In the great volumes of the Cosmic Library, on the sparkling shelves among the theme of Sleep and Dreams in the subheading: Wisdoms and Warnings, there can be found in a silver cased tome a small tale of a village and their pearls from long ago. When you have found the page bookmarked with a ribbon of light—it is 234—this is what you will find to read: The nights, always filled with expectation, held no secrets. The moon, in full grown shining face or new black blank stare, knew what was to come. The stars, holders of the firmament, gazed glistening down. The souls, gathered in their memories, twinkled with their wide eyes open. It happened every night in that village held tight from forlorn ways. Each dweller there, above or below, knew the past—knew the now—knew the possibility of what may come. They all knew each other. Their future was bright without lies. Their past alive. Their now a truth. Their dreams always shared, there were no nightmares there. Everyone rested in peace, both the living and the dead. That Valley, in which the village had long ago been built, was so deep and so long that the only sunlight to reach the village fell from the waterfalls in their cascade from on high. The silver streams a chanted treble clef flow along the cliffs, the swallows adding their song. Below the lake caught that falling light and tossed it up again gleaming in the eyes of those who dwelt there. Each face holding a mirror of the other and those who had gone before. That was the way it had always been, at least as far back as they could remember. And they could remember back to almost the first tick and tock of time. Like all villages that are cut off from the usual comings and goings of men, they too had customs that might seem strange if anyone from the outside had ever come there. A stranger might feel unsure. There were the noises of carts and wagons, the neighs of horses, the barks of dogs. The birds were a constant chorus and even when the sun went down, there was the watch of nightingales. But those inhabitants, they never said a word to the others, to themselves. They were not needed. That is how it had always been. Some say an earthly paradise, but we know from stories, there is always a fall. And the fall came one day when Noah Methuselah Meyers said with his tongue and teeth rather than in sleep and dreams, “I’m leaving, I wish to see the world—I’ve had enough of the memories here.” His words stopped the carts and wagons, the dogs held their breath after a high pitched whine and the birds lost the next notes to their songs. Even the tumbling water from on high held its drops tight. There was but silence. No one knew what to do. They had never heard words slapped by a tongue against the teeth of a mouth. It sounded odd. It was ugly. It would bring nightmares. Noah Methuselah Meyers just stood and let his eyes wander from quizzical head to quizzical head. Then he did the unthinkable, the unforgivable. He pulled the pearl from his ear, the precious gem he had been entrusted in his sleep the night before. “I don’t want to do this anymore.” Again his tongue and teeth rattled like a sword, did what they had never done before. He held the pearl up, a creamy sparkle. Then he did the next thing, most unthinkable and absolutely unforgivable, he tossed the pearl into the mix of manure and mud that made up the one main road. If the sun hadn’t been out, they would have seen, a small brightness taken from the sky above. He had tossed away the memories of Ariana Atkins née Duncan. In an instant she was no more among the living, nor among the dead. They all felt a strange twang in their heads. Noah Methuselah Meyers had been ready. He had his small pack on the end of a wooden pole. He turned his back on all of them. He scraped his hands, he tore his knees. His leather boots began to crack at the heels and soles. But he made it out of that valley. He left it all behind. His memories were gone, he dreamed no more. Down in the village they continued to exchange—among the living and dead—-the gems of their memories each night in those pearls. But they found a spot that seemed blank, black and so dark. Something there that no one could remember. In time that agitation became a black pearl of its own. In the town chronicles it was marked for the very first time: a loss of opulesence. That black pearl passed from one to the next. It began to cause disquiet then distress. It rubbed in the ear, it scratched their dreams. Then came the nightmares that clouded the light and those pearls they exchanged became grayer and grayer. They began to lose their light. And then one day it happened. All the pearls went black. Over the valley the stars flickered thin and dim. The souls of those who had gone before went out. The water no longer held sunlight. They began to lie, to cheat and in great anger to slaughter friend, sister, brother. The memories were gone of what had been and the trust of what was. The valley became just a shadow of the night. Screams were heard in pain and fright. No one remembered love and light. No one remembered they were friend, sister, brother. Far, far away Noah Methuselah Meyers after a hard day of pulling coal from the earth collapsed on his rusty springed one mattress bed. His eyes closed and he thought the usual darkness would come. He just wanted to forget. But He heard a scream again and again. Then, he had what he hadn’t had for a very long time. He dreamed. He dreamed of a pearl lost in the mud. A sorrow so deep washed over him and he woke where he once had been. He was stamping that so beautiful of pearl into the mud. He wasn’t sure why, was it what some called anger or hate or fright? There was no anger now. There was only rue and remorse, which flickered and flamed to bring back light again. His eyes welled up with more wet waves than an ocean. Those tears fell upon the earth, salt full of sorrow fell upon that pearl and washed it clean. He pinched it with the tip of his fingers and lifted it up. It glowed. It sighed with a whisper from Ariana Atkins née Duncan. She had not been forgotten after all. The sky brightened, and what had been was no more. Memories returned, pearls were restored. The village was back to how it had been before. So, always be careful with your pearls of memories—those of yours and others—because not every story, not every life ends in a dream and a nightmare forgotten. Here ends page 236 of this tome of wisdoms and warnings among sleep and dreams.