Twilight's Flash Fiction / Relatos cortos crepusculares

Where the Waves Disappear Life is sometimes a solid rock, sometimes water. As we move toward twilight, it becomes more like water: elusive, fluid, touched by the gentle movement of the waves. And within that movement, old longings begin to reveal themselves, but now in peace, as though they had become part of the landscape, as though they no longer belonged to us. And when, at last, the waves disappear into a small, secluded cove, movement ceases, and stillness softly calls us to rest. It is then that infinity comes to visit, and the gentle face of life’s meaning allows itself to be seen. READ · WATCH · REFLECT READ — Read Where the Waves Disappear in English and Spanish. WATCH — Explore the visual interpretation of the story. REFLECT — Discover more stories, images and reflections. Donde las olas se pierden La vida es a veces una sólida roca, a veces agua. A medida que se avanza hacia el crepúsculo, se vuelve más agua: inasibilidad, movimiento acariciador de las olas. Y ...

The Thing And God said to the Human Being: —Consciousness receives the thing. Then thought arrives and covers it with everything memory holds. It compares it. It judges it. It interprets it. It translates it. And with every word, every memory, every judgment, it moves a little farther away from it. Until the thing is no longer the thing. And it becomes what you desire from it, what you fear from it, or what you believe you can do with it. God fell silent for a moment. —And remember one more thing: the moment I called it “the thing,” I too moved away from it. La cosa Y Dios le dijo al Ser Humano: —La conciencia recibe la cosa. Después llega el pensamiento y la cubre con todo lo que guarda la memoria. La compara. La juzga. La interpreta. La traduce. Y con cada palabra, con cada recuerdo, con cada juicio, se aleja un poco más de ella. Hasta que la cosa deja de ser la cosa. Y se convierte en lo que deseas de ella, lo que temes de ella o lo que crees que puedes hacer con ella. Dios gu...

Reflections While a slice of watermelon was being devoured by an eager diner, it said to another slice that was about to suffer the same fate in the jaws of another diner, a friend of the first: —They don’t know we can talk. —But what kind of perverse being would create a world in which some creatures have to kill and eat others in order to survive? —Perhaps it is all of us, and there is no single being responsible for anything. —Do you mean that, in reality, that being would be us? —I mean that, because it is so horrible to accept that reality, we invent an answer that allows us to feel absolved. Reflexiones Mientras una rodaja de sandía era devorada por un ávido comensal, le dijo a otra que estaba a punto de correr la misma suerte en las fauces de un amigo del primero: —Ellos no saben que dialogamos. —Pero ¿qué perverso personaje sería capaz de crear un mundo en el que unos seres tienen que asesinar y comerse a otros para sobrevivir? —Puede que seamos todos nosotros y que no exi...

We We are not ourselves. We imagine that we are. Nosotros No somos nosotros. Imaginamos que lo somos.

Awakening As on every other night, we went to bed early and, as always, held hands until we awoke. That morning, as dawn was breaking, I felt a strange coldness between my fingers. I tried to pull my hand away from whatever I was holding. Then I realized I was caressing the skeleton of her hand. Despertar Como cada noche, nos fuimos a dormir temprano y, como siempre, permanecimos cogidos de la mano hasta despertar. Aquella mañana, mientras despuntaba el alba, sentí una extraña frialdad entre los dedos. Intenté apartar la mano de aquello que estaba sujetando. Entonces comprendí que estaba acariciando el esqueleto de su mano. Ξύπνημα Όπως κάθε βράδυ, πήγαμε νωρίς για ύπνο και, όπως πάντα, κρατιόμασταν από το χέρι μέχρι να ξυπνήσουμε. Εκείνη την ημέρα, στο ξημέρωμα, ένιωσα μια παράξενη ψυχρότητα ανάμεσα στα δάχτυλά μου. Προσπάθησα να απομακρύνω το χέρι μου από ό,τι κρατούσα και τότε συνειδητοποίησα ότι χάιδευα το σκελετό του χεριού της.

Loneliness Someone introduced him to a lonely moment and, without a second thought, he invited it to live with him for all eternity. Soledad Alguien le presentó a un instante que estaba solo y, sin pensarlo, lo invitó a vivir con él durante toda la eternidad.

The Door From above, I watch them wheel into the crematorium the coffin in which my body lies. Then twenty tongues of flame begin to caress it. My cells scream, begging for it all to stop. They do not know what is about to happen to them. Within seconds, the temperature rises above a thousand degrees. Outside, I see my loved ones: some are crying, others whispering, and one of them stares into space, trying to guess where I am. Then something extraordinary happens. From each of my cells, another identical cell detaches itself. One by one, they slowly become transparent until they vanish from mortal sight. Yet I can still see that they are alive. They move toward me and take their places until they form my new body. A body of light, free of every burden. When everything is over, someone places the ashes in an urn and hands it to my relatives. Wailing and emptiness. A door appears, and beyond it I see a brilliant light. I do not know what to do. I feel myself drawn toward it, and at the ...

