In the Clay

Back along the Cote D’Ivoire, before it was called such, I was born. Born for mankind, bred in fire, my usage now singular but my representation unending; I remember the day my lineage became irrevocably linked to the people of our land. Out of the dust of the earth we came, under the solid rock and from the clay. Originally my kind was made for warriors to show their triumphs; they would stain the fire burned clay with the blood of their opponents as a sign of pride and to show others that they were a person to fear and respect. But as time flowed on, and the people of my land were changed by newcomers, so was the purpose of my kind. It was no longer the warriors I represented, but the families and their history. One might say the history of an entire nation.
As time went on the image of my kind changed. Originally strung on tanned leather or a fibrous string we were now strung on smooth cold metals that the newcomers forced the people of our land to trade. We were soon dyed in strange colors that hid our natural earth tones so that the people of our land could employ us as a form of storytelling, each color representing a memory or a fact about their families. Dramatic greens taken from the tea trees that would grow along the hillsides often told of a prosperous agricultural lifestyle for that family. Blood Root and Turmeric made the brightest oranges or the deepest reds to mimic the old tradition of the warriors representing a heritage of war and bloodshed. Saint John’s Wart would make a beautiful golden wood color to show a family’s wealth, the more golden pieces, the wealthier the family.
These days were the last ones that my kind would have purpose, a meaning that all who came across us would understand. The people of my land were forced to trade us with the newcomers. We would be made into small forms and strung onto miles upon miles of those smooth wires of metal. Strange metal beads were strung along with us, eventually large disks were added. Soon the people of our land stopped coming and instead we were taken, ripped, from the ground by a big metal mouth that swallowed us and then spit us up into a pile where we would be taken by the handfuls to a horrible machine. First we were tossed into a mold, as the people called it, pieces of us oozing out onto the ground where we would lay to harden, or become stuck in people’s feet covers and dragged further away from each other. Those of us who made it through the mold were then set onto a moving piece of cloth that took us through a metal oven that baked us until some of us cracked. Those of us that did crack would be thrown into a bag with other discarded items, old paper, crusts from sandwiches; unwanted items. Those of us who made it that far were sent under a harsh bath that scalded our top layer and sealed us in a strange ice that would never melt. We were then divided up and blinded by coats of color and sealed off with another coat of the ice; all was darkness and silence.
We could feel movement, but where and why no one knew. It went on for days, jumping about, sometimes stopping for an hour but it was not long before we were moving again. At one point it felt as though we were flying, though this lasted seconds before being suspended from something, the weight of my kind pushing down on me. I could hear muffled voices and feel the slight clink of my hard shell off of my kind hanging behind and next to me. Once in a while there would be a great falling feeling followed by a shock-wave that surged through me and the wire I was suspended on, after which I was taken back to the feeling of being suspended. Until one day I had a familiar, though detached, feeling of being in contact with skin. I could feel myself touching something warm, I could almost hear a heartbeat, and for a moment I felt better. I could feel the swing of the person as they moved, and I could feel myself slip up and down their skin slightly when they swung more violently. It was nearly like being home where I witnessed the lives of these people and clung to their skin like another part of them, until I felt myself tumbling. I hit harder than before and lost consciousness. When I woke up, I was freezing, so much so that I felt I might have cracked. I still felt the metal inside of me, though I noticed that I had more room to move. It was then that I broke, a cruel hard surface cracked against me with such force that I shattered wide open, my inner parts exposed. What I saw made me wish for my blindness and ignorance again. Huge structures made from my kind, burned red and purple, some made from trees or the metal that I had come to recognize. More people than I could imagine walking stone streets made from an inorganic earth. There was no sky, no sun, hardly any air. Lying helpless, scared, and sad; I was ground into the new man-made earth by the rough feet covers of the people passing. I cried out, but no one took notice. My colors have been ruined, I have become unwanted. Where the rest of my kind are, I do not know, but I hope that they never witness this world.