Days of brass and sunlight, and the chrysanthemum face
with eyes of gold.

He would sit there in the light,
without moving, sometimes for
years... Then, when he spoke, it
was of small details, trivial visions.
One could often think on one such chord for an age,
live an ordinary life of bees and stairs and
children, and realize one pale autumn morning
what meaning was hidden in that
handful of words...

We would talk there, in the sunlight,
of small things, every phrase he spoke
being a little truth.
If you took each of these, and fit
them together, and angled them
to the light, so, they would form
a large truth...
or merely a collection of small ones.

He lived in Peru, long ago.
Many of them did -- the old ones settled to rest.
They liked the foothills of
the mountains, where the
air was mellowed, and the feet of the giants
were full of caves which held the collected
sunlight of centuries, released in the warm,
dust-filled summer nights. His scales caught
and reflected the golden light, turning black metal
to brass, and brass to gold...

Days of warmth and stillness, and the
rumble which filled the corners and
teased into every crack which is the
laughter of a dragon... I remember.

Dust and truth, with the motes which hung in the sunlight
like gold floating in oil, amber flecks in the deeper brown
and black, the click of claws on stone. Twin pools of
molten brass, unblinking, holding wisdom
behind polished rims. Holding souls, and
the depth of time, and the dust and sunlight
of an age long forgotten.

Dragons are rare these days,
with their slow habits and
quick thoughts, their eyes full of fire and time.
Still a few drowse in Peru, in mountain
caves full of sunlight. Still a few send
laughter wandering the cracks and corners
of the stones, making the mountains
rumble. Still a few dream of dust and warmth and stillness,
of days of brass and sunlight, and of the small
truths which are so much more important than
the large ones.

A memory of a memory, perhaps, but the
dragons know. Silence, and light, and gold.
Truth.