“What Pegman saw” is a weekly challenge based on Google Streetview. Using the location provided, you must write a piece of flash fiction of no more than 150 words. You can read the rules here. You can find today’s location on this page, from where you can also get the Inlinkz code. This week’s prompt is Wadi ad-Dawasir.
Desert Vigil
“God is great!”
I gaze up at the stars. The beauty of the night sky cuts me like a sword. I am caught up in the purity of the desert, overwhelmed by awe and gratitude. Here the division of life from death is sharp and immediate. I yearn to remain.
“God is great!”
I smell stone, dry, unblessed by water. Mercy can sometimes be harsh like stone, like sand, like the desert, a mercy that purges, that strengthens, that forces a man’s courage and endurance to grow in response to the will of God.
“God is great!”
I hear the whisper of the night air, the siffle of shifting sand, the creaking of the cooling world.
Sound in silence.
Meaning in stillness.
Tiny grains cohering into a ripple, a dune, a ridge, a desert: a community, a nation, the umma.
“God is great!”
I dedicate myself to martyrdom.
Autumn Leaves 