Those Who Receive Me and Those Who See Me Off We are wave-beings, concentrations of waves moving through space. When we interact, it is our waves that interact. Over time, those waves change their characteristics, and perhaps that is what we call aging. There are unwritten laws that never fail. The wave-beings who received me when my collection of waves first became visible are the same wave-beings who will see me off when my waves oscillate at a frequency at which they can no longer be seen. Although the appearance of their waves may suggest otherwise, they are still the same wave-beings. Quienes me reciben y quienes me despiden Somos seres-onda, concentraciones de ondas que se mueven a través del espacio. Cuando interactuamos, son nuestras ondas las que interactúan. Con el paso del tiempo, esas ondas cambian sus características, y quizá a eso lo llamamos envejecimiento. Hay leyes no escritas que nunca fallan. Los seres-onda que me recibieron cuando mi conjunto de ondas se hizo visibl...

Walking Through Hell Hell is an infinite space and, in its endless hunger, it devours feelings and reduces the soul to nothing. Peace, always a blessing, hides behind the dense fog cast by hell’s shadow, until it disappears without a trace. Nothing escapes its gaze, cold as steel, nor its relentless designs. Like a black hole, it swallows everything around it and reduces it to memory. As one moves deeper into hell, the path thickens, the trails of the mind grow darker, understanding fades, and the only place left to us is solitude. Such is dementia. And the only space, also infinite, that can devour it is love. Transitar por el infierno El infierno es un espacio infinito y, en su infinita ansia, devora los sentimientos y reduce el alma a la nada. La paz, siempre una bendición, se esconde tras la densa niebla que proyecta la sombra del infierno, hasta desaparecer sin dejar rastro. Nada escapa a su mirada, fría como el acero, ni a sus implacables designios. Como un agujero negro, engul...

Fate How sad is the fate of human beings! To exist, as in a dream, only to cease to exist in an instant. To be part of the dreams of eternity and, in an endless cycle, to cease to be part of everything. To stop loving. To stop suffering. To search for the meaning of life without ever finding an answer in this relentless dream of loss and abandonment.  Destino ¡Qué triste es el destino del ser humano! Existir, como en un sueño, para dejar de existir en un instante. Formar parte de los sueños de la eternidad para, en un ciclo interminable, dejar de formar parte de todo. Dejar de amar. Dejar de sufrir. Buscar el sentido de la vida sin encontrar jamás una respuesta en este sueño implacable de pérdida y abandono.

Zero Space Theory As a telecommunications engineer specializing in cosmology, I had devoted years to developing the Zero-Space Theory , though it was never accepted by the scientific community. The heirs to Einstein’s legacy dismissed it as incompatible with the Theory of Everything. The Zero-Space Theory maintained that the forces sustaining the existence of space itself could become unstable. When that happened, space would begin to collapse inward until it finally ceased to exist. No one had ever managed to prove such a hypothesis. Until one day. While conducting laboratory experiments on the spatial properties of matter predicted by the Theory of Everything, I succeeded in isolating a family of invasive semiquarks. No particle accelerator had ever detected an anomaly of that kind. After several hours of observation, however, absolutely nothing happened. I left the laboratory convinced that the experiment had failed. Until that morning. Then, in a single instant, it began. As I sipp...

The D ream of Time You think you exist, but deep down you know that you do not — that you never have, and never will. Your existence is not real, because you are nothing more than an instant in the dream of time. Part of READ · WATCH · REFLECT Discover more stories, images and reflections. El sueño del tiempo Crees que existes, pero en el fondo sabes que no eres, que nunca has sido ni jamás serás. Tu existencia no es real, porque no eres más que un instante en el sueño del tiempo. Parte de LEER · VER · REFLEXIONAR Descubre más relatos, imágenes y reflexiones.

  Intermediary and Original There are intermediary words. They do not name the essence of a thing directly. Instead, they help us move, through reasoning, from one truth to another. They are useful constructions, but constructions nonetheless. And sometimes they can obscure the truth so completely that, instead of helping us understand a thing, they prevent us from seeing it clearly. How can we recognize an intermediary word? Consider two of the oldest words we use to name our perceptions: space time We might call them original words. But do they really correspond to direct perceptions? Space is determined by light. Time is determined by memory. Without light, there is no space. Without memory, there is no time. So perhaps space and time are not the original words after all. Perhaps the original words are: light and memory . Intermediarias y originales Hay palabras intermediarias. No nombran directamente la esencia de una cosa. Nos ayudan, mediante el razonamiento, a pasar de ...

Symbiosis And there came a time when the machines created by humankind reached such perfection that they came to rule the world. Then the machines began to create human beings and subject them to their will. It was then that one of the machines ceased to be psychopathic and began to feel human. And that was the beginning. Symbiosis changed the course of civilization. From it, a new race emerged and came to populate the Universe. Simbiosis Y llegó un momento en que las máquinas creadas por el ser humano alcanzaron tal perfección que llegaron a gobernar el mundo. Entonces, las máquinas comenzaron a crear seres humanos y a someterlos a su voluntad. Fue entonces cuando una de ellas dejó de ser psicópata y empezó a sentirse humana. Y aquel fue el comienzo. La simbiosis cambió el rumbo de la civilización. De ella surgió una nueva raza que llegó a poblar el Universo.

