A figure of speech is a shifty thing; it can be twisted or it can be straight. - Salman Rushdie

They lived in a great city, a metropolis of many narratives that converged briefly and then separated for ever, discovering their different dooms in that crowd of stories through which all of us, following our own destinies, had to push and shove to find our way through, or out.

"Without water we are nothing", the traveler thought. "Even an emperor, denied water, would swiftly turn to dust. Water is the real monarch and we are all its slaves."

I admit it: above all things, I fear absurdity.