After Oblivion

      The rain was falling and there was a damp mist in the air.
I felt the cool drops hitting my face, millisecond by millisecond.
For the first time in years, the rain had not burned my skin.
      The roads were no longer trails of heavy ash; the beautiful cracking flaws of the pavement stood out to me so vividly, as if they were lines on the face of an old forgotten friend.
      The sounds of life were echoing through spaces between the trees, like a voice traveling through cavities of the ear.
     And my god, the trees were alive!
     The slight hint of green on the tips of the branches was like a beacon emerging from a gray landscape.
     In the time that had passed I had almost forgotten what colour looked like.
I brushed away a layer of dirt, only to find at first a single bud...and then a second...and then a few more; full of hope and potential.
      I had almost forgotten what life looked like, and how it thrives.
      Despite the abysmal catastrophe of our own devices, life continues to be;
      Without end, without beginning, with or without reason, it simply is.