The Metal Rabbit

The metal rabbit lived in a room covered in dust. His face had been punched in many years ago by a soldier and it gave him a somewhat depressed and demented look. The room was on the third floor of a large building in an abandoned city. There was one window from which the metal rabbit would peer down onto the street if he so wished, but there there was never anything to see except burnt out buildings as far as the eye could see. He had once watched a building collapse; this was the second most exciting event he had witnessed. The room was empty but for an old piano. Once some plaster had fallen from the ceiling and striking a chord on the piano, the metal rabbit had deeply loved this moment and thought it the most beautiful sound he had ever heard and every day he wished that some plaster might fall and strike the piano just once more, but alas the ceiling stayed intact. On another occasion there had been a strange raucous noise outside, at first the metal rabbit thought it a storm approaching and had stood by the window -for he loved to watch storms approach, but this was no storm: a large flock of crows were circling overhead. They had stayed for a few days and the metal rabbit had watched them with fascination for he could not remember the last time he had seen or even heard an animal. Very long ago the metal rabbit had tried to savour his memories but he soon fund it better to block them out. He had counted every spot of dust in the room and named the stars and mapped the weather patterns. He had invented whole new civilisations, their languages and histories to study. Each night he sung himself to sleep with a new lullaby and sang a new song each morning. His mind was an ever expanding universe. The door to his room was locked and he had been confined there for as many years he knew not, for long ago he had stopped counting.