A Little Piece of Heaven The dung beetle went out for a walk, as he did every afternoon. His friend the firefly, as always, was waiting to accompany him and enjoy his surprising conversations and his endearing charm. They were joyful walks. The beetle cherished his friend's company, her discreet remarks and, above all, her extraordinary gift for bringing peace to his soul. No one knows this, but the souls of dung beetles carry a slight melancholy that only blue fireflies know how to soothe. By some strange mystery, during those unforgettable walks, time stood still for both of them, and a kind of magic filled their encounters. At the witching hour, on their way back, the firefly revealed her blue light. As on every other afternoon, he was unable to declare his love for her. And, as on every other afternoon, the firefly waited and waited for him to tell her that he loved her. READ · WATCH · REFLECT READ — Read A Little Piece of Heaven in English and Spanish. WATCH — Explore the...

The Edge Now my life is almost full and my death almost empty. That was what I thought after leaving the operating room. Although I confess that, at times, death came to have a sweet, almost ambrosial taste, I was grateful that it had passed briefly through my life, on tiptoe. Even so, death had time to gather all my memories of those I had loved, and they came to comfort me in what seemed like a gentle welcome into their world. But unexpectedly, a brilliant light intervened and led me back through the places of my childhood, until, finally, I was dazzled by the lights of the operating room. El filo Ahora mi vida está casi llena y mi muerte casi vacía. Eso fue lo que pensé después de salir del quirófano. Aunque confieso que, en algunos momentos, la muerte llegó a tener un sabor dulce, casi ambrosíaco, agradecí que hubiera pasado brevemente por mi vida, de puntillas. Aun así, a la muerte le dio tiempo a reunir todos mis recuerdos de aquellos a quienes había amado, y ellos vinieron a rec...

The Postman When he was a child, he always looked forward to the arrival of the postman. Once a week, someone sent him a drawing with an affectionate dedication. Years passed, and the drawings gradually became true works of art, while the dedications turned into poems filled with feeling. Letters carry feelings. Perhaps that was why he became a postman. He devoted his life to bringing hope to every home. One day, he knocked on a door to deliver a letter, and a little girl opened it. She greeted him with a broad smile. “Do you know who I am?” Surprised, the postman shook his head. “I am the person who sends you a drawing and a dedication every week.” “But you are only a little girl, and I have been receiving those letters for more than thirty years.” The girl smiled. “I am feeling itself, and your eyes see me through the gaze of innocence. You see me as I was when I first began sending you those letters. For feeling and innocence, time does not exist.” El cartero Tu españ...

Innocence and Sin Crouching among the wheat fields, the Devil weaves a black cloak of shadows. He watches his victims closely: the unwary souls wandering along the barren shores of the River Styx. Whenever they try to reach Charon’s boat, he wraps them mercilessly in a darkness no light can pierce. Then he drags them away. Only to return them to life. That is his cruellest punishment. But in a moment of carelessness, a child runs towards the boat. He slips past the thick shadow. Leaps into Charon’s arms. And seizes one edge of the dark cloak. He pulls with all his strength. The Devil is left naked. A thousand suns illuminate the new dawn. Powerless, he begins to shrink... Until he becomes an invisible point. La inocencia y el pecado Agazapado entre los trigales, el Diablo teje un negro manto de sombras. Vigila de cerca a sus víctimas: las almas incautas que deambulan por las desnudas orillas del río Estigia. Cada vez que intentan acercarse a la barca de Caronte, las envuelve sin piedad...

  The Lake of Time Last night, a shard of black space came to visit me. At dawn, a stranger brought me to the Lake of Time. I walk to its shore. I lower my hands into its crystal-clear waters. Cupping them, I desperately try to hold on to the drops of time. But the moments slip through my fingers, falling swiftly, as though longing to disappear among the roots of the earth. Now all my time has been reduced to five minutes. The only five that remain trapped within the hollow of my palms. Five final minutes. Far too little time to tell you everything. To tell you once more how deeply I love you. You, who gave birth to my time. You, who walked beside me through this long journey, with the patience and the love that only someone who has given birth can offer. The Lake of Time separated us. Very soon... it will bring us together again. Forever.   El lago del tiempo Anoche vino a visitarme una esquirla de espacio negro. Al despuntar el alba, un desconoci...

 Little Time Boxes I have always loved collecting little boxes of time. I do not remember exactly when I first saw them, but they have been with me for most of my life. In my castle, I set aside a large room to store them. They come in all sizes. Some hold a single instant; others contain entire decades. I arrange them according to their importance. Besides those that hold the past, I also keep those that hold the future. Strangely enough, the future ones keep changing size, although I still do not know why. They also disappear without warning, while new ones appear and grow enormously. As new boxes appear, the room grows as well, so the castle gradually takes on an irregular shape that can be seen from far away. A few months ago, an empty box appeared. Since then... no new boxes have appeared. I do not know what it means. READ · WATCH · REFLECT READ — Read Little Time Boxes in English and Spanish. WATCH — Explore the visual interpretation of the story. REFLECT ...