Chronographia


Chronographia (chro-no-graph’-i-a): Vivid representation of a certain historical or recurring time (such as a season) to create an illusion of reality. A kind of enargia: [the] generic name for a group of figures aiming at vivid, lively description.


Sunset. Pink, silver, red, grey with some clouds and blue sky in the background. Venus appears—steady in the sky, like a promise as the sun sinks—a promise of night and illuminated pumpkins, and kids in costumes loading up on candy.

I can’t stop thinking about you. Remember? We met at the Halloween Ball in the high school gym. I was dressed as a serial killer, with a hammer for a weapon. You were a shopping cart lady, with a cart filled with dirty laundry, an empty vodka bottle, and a one-eyed teddy bear. I got in the cart and you pretended to dance with me, pushing the cart in circles, zig-zagging, and doing wheelies (which was quite difficult).

We dated for awhile, but you made me ride in the shopping cart wherever we went. You said you only wanted to reenact the night we met. I thought you were crazy. And you were. On our anniversary, you pushed me and the cart into traffic. I was nearly killed and you were convicted of attempted murder and sentenced to ten years.

I asked the judge if I could keep the shopping cart as a part of my recovery plan. He assented.

The cart is bent and twisted. The one-eyed teddy bear is forever wedged between the front and back of the cart’s crushed plastic child seat. It is missing a wheel—it is totally unusable, except it can be dragged around with the piece of rope I tied to the frame.

Happy Halloween Suzy! I hope you are rotting nicely in prison. Are you wearing your orange jumpsuit costume tonight? Ha ha!


Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu). Bracketed text added by Gorgias.

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