LordDunsanysPegana/ConcerningSish
LordDunsanysPegana/TheSayingsofKib -LordDunsanysPegana/TheSayingsofSlid
Concerning Sish
The Destroyer of Hours
Time is the hound of Sish.
At Sish's bidding do the hours run before him as he goeth
upon his way.
Never hath Sish stepped backward nor ever hath he
tarried; never hath he relented to the things that once he
knew nor turned to them again.
Before Sish is Kib, and behind him goeth Mung.
Very pleasant are all things before the face of Sish, but
behind him they are withered and old.
And Sish goeth ceaselessly upon his way.
Once the gods walked upon Earth as men walk and spake
with their mouths like Men. That was in Wornath-Mavai.
They walk not now.
And Wornath-Mavai was a garden fairer than all the
gardens upon Earth.
Kib was propitious, and Mung raised not his hand against
it, neither did Sish assail it with his hours.
Wornath-Mavai lieth in a valley and looketh towards the
south, and on the slopes of it Sish rested among the flowers
when Sish was young.
Thence Sish went forth into the world to destroy its
cities, and to provoke his hours to assail all things, and
to batter against them with the rust and with the dust.
And Time, which is the hound of Sish, devoured all
things; and Sish sent up the ivy and fostered weeds, and
dust fell from the hand of Sish and covered stately things.
Only the valley where Sish rested when he and Time were
young did Sish not provoke his hours to assail.
There he restrained his old hound Time, and at its
borders Mung withheld his footsteps.
Wornath-Mavai still lieth looking towards the south, a
garden among gardens, and still the flowers grow about its
slopes as they grew when the gods were young; and even the
butterflies live in Wornath-Mavai still. For the minds of
the gods relent towards their earliest memories, who relent
not otherwise at all.
Wornath-Mavai still lieth looking towards the south; but
if thou shouldst ever find it thou art then more fortunate
than the gods, because they walk not in Wornath-Mavai now.
Once did the prophet think that he discerned it in the
distance beyond mountains, a garden exceeding fair with
flowers; but Sish arose, and pointed with his hand, and set
his hound to pursue him, who hath followed ever since.
Time is the hound of the gods; but it hath been said of
old that he will one day turn upon his masters, and seek to
slay the gods, excepting only MANA-YOOD-SUSHAI, whose dreams
are the gods themselves -- dreamed long ago.
