I never wanted to live forever. It will never end, but it feels so final. Never aging, never dying, never changing. I watch those who chose eternity with wide eyes and bated breath, waiting for their inevitable fall. I feel them, and they are divine. But divinity is not for mortal minds. It pulses and writhes under their skin, staining their thin lips and bared teeth gold with ichor. They hunger and shake, and are never sated. And now I know why the pantheon was declared mad. They feast like they are gods and drink like nothing can touch them, but they are like shattered glass and burnt pages of a declaration that used to represent freedom. Untouched by death, they are prisoners of their own constructs.

I am content with being human, singing and crying and hoping and breaking.

I don't want to live forever, immortalized in a world that does not care.

It does not care.

I never wanted it. I didn't want to live forever.

h.f.m.