The World Beyond

The World Beyond

All around each town was a road. A road that curled away and connected each town. It was a tiny island in the Caribbean Sea, so tiny that only three towns, each with only three families, were on the island. Around the island hovered a strange wavering light that no ships could penetrate from the outside.  The families had little contact with the outside world. They really didn’t mind. They were happy on their island. They grew all their own food and raised goats for meat and milk. The sun always shone, except at night time when a light rain would fall on all the crops and gardens. They were all quite happy, except for one son. Agwe was the son of the island’s blacksmith, Josue.  Agwe watched when his father brought supplies in from outside the light on the sea. Agwe walked and walked the roads from Merry Vale to Sunny Dale to the smallest town of Happy Ville. He would stand on the shore just past the road and stare out into the strange wavering light. Then he would turn around and go back on the roads around Happy Ville back to Sunny Dale and to the largest town of Merry Vale. He would stand on the shore just past the road and stare out into the strange wavering light. He so desperately wanted to find out what was on the the other side of the light, what was out on the sea and see how big the world really was. At night, Agwe stood on the shores on the road past Sunny Dale and saw the crescent moon carving a thin stripe on the dark sparkling sea. 

One day, Josue said "Come with me, Agwe. Come with me on to the lands outside the wavering light." 

Agwe was excited and glad. Proud that his father could see he was old enough and ready to begin his journey into the world of grown ups. Once out on the sea and out of sight of his island, Agwe took a deep breath of the cool, moist sea air. His heart pounded against his chest.  The wind was taking their small sloop closer and closer to the wavering light which seemed to just blend with the sea and the sky. 

"Agwe! Stop dreaming and come help me with the sails. Passing through this light is the most difficult part of our voyage. It is like a waterfall of air and light and mist where the wind currents waver as much as the light."

It was hard for Agwe to pull his attention away from the sea and sky to help his father, but he knew that if he didn’t he would forever be left on the island to walk the roads. He would be hammering iron, tending the fires for the rest of his life. When the little sloop broke through Agwe and Josue were on the open sea again approaching the shores of a strange land where buildings were taller than the tallest tree on his island. Ships that loomed over them making their sloop a speck on the sea. Agwe gasped and drew back. His imagination had not been large enough to build all these wondrous things. Agwe was excited and frightened. 

"Father, how soon will be return home. This land is too wonderfully strange for my heart. Are there roads I can walk on? Will I be able to come back with you?" 

"Yes, Agwe, but first we must get the supplies. There is a small path behind the supply store you can walk on while I talk with the owner."

But Agwe barely heard. He stood with his mouth and eyes and ears wide open trying to gather in all the abundance that surrounded him. 

“Agwe! Come. Once we are done you can gape all you want and you can walk that path over there. But, mind. If you can’t do this work you won’t be coming back this way."

"Yes, father." Agwe paid close attention now. He wanted to go home, but he wanted to come back even more.

The next day, when they returned to their home, Agwe stepped ashore with his father, carried the supplies to the blacksmith’s shop and went to see his mother, Bijoux. Bijoux was in their humble kitchen preparing bread and stew for their supper. Agwe breathed deeply. Until he had seen the great wide world, until he felt the frightening and marvellous excitement of the world beyond the wall of light, he had not known the abundance on the island. The island still felt small. Agwe still wanted to go out and away to walk on new roads. Yet, as he embraced his mother, he knew he had been missing a different kind of abundance at home. To journey away he would have to leave the abundance of his family’s embrace. 

“I tramp a perpetual journey.”

~ Walt Whitman, Song of Myself