Notes: 1) Hakkai is never allowed to talk to my ubermartyr Kirkmuse again. 2) The title's from Dickinson. 3) You should hear the music Allen Shawn wrote to the poem; it's gorgeous. 4) I am, perhaps unfairly, blaming Rana, Snowy, and Rune for this. Because, apparently, I'm not allowed to blame Gojyo. See disclaimer. =,=
It's no good.
Oh, you can have his shoulder to rest on. You can have the rallying flag of his hair at your side every day, every hour, you can fill him with yourself until it turns to a black silhouette against your light. You can taste the tender pink furrows in his wind-roughened summer brown. You can drown in his warmth, breathe your name from his lips, feel his willing cries course your blood.
And that's all.
He grudges nothing. Anything you need--and isn't that just it? He'll be big brother, white knight, the grit to polish a gun. If you need it, he'll even be everything.
When did you come to need anything? What happened to that still-faced boy, that self-contained breath of frost? When did you learn desire for the world beyond the page, for color more vibrant than clean, sharp ink could afford you?
It was her--sweet, glorious disaster. She was the one to paint the world in delicate eggshell strokes. But shells shatter, and the shards beneath your skin leave you bleeding still, leave glistening footprints behind you, crimson dogging your steps until you can't imagine looking behind you, before you, without that bright reminder catching the wind at your side.
And you know this, this reliance, this false, fragile security. You've lived before with this feeling of everlasting days stretching ahead. The broken promise of a future is more painful than anything--you survived it, but what will be left of you this time? What will remain this time, when the temptation of peace is snatched away again?
Desire. Desire. What could be more useless?
Maybe it's time to slip on again that orphan's mask. It's unlikely that anyone would notice the frozen steel and silent eyes, so long as you paint it with a smile.
It was luxury to begin with, and unaffordable. Really, what kind of a fool...
Foolishness. Just that and nothing more, to think more of it than the natural expression of a generous nature. And really...
Foolishness to think strong arms wouldn't reach to enfold the next lonely princess. Laughable, wishing that well-used hands would hold back from the next battered puppy. Arrogance beyond imagination to expect that broad back to stand tall in the circle of your protection, and not bend away to scoop up the next spitting, abandoned alley-cat.
Really, what kind of fool falls for prince charming?
Fool, bind yourself tight. Lash yourself to motley. Grow the void and renounce envy, because not even losing him could be worse than recreating him small enough for your own grasping fingers to enclose. You don't want him chained. You don't want him fettered.
Of course not. Of course not, of course.
The story acclaims an emperor who cut away a priceless triangle of yellow silk, left it pillowing his beloved's dreams. A charming story, a generous display of devotion. Cotton isn't silk, and surely freedom and nobility are more precious than a lazy moment's sleep.
Maybe it's time to leave the sleeves behind. If the falcon won't perch, cast off the glove.
After all, isn't it enough to see wings spread against the sky without trying to lay claim to them? You could tame him with a hood, but how many in a group can walk blinded at once, shut away from the sun?
You have that, at least. If you can't touch the fire, at least you can still feel sunlight on your face.
Maybe it's time to borrow a sunbeam.
Soar high, then. Just do what you do, and never mind who benefits, who's burned. You could do it once. Surely you can recreate the habit? Surely this charred ember has a spark of pride left. It's too exhausting to reign back to this gentle glow, too greedy to demand that someone feed you air. It's not like you. Flare bright, flare steady. Flare cold. Be sun on the snow. Need nothing.
All you can do is give back. All you can feel is reflection. Whose idea was it, to begin with, that you could give directly, without a buffer of glass to pull the light and clarify the world? Your reborn eye may see clearly, but clearly you don't.
You haven't been reflecting very well, you know. You've been relying on others to show you the way. There's been too much clumsy tripping, too much clutching at anything within reach. You've come too close to falling.
Maybe it's time to go back to spectacles.
Or is that too obvious?
Email: Nightfall@suntemple.org