The water wasn't the same down here. Water is what runs out of the kitchen taps or a playground drinking fountain. It fills bathubs and pools and yes, of course, the ocean- but at a certain depth, water becomes a barrier from all you remember, all you think you know.You're trapped within it, a plaything of it.Focus erodes. Your thoughts mutate. The pressure.The pressure.The soul can't cope with that. It shouldn't be expected to.Humans weren't built for this. There's a reason nothing lives down here.Or nothing should.
When the ship approached the equator, I stopped going out on deck in the daytime. The sun burned like a flame. The days had shortened and night came swiftly. One moment it was light, the next it was dark. The sun did not set but fell into the water like a meteor. Late in the evening, when I went out briefly, a hot wind slapped my face. From the ocean came a roar of passions that seemed to have broken through all barriers:'We mus procreate and multiply! We must exhaust all the powers of lust!' The waves glowed like lava, and I imagined I could see multitudes of living beings - algae, whales, sea monsters - reveling in an orgy, from the surface to the bottom of the sea. Immortality was the law here. The whole planet raged with animation. At times, I heard my name in the clamor: the spirit of the abyss calling me to join them in their nocturnal dance. ("Hanka")
American Fantastic Tales: Terror and the Uncanny from the 1940's Until Now
Quote Detail
When the ship approached the equator, I stopped going out on deck in the daytime. The sun burned like a flame. The days had shortened and night came swiftly. One moment it was light, the next it was dark. The sun did not set but fell into the water like a meteor. Late in the evening, when I went out briefly, a hot wind slapped my face. From the ocean came a roar of passions that seemed to have broken through all barriers:'We mus procreate and multiply! We must exhaust all the powers of lust!' The waves glowed like lava, and I imagined I could see multitudes of living beings - algae, whales, sea monsters - reveling in an orgy, from the surface to the bottom of the sea. Immortality was the law here. The whole planet raged with animation. At times, I heard my name in the clamor: the spirit of the abyss calling me to join them in their nocturnal dance. ("Hanka")
Quick Answer
What this quote page tells you
This canonical quote page keeps the full saying, the attributed author, any linked work, and the topic tags together so the quote can be cited from one stable URL.
Related Quotes
More quote cards from the same area
There was an ocean above us, held in by a thin sac that might rupture and let down a flood at any second.
You sea! I resign myself to you also-I guess what you mean, I behold from the beach your crooked fingers, I believe you refuse to go back without feeling of me.We must have a turn together,I undress, hurry me out of sight of the land,Cushion me soft, rock me billowy drowse,Dash me with amorous wet, I can repay you.
On the sea he wished to meet it, if meet it he must. He was not sure why this was, yet he had a terror of meeting the thing again on dry land. Out of the sea there rise storms and monsters, but no evil powers: evil is of earth. And there is no sea, no running of river or spring, in the dark land where once Ged had gone. Death is the dry place.
There will be times in which things appear hopeless. You will begin to doubt everything around you. You will even begin to doubt yourself. You will think things will never look up and you may be in the deepest, darkest, loneliest place in the world. Everything which had once been infused with wonder may appear disappointing and harsh. You may grow cynical and come to believe that this is simply the way the world is...that one must bear with the unforgiving realities of the world and only hope that it doesn__ get worse. You might grow suspicious of others, as adults tend to do, and close yourself off from the rest of the world. You might just look to the past and reminisce about better days...or you might just dwell in one place for a little too long and become nostalgic for the future. Just remember__egardless of where you are, what experiences you have, and who you have become__hat there will always be those who have loved you. Those whom you may have taken for granted, but have nonetheless, always had you in their hearts and in their hopes and wishes. Lives that you have touched: whether you realize it or not. To separation you may venture, but indissolubly in union shall you drift...you will always be at the whims of forces, both great and small, and far beyond your capacity to control. That__ how all our stories go. Innumerable arcs intersect and scatter into a vast indefinite sea.
And any room that I enter may become a sideshow tent where I must take my place upon a rickety old bench on the verge of collapse. Even now the Showman stands before my eyes. His stiff red hair moves a little toward one shoulder, as if he is going to turn his gaze upon me, and moves back again; then his head moves a little toward the other shoulder in this never-ending game of horrible peek-a-boo. I can only sit and wait, knowing that one day he will turn full around, step down from his stage, and claim me for the abyss I have always feared. Perhaps then I will discover what it was I did - what any of us did - to deserve this fate.