The documents are lost, and no one can be certain if the fence was built to keep us in or out. It stretches on and on, like a line at a soup kitchen, grey upon grey, until it cuts the blue horizon, with no curve but the smooth arc of the Earth. It’s too high to climb and there’s not even a chink between slats to offer a glimpse of what might be on the other side. Whoever built it sure knew about fences, and how to build one so strong and tall that it’d grow in the hearts and souls of all who lived in its shadow. Some days, we want to tear it down and claim our rights in the rest of the world; but some nights, when the dogs won’t sleep and dark birds tap at the windows, we’re sure it’s the only thing standing between our fragile lives and the End. Once, when I was a child of nine or ten, I painted my name in red letters three feet high. Within a week, someone had scrubbed it clean away.
Oz Hardwick
Picture Nick Victor
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