sky.
First men came on burro back,
The switchback trail laboriously hacked.
Miners then honeycombed the peak,
Their tunnels below still a path to seek.
Of late a road reaches there if you
Use a goatlike truck or car, tis true.
The ladderrack rails of the Skybound Track
In summer have trains with belching stack.
The purists disdain that smoke-shrouded way,
But how else to get from Beitong in a day?
The back of the mount where the iron rungs run?
An ascent of a week, and none of it fun.
On the rare windless day, yes a zep can still dock
To the Tower of Shree, but the wrecks below mock.
Those winds and the dust of the westernmost plain
At the sunset, betimes, make The Shadow-Road seen,
As the peaks of far Nizor cast their long streaks of shade
For the spirits of pilgrims to return, ere they fade.
The eighth, too, is windborne, when the Willadoo blows,
Then the flowers of graves from the towns far below,
Dust a final display of color atop snow.
Eight ways to arrive - so you asked, now you know.
Yessssss, there's a map in that. Story enough for a map, map enough for a story.
