Intro..                                                                            ...Back
Draw...                                                                            ..Along
Poems..                                                                            ...More


       A little while ago a beautiful green woman gave me her hand: I would guess that she
is thirty-five at most - before settling down in her chair: she unbuttoned her translucent
white shirt halfway: and asked me for a glass of water and a diffuser.    In the warm pink
light: that was the first condition for her today' arrival:    her skin glowed in brownish
hues ..

      Happy birthday Madam Minor. How are you feeling today?

      Thank you.     I feel very well.   You can say:  almost as well as a fifty years ago
(ringing laughter). Apart from a slight loss of elasticity in the tissues and joints:  and
a little yellowing of the hair   .. it may be interesting to mention: that among the green
people the blond hair color is by far the least popular        (again ringing laughter and
ruffling the hair - of course absolutely beautiful and flawless bright green).       .. So
except these things: I don't have any other signs of old age.        I remember everything
important from my childhood as well as from the day before yesterday: and not only me    -
today we can say with firm certainty:    autotrophy visibly slows down the aging processes
and it is very likely: that it also significantly extends human life   - when we consider:
that not one of the green people has died so far  - and the first of them  - me - is still
flourishing lavishly at the age of fifty-eight (adds Madam Andrea with hot sparkles in her
malachite eyes: and you can almost see the little flower buds in her hair).

      How did you come up with the idea of oo-autotrophy?   Were you really the only human
test subject?

      Yes: on the one hand: I didn't want to risk failure on anyone else's skin:    and on
the other hand: I was deeply convinced that it had to work   - you know: at that time: the
crew of the Hydron ship and I were in a very strange situation:   there was a thick fog on
the ship due to a broken climate system: we were isolated from each other: but at the same
time constantly forced into intimate contact    (madam Andrea closed her eyes and breathed
quietly - we would all like to see the photos:    which flashed behind her eyelids at that
moment) :After a few weeks: we all went completely wild: and drank and danced for the next
few months.          Before the mission: the Academy asked me: to try to breed a symbiotic
luminescent bacterium: which could spread non-violently in the body of the plant and cause
its own light - so that its photosynthesis would not be dependent on sunlight.    Maybe it
was the fog: and the sea of romantic feelings: in which we were all swimming: or: only the
alcohol gave me the courage to look at it from a different angle     - one way or another:
from a certain day: I started persistently chasing the idea: "what if animals could photo-
synthesize? and I got off the ship already green.


      Why didn't you accept degreening? And not just you:  why do some of you want to stay
green?

      I don't know: it's probably about that feeling      - when you enter the thicket and
merge with it: I'm probably not alone: what can't give up that absolute embrace:      that
ultimate unison..   (Says Madam Andrea Minor between her shining smile and gracefully gets
up from the chair: with which: at the same time: she nobly letting me know:   that she has
just finished answering my last third question.)