The road was wide, metres twenty, it is not less. Excellent highway, 
Equal, as an ironing table. Hour was early, and the god of snails yet did not see 
One car. And it is possible, will not see see you in the evening, and it is necessary to come back in 
The house which any more was not for it the house. The beams reflected from damp asphalt 
Of rising sun hurt the eyes. Day promised to be roast, and a moisture quickly 
Evaporated. On either side of highway green meadows have been covered grey-haired dymkoj 
Dews. 
        The god of snails knew, that has risen too early. Has simply bothered to wait. In 
Last nights he woke up in three and could not fall asleep any more, turning on 
The crumpled bedsheets. It seemed to it, that he wastes time, though in this hole it 
Has already lost all that is possible. Having made of the decision, he did not know, where itself to put. 
It would be desirable to operate, move, something to do. He has hardly waited and 
This dawn though has killed aimlessly forty years. 
        And here now, when it at last has got out on a roadside of big road, 
There was no dolbanoj wheelbarrows which would pick up it and has brought... Where? 
Here he yet did not know it. But the hope has lodged in him, and it is already a lot of. 
        Good highway. Good, become almost unnecessary and thrown. Five 
Years back on seventy kilometres to the south have cleared other road and have constructed 
The bridge through the river that has reduced a way for tranzitnikov twice. Now settlement, 
In which there lived the god of snails, died out. There were one old men. Last two years 
There was no job – the present job, and the god of snails was interrupted by the casual 
Earnings. One time was on duty on a filling station – differently, than 
Watch, it was difficult to name. It is good, if it was possible to sell one hundred 
Litres for days. Sometimes he thought, that it would be quite good to have any 
Hobby, and then laughed at itself: to exchange a life for a hobby? There is no, it 
Will ruin it entirely... 
        The wife has left three years ago – it cut out it from memory, as cancer 
Tumour. False greedy a knot. Children at them were not. It can and to the best – 
He saw, how weeds and their seeds grow carries a dry wind. And loneliness 
All was felt more sharply. If soberly to look at things, there was at it nothing – 
Neither behind, nor ahead. Only road in anywhere which he to itself(himself) has thought up. 
In hope on what? So it is far it did not look. To begin with it sufficed most 
Roads. He has dared to act in film from a familiar spot, and the way laid before it – 
Most likely senseless and fraught with dangers about which it at all had no 
Concepts. But of that to it to be afraid? Eventually there are only two ways 
To die – in the bed and in a roadside ditch. All the rest – details and 
The scenery which are not changing an essence of the matter. 
        The god of snails has moved the backpack on the dried up site of a roadside. Again 
Has darted a glance in both parties – at first at the east where it was blinded by the ascending 
The sun, then on the West. Today he will wait the car. Should wait. And it 
Removed a question on in what direction to go. All will be solved for it by destiny. 
It was not necessary even to cast lots. Both in the west, and the big in the east laid 
The cities full of temptations, deceit and death. And further away – the oceans washing 
Continent. And it not a limit – were still the ships making flights from port 
In port. And unless they so strongly differed from usual trip buses? 
        The god of snails had a presentiment, that to it will be close on this earth, where 
It has appeared, where the hard has brought. And in heavens too it is close, and 
On the sea. So where this homeless and doomed soul was torn? He did not know. 
It was blind, his soul. Blind and homeless. And in what did not find to itself 
Rest and a consolation. 
        He looked at a highway tape. On it there were hardly appreciable shades. 
Similar on a gravel scattering, but not gravel. There was that, as always in this 
Time of year and in this hour. A habitual picture. Shades moved. Their movement is possible 
Was to notice, only if long and patiently to peer. Or to approach 
More close. But the god of snails did not approach. He knew, what is it the such. 
        Snails crept out on highway and went to hopelessly long way on 
Other party of road which it never to reach. For its memories any 
Independently has not crawled. What attracted them there? A blind instinct? Same 
Blind, how his soul? Really the instinct promised to them, that on that party 
It is better, what there there is more than food, the summer, longer a life is longer? Anything it there not 
Was, nevertheless they crept with stupid rectilinear persistence, and shades, 
Stretched from them early in the morning, reminded the cut off fingers. They crept 
And gibli in tens, in hundreds, but all the same everyone – in full loneliness... 
        There was something bewitching in it is intolerable slow, inevitable 
And voluntary movement to death. Migration of the doomed. The god of snails knew, that 
The part from them dries up on the road, many birds, and most of all peck them 
Perishes under wheels of cars – more correctly, giblo earlier. It was distributed hardly audible 
Crunch – also there was a small damp stain on asphalt. 
The validity presented a lesson: that's all, that remains from persistence, 
Senseless efforts and ridiculous hopes. And these ephemeral traces soon 
Disappeared under scorching beams of the sun. It is less than in an hour already there is nothing, 
Even memoirs. 
        Now birds, a heat, distance and own were enemies of snails 
Nonsense. And every morning repeated same... 
        The god of snails did not differ special mind – otherwise, can, 
It would be arranged in this life better. But it is not necessary to be the genius to understand: 
It – too a snail. A blind snail on the road, not suspecting about the deadly 
Threats and that there is its god, same lost, as well as he, 
The god standing somewhere on a roadside and observing of how it it is stupid and persistent 
Creeps from a green grass and plentiful dew on dead asphalt... Where? What for? 
Who knows? Anybody, even the one who costs on a roadside. 
        ... The Sun started to burn. The god of snails has looked in the cloudless 
The blue sky which through pair hours will turn to a ruthless paraboloid. 
Around there was no tree in which shade it is possible to take cover. Only 
Bushes and corn thickets have fallen asleep in one hundred metres from a roadside. 
        The god of snails has licked the cracked lips, has got a plastic flask, 
Has got drunk waters and was engaged in in what was engaged in such days already long years 
Approximately from five years' age when for the first time has heard a crunch and has seen 
Wet stains on asphalt. It has started to transfer snails on other party 
Roads.