String Days

String days have fooled us

and through their string hours

we dangle alone

bodies tangled

memories knotted

as we sway from the day

to a string night of bone

What sort and span of a string is needed to render anyone ordinary steadfastly restrained?

They started to fall down on us in every city and town around the world, seeking to cuff the members of every one of us, both hands to both feet, using their pre-set procedure. They were made from an unknown material and around six feet long. There was no way to release ourselves from their unbreakable restraining, or avoid them as they crawled through any opening. And when most of us got cuffed, it became clear that we were going to lose our lives to the strings.

Strings days were upon us, dimming the light even before the night crept in, hour after hour towards the fast-tracking end; a plague to put all past pandemics to shame; a holocaust ― not the Holocaust ― of everyone human. All other animals were spared, some of them devouring us while we still breathed, except for the cats ― I hope they rule next ― who asphyxiated us before the feast. They seemed to like our meat, especially the dogs that masticated every bone, releasing the little that was left of us from the strings’ clasps. What did remain of us? Hair, teeth, nails, and the robust temporal bone.

Some of us were fortunate, but we were not numerous enough for the survival of the species. Homo sapiens had overstayed their natural welcome and should have become extinct a long time ago. Our heinous crimes had finally caught up with us. But where did the strings come from? No one knew. There were a few theories, however. Punishment from a pissed-off God satisfied most of the dimwitted. An appropriation of our planet by an alien entity, or a sentence/punishment by such an entity, was seen as a plausible explanation by most of the bright minds. Some conspiracy theory enthusiasts considered the strings to be an unsuccessful or successful Earth-concocted scheme to curb our numbers. Yet another faction of Homo sapiens saw the strings as a natural response to our virulent evolution.

While I wished that the latter could be true, I had to side with the bright minds. I did not necessarily have a canny brain, but quickly rejecting the first and last theories as the least plausible, I had to cherry-pick between the middle two: them versus us.

Them and us

and after that we’re surely sentenced to be pus

You and me

nobody really knows if it was meant to be

Having lost all means of long-distance communications, we could not find out if we were the last ones to remain alive. Doubt endured like ignorance. Still, any small pockets of us dwindled as time marched on, with all odds loaded against us like the certainty of the excruciating pain that accompanies a kidney stone.

...

A stringer of strings I am, a stringer of strings.

“A stringer of strings?”

A stringer of strings. The two ends of strings I tie, and a string through them I insert.

“A stringer of strings.”

A stringer of strings.

“And what may the point of it be?”

Perfection.

“Perfection?”

Perfection. Circles of string held together they are by a circle of string.

“And that represents perfection?”

Naturally.

“There is nothing natural about it.”

Look what happened to humanity during the string days.

...

What is as stringent as a string?

A rope around somebody’s neck?

A strap before the needle breaks?

Restraints for a non-fitting act?

A belt after a childish prank?

Anyone on a string can choke.

It is even called a death wring.

And one of them looked like—I swear—

A heart-shaped locket on a chain.