General Question
Could I please get some input on my short story?
Basically, during English my teacher wanted us to do on short stories. So he gave each of us a random picture. Mine was of a gargoyle. I created it quite quickly and presented it to the class two days after. You tell me what you think of it first and how you think I should improve it (structure-wise, in terms of vocabulary, punctuation blah-de-blah..)
Here it is:
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Time in Stone
I stopped as I was walking towards the city square. There was a gargoyle on the crumbling facade of a building. Water was pouring out of its mouth into a basin, overflowing into a hole in the ground which somehow channeled the water back to the mouth of the gargoyle.
I lowered my camera and began to think to myself.
By whose hands did this beast come to being? A genius? Some menial workers who were not paid enough to even buy a loaf of bread? Did the sweat and blood which created it look as pained as the look chiseled onto its face now? Chained to the machinery of society?
By whose plans were the pipes engineered to fit into the vast maze of plumbing existing beneath this city, a whole network explored as much as the moon?
Under which king was this statue created? A iron-handed king? A benevolent dictator?
Was it unveiled to great fanfare, graced by the monarch in all his finery? Or quietly started, the water pouring out of its virgin mouth like a gentle stream, beginning a cycle which would last for centuries?
What happened to this gargoyle as the city was in the throes of revolution, with bullets flying and swords flashing?
Did anybody fall in front of you gargoyle? To be taken away by comrades or to be kicked into the gutter with hatred?
And as the skies filled with the planes of the enemy, what were you doing gargoyle? Did you recoil in fear? Were you afraid that you would be destroyed in a single blast, to disappear forever? Did you think that the water pouring through your mouth would never do so again?
And now… You are faced with a new threat. Will the venom-tinged rain from the skies slowly etch away the fine details of pain in your face? Will you one day be molded by poisonous water into formless rock, a victim of man’s greed for material comfort?
And in the centuries to come, will you still be here, dear creature of stone? Will you be torn down from your perch to make way for the new? Will you be remembered when you are no more? For though you have survived far longer than the short life of a man, you will never last forever: brief in the sands of time.
But do you ever wonder, gargoyle? Do you, as you sit there with water calmly flowing from you? Or do you just exist like the animals, never wondering, never seeking, just being.
As I pondered on this, I lifted my camera up again. And took a picture and carried on walking towards the city square.
There were ten thousand more such gargoyles in the city. That’s what the travel brochure said.
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So yeap, improvements tip would be greatly appreciated! And from what I gathered, my class generally liked it.
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