I see it clearly upon her neck, claws
clutching at Obelia's throat...
... and Vanessa exhausted - unknowing!
 
 
 

'twas not a thing in reality,  but a pain, a pang, a fear...  and the force of stress that  raises it now.	Lightscape Editor's note: We understand that Larry had been trying to give up smoking during Vanessa's pregnancy!
For had I not, in all these months, fought it invisibly for the sake of my daughter's future.

 

I gathered strength and purpose,  became a calm and airless void  within an ETNA gasp of polluntant death...  I worked quietly,  almost blindly in the smoke,  to secure my new-born child.  I carried, dragged, and stumbled with my beloveds down the mountain towards the sea, away from the larva flows and the choking fumes...

 
 

Now and then the smoke would break for a moment and I could see from my vantage point on the ridge, the larva - engulfing houses further down the slopes. A red, oozing, river - which one day will be solid rock - stole back man's constructions and froze them into the earth.

 

It was only when we reached the sea  and clean air... when I lay them both down... that I first saw Obelia, my darling child, clearly - and realised there was something tragically wrong...