INIATURE DIORAM INIATURE DIORAM
Stella Lei
MINIATURE DIORAMAS
Clanging trains rouse the paper dolls. They shudder from slumber, peeling themselves from the table, shelf, floor, and stretching their card stock arms. They have been still for so long. Wind rushing from the window topples three, and they flounder, rosy cheeks pressed into crumbs and lint. One skids across the rooms, sliding into the darkness under a cabinet. The dolls wobble to unsteady feet. They brush their twodimensional skirts, tissue paper crinkling under chipped hands. Paint flakes off the corners. The legs of some are bent, material creased in pulpy knots that fold at the slightest touch. These dolls kneel, palms to the ground, spines arched in eternal question. Eyes wide, the others meander—they have missed so much during their sleep. Unvacuumed corners cradle them in dust. Their colors are faded in the fingerprint-greased mirror and their silhouettes bulge around glass, distorted by years of sweat-sweet hands. Some open a drawer and uncover a stack of postcards buried under stamps and pens, strange worlds glowing from glossy paper. Soft mountains dissipate into clouds. Canyons bite through stone. Sunlight, sunlight, sun. Bolded script leaps across the photographs. The dolls trace unfamiliar names, hold Rocky Mountains and Zion between their chapped lips, press each syllable into the roofs of their mouths and let them dissolve. They stare at the images, touch the paper until they too are dusted and pale, clouded by grime.
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