It is hours before dawn. A figure emerges from the darkness of the huts. He is a young man, bare- chested and wearing only a sarong. In the cover of the night, the color of his robes cannot be discerned, but as moonlight touches his skin, flashes of red and gold flicker in the dark. His hair loosens in the wind, his muscles and tendons flex as if in anticipation. Above, in the dark trees soaring overhead, strange birds and insects call out to each other.

The smell of old wood smoke and ashes fill the air. Closer to the river - churning and rushing into the future- there is the strange smell of lavender, as if someone had poured a jar of perfumed oil into the brown waters.

In his left hand he holds the oars that will help him negotiate the waters. His right hand grasps a jar of food to nourish him on the journey. The boat with no oars is waiting.

The brown boat bobs silently on the shore. The boy gathers the loose folds of his sarong and surveys his sleeping village one last time: the shuttered huts, the dying embers of last night’s fire. Everything was cast in gradients of shadow and moonlight. It begins to drizzle a little. The northern wind grows stronger and begins to whisper. Murmuring blessings and curses. The pleas of dead soldiers carried from battlefields far away. He stops to listen to their whispering…

He stoops down and plucks a flower from the bush. As the clouds above part, he admires the ghostly white petals of the flower. He places it behind his left ear. In his village women wore flowers on their right ear, men on their left. A yellow flower meant the person was married. A white one was ambiguous: it could betray availability or the desire to remain celibate. The allure of the symbol lay in its confusion. Its duality.

He swipes the drizzle from his skin. He tastes it with his tongue. He savors its saltiness. Was it his or did it belong to the sky?