Firewhirl

On my way from the Cable Factory to Meilahti, I’m biking between the cemetary and the sea.
Those deceased over there, a huge stone wall keeping us apart.
It is midnight.

For some reason I have to turn around. Something strange is bothering me.
I turn to Hietaniemi street and back to the blocks of flats.

There’s no one here. It is too silent. I may have been drinking too much. My ears are broken. 126-133 dB of a tender feeling.
I tried to play like a firewhirl. Not successfully, anyway.
I cannot hear. I can see, although, with a little sway everywhere.
No one here.

By chance, I had been reading stories by Ray Bradbury the same day,
Pillar of Fire, for instance.
I stop in the crossing by Mechelin street and look towards
the gas station Esso.
Still no one there.
I lose my breath, I think I am William Lantry.
I cannot see the stars, otherwise I’d calculate what year it is.
I suppose it is 1999.

I turn back to Hietaniemi. My fantasy must have played a trick with me. My breath flows again, I turn in the crossing, where Arkadia street meets the two other ones.
I throw a glance towards the Crematory. I lose control of my bike.
There is a black car in front of the open doors, and figures in black robes bearing oblong black boxes.
This is all I can see before the street rises up in front of me,
when falling I hit my head on something.
Flames are rising from the Crematory twin towers,
not one pillar of fire, but two of them, and black smoke.
It is 00.06 o’clock, a little past,
And I have lost my consciousness.
I’m woken up by a strange smell, someone bending over me.
Black robe, hood over head. Quite a pale face.
“Et in Arcadia ego…” Even the voice is like from a grave.
The last thought, I suppose:
A spelling mistake, misinterpretation, that’s what this whole life has been.