Kulkaran

Kulkaran? Bound, but just now let loose into the ball field. This is his second trip to the Great City, a prisoner of the cocoa masters, but his nakedness is all glory and jungle oil as he walks across the grass, wooing the eyes of the crowd his way. There are other prisoners, but he does not look at them. He keeps his pantheric gaze firm on the team across the way: they are stone-armoured, feather-headdressed, jade-painted. At their feet, one ball. It might as well be the globe of the earth.

On both sides of the field high stone walls, lined with small loops, contain the players. Ball in loop, earth in void, and Kulkaran lives. Ah, but he is not like them, these stone makers. He has secrets collected in the net of his hair – caught as he passed through trees and under rivers and over mountains.

The match begins, and they have weapons. Kulkaran is lake-weed, hovering at the edges. There are fonts of blood, and prisoners dying, and a ball knocking around in the air, spin-struck.

Kulkaran sees an opening, and he is yellow adder, fang-striker, snagging the heel of a jade runner. He clamps upon him hawk-swift and taloned, removing the headdress and the armour, smearing the paint on his own body. Foot-stomp, face-crush, he dons the stolen outfit. He remembers the sting of the tree ant, and becomes pincer-toothed. He bites, and bites, and avoids the ball, biting. He is killing prisoners. He is gaining trust. He is standing by the crowd, smiling, red-tongued.

The ball comes towards him then, a rubber sparrow of speed. Now Kulkaran swats away the tree ant, and is tender-foot, the puma. He turns and warps his way forward, keeping the ball from touching his hands, powering up on pounding thighs and curling shoulder blades. Trickle-step, stutter, and thunder rolling on the field. Kulkaran heaves the middle name of lightning and throws it into the ball, rage-wise. Through the loop spinning is freedom; sweet, sacrificial freedom, burning cocoa in the morning sky.