I am a seller, said the Ice Girl

Greetings,

As dawn light savored green jungles along rivers a young Banlung woman-mother, one of many, cut ice. She sawed ice into manageable chunks as glistening elements dripped their moisture into delicious red dust. Red dust is stirred by countless women sawing and sweeping in front of their red dust covered wooden shuttered doors. Up and down the red dusty street.

Ice slides into blue plastic bags. Four foot long blocks of ice are loaded on the backs of antique battered black and red motorcycles driven by delivery boys wearing dusty baseball caps with glittering golden stars. Women in front of their shops open large orange plastic boxes to hold fresh clear frozen ice. 

Ice lives and dies every morning in a red dusty paradise. Sun streaks water. Ice cries.

After school the mother's daughter, 12, saws ice. A man sees her. What are you doing? he asked. She smiled. She is happy. I am a seller, she said. Her English is clear, distinct and filled with confidence. She bags a block of ice and hands it to a cycle man. He hands her crumbled red dusty notes.

She saws ice in afternoon heat. You are a good seller, said the man. Yes, I am, said the girl. I greet the buyer and sell, I cut, I bag, I talk, I sell. Ice is moving.

See you later, she sang playing her saw through crystals inside red dust. 

Metta.

Iceye

Greetings,

I asked for a Vietnamese iced coffee in an alley off a main street filled with jolly plastic Santa Claus armies and tinsel. Tis the season.

The young girl opened a Styrofoam box. She picked up a chunk of white ice in her left hand, cradling it inside a blue cloth. She slammed a hammer on the ice. It cracked.

Fissures of released pressure, jagged lines, imperfect beautiful lines spread deep inside the ice. She held global warming in her hot little left hand.

She smashed it again and again creating fragments of ice, chips, particles. She dropped the small block of ice back in the box. She collected chips in a glass, added fresh thick brown coffee extract, some condensed milk, a straw and a spoon. Done.

A piece of cold sharp ice pierced my left eye. The pain was minimal, cushioned by the delicious cold feeling as the ice melted through a retina, a pupil, nerve endings, tissue, layers of perception - then my vision altered its state as light transmitted new signals from rerouted optic nerves to the cerebral cortex. 

It was the quality of ice and I began to reflect everything around me. The stimulant of ice this frozen water now becoming liquid was glass. The world is made of glass, crystals shimmering inside the kaleidoscope of ice. While the illusion appears to be smooth and clear on the surface, buried deep inside are long jagged beautiful lines filled with magic, mystery and sparkling universes, emitting glowing crystal rivers.

The world is ice. Everything you see, hear, touch, taste and feel is ice, a sibylline language of clarity.

Metta.

Before this woman became a butterfly she was a useful member of society. She is practicing here.