Fragment Explosion

In my high school English classes, we would occasionally do exercises called "explosions," where we would take a written work -- usually poetry, though performing this operation on works of prose could be interesting, as well -- and pry at it with our own mind, using a piece of the work as our inspiration. Usually we took a line from within the meat of the poem and used it as the first line of a poem of our own creation. It was especially interesting when, later, our teacher would read through the poem, and wherever we had "exploded" one of its phrases into our own short idea, we would cut the reading off and insert what we had written ourselves. As a result, the original work not only became much longer, it became interesting in a new way. We saw certain words and phrases in a new way based on how our peers had reacted to them. In short, we took the work and made it our own.

I mention this only because it is how and why I approached the following bit of prose. If you read a few posts below, you may notice one labeled "(Fragment)", and that what follows is an expanded version of it. I suppose in the real world one might refer to this as "expanding on a previous idea," or even just "the process of writing." Which is true. But in the same way that the first (Fragment) was written in a spurt of inspiration as the sentences formed in my subconscious of their own volition, this is merely an explosion of that original idea. Perhaps it will grow little by little until I get a publishing contract for the 300-page novel it will become. But for now, baby steps.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

And beyond hope, beyond his kindest dreams, a surprise greeted him when he awoke. Dew clung to the grass, each blade glistening like a crystal, a precious keepsake polished with care. It clung to the tips of his hair, and as he shook it loose it rained down as a fine mist, each tiny prism flashing, breaking the light into a thousand colors that mixed with the air around him and saturated every detail of the morning.

The light.

The sun did more than rise in that moment; it smiled. And he shined, golden, into the new day.