Why do they leave us?
When the sun is shining on,
When there's no moonlight to devour,
And the skies are blue and lorn (1).

They know loving, a different way,
A total one side ardour( 2 )
They keep shining, for our affection,
Even when the sun is strong.
.
Such is the love, of stars for us,
For the moon and rivers and ponds,
Propel your worries towards the sky,
Because all stars do have amours( 3