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One day, while the sky rested, in the afternoon, it fell asleep and dreamed that the sun came and sat very close, right next to it — golden, warm and very, very close.

So the sky reached out and took hold of the sun, and up into space it flew with the sun and they settled together in their place in the galaxy. But then suddenly, the sun fell from the sky’s grip and slid down to the earth again and disappeared silently below the edge. And looking down through the bouncing twilight, the sky saw the strangest thing.

It saw the earth below it begin to expand. The earth stretched! It ballooned in size. It was so big now it was half-way to the moon. The creatures and all the plants looked out at each other in shock. They were separating — further and further from each other now than a moment ago! They cried out, each in its own language.

Suddenly everything was in chaos; all the creatures and all the plants of the earth, all living things, great and small went into motion — slithering, crawling, wiggling, swimming, running, flying — wing and fin and leg and trunk and branch and leaf and every type of appendage and every kind of locomotion was in motion racing across the bulging earth, each powering toward another, some toward their own kind, some toward any other, each one in a desperate battle against a great separation.

The ground loosened! Soil tumbled into the gaps. The plants clutched the earth, but the earth fell away from their roots. Unrooted they collapsed to the ground. And all the creatures now falling down too, and all the plants, falling, reached out for the other creatures and plants falling only to find the others disappearing at a fantastic speed over the horizon.

Bigger and bigger the earth became, as an insane, crazy wild distancing tore across it. And then suddenly it stopped, the earth stopped expanding, and a great hush fell over everything.

Their was a great silence over the globe. Then the sky awoke. The sun and moon were gone. It felt alone. It moved across the earth and sat down by a small creature.

And in that silent, dark moment the sky moved yet closer, and reaching out, wrapped itself around the earth, took hands with all who would, and ached and longed, it’s wings afire, to put a gentle end to the stupefying distance between all living things.