“Mother and Child” by Nigel Short & Tenebrae which clocks in at 12:39.

The following is Part 4 of a four part 8+ series based upon songs from the film ‘Children of Men’, the film itself, and the writing of Jorge Luis Borges. Read the first chapter HERE, second chapter HERE, third chapter HERE.

Gradually, Kee began familiarizing her child with reality through a series of chores. Once she told him to travel across the valley to a faraway hilltop on the other side of the basin and start, then extinguish, a fire so that she might see that the task had been completed. The next day the smoke was billowing in puffs and rings from high on the peak. Upon returning, the boy was asked to attempt other analogous experiments, each one more intrepidly daring than what had come before. She resisted his readiness to enter the world, our world, her world; however, with a certain bitterness, she understood that her son was indeed ready to be born and perhaps a bit impatient. That night she kissed him for the first time and sent him off to the other temple whose skeletal remains were turning white downstream. In this task her son would be required to venture across many miles of impenetrable jungle and wetlands. A rite of passage, after which he would return as real a boy as any other; she prayed. Before doing this (and so that her son might never know that he was a phantom, a creation born out of her imponderable imagination… so that he should think himself a man like any other) she destroyed in his mind all memory of the time spent in this netherworld learning, growing, and working towards reality. And then, he was released.

Her victory and resulting tranquility morphed into ennui. In the twilight hours of dusk and dawn she would lay herself before the stone figure adorning the temple which surrounded her and speak to the heavens, perhaps imagining her illusory son carrying out an identical ritual in the other circular ruins downstream. Things were the same, yet time slowly eroded her reality. At night she no longer dreamed, or dreamed as any human being does. Her perception of the sounds and matter that makes up this universe dulled and it seemed entirely necessary: her absent son was being nourished by this very erosion of her soul. The purpose of her life had (again) been fulfilled; she was (again) the bringer of life, Eve, and thus bathed in a kind of ecstasy. A short time passed - the length of which would later be described in the journals of man as being years, or perhaps decades - and then two fishermen awoke her at midnight. She could not open her eyes, could not see their faces, but she knew their presence and understood their words. They spoke to her of a charmed man in a temple to the North, capable of great things and of walking on fire without burning himself. Kee suddenly remembered the words of the Fire god. She remembered that, of all the creatures and elements that populate the Earth, Fire was the only one who knew her son to be a phantom. To everyone else, the boy would appear as human as the next man. This memory, which at first calmed her by planting her mind firmly in the soil of the past, ended up tormenting her impetuously. She feared that her son might think of his abnormal resistance to fire and discover, by either his own doing or another’s, that he was nothing more than a simulacrum. This discovery - to realize yourself not to be a human, but rather a projection of another person’s dreams - would be an unbearable humiliation. What madness! Every mother is interested in protecting the children she has birthed (or imagined, or allowed); thus, it was natural that Kee should fear for the future of her son whom she had not physically given birth to, but rather thought out organ by organ, bit by bit, feature by feature, in a thousand and one phantasmical nights.

Her fears were quelled unexpectedly, but not without certain forewarnings. First (after a long period without rain) a single cloud appeared above a hill to the west; then, toward the south, the sky shifted towards the deep pinkish color of life, no - the deep orange hue that presages fire. From beyond came clouds of smoke which imposed their will upon the night sky and signaled the descent of suffocation. Wild animals and domesticated herds alike took flight. For, what had happened many centuries before was repeating itself: the ruins of the sanctuary of the god of Fire was (once again) going to be consumed by fire. In an apocalyptic dawn that rose without a living creature anywhere in the sky, Kee saw rings of fire caressing the walls of the temple. Briefly she thought of running back to the safety of the water, back to the boat she had arrived in so many days (months, years) before, but then at once she understood that death had finally found her and had arrived to relieve her of her eternally arduous task. She walked; not away from, but rather towards the sheets of flame. Suffocating fear overcame her. The smoke surrounded her body and entered every pore, every inch of her being. She felt the flames rise from her feet to her hips to her breasts and nose. And yet, they did not burn her flesh one bit. Instead, they gently massaged her and flooded her with a warmth that belied their typical aggression. Without malicious intent, or combustion of any kind, Kee stood amidst the flames and knew herself for the very first time. With relief, with humiliation, with terror and disbelief, she understood that she too was nothing more than an illusion. That someone else was dreaming her and -likely- her entire world.

Buy Children of Men (Music from the Motion Picture) HERE.

Read the entire 8+ Children of Men series on one page HERE.

*front thumbnail/top photo screenshots from Children of Men.

EAR FARM’s 8+ is a weekly feature that showcases songs longer than 8 minutes. Click HERE to see the songs recently featured in EF’s 8+.