The Keeper of The Light
1899
It is alleged that when someone dies, the clocks around them stop - so that their spirits can move on - but gazing at my watch, time continued to move in the aftermath of the scene before me. Looking down from the cliff face, I was in denial of the chaos on the rocks below and could not understand that the young keeper and I had slept through such a tragic incident. If I closed my eyes, I would have simply been unaware of the havoc that existed, only feeling the whips of wind, the rain, and the cold against my face. Time would continue as if nothing had happened. But my eyes were open and I could see that the wreckage of a ship had been twisted and snapped from the tide, splintering into hundreds of pieces that found refuge between the cracks and crevices of the barnacle-infested stones. Among the wreck, I could see the remains of the small crew, bodies prostrate on the rock, trying to huddle together to fend off the cold of the New England winter, but the stillness of their corpses told me that their light had expired long before sunrise that morning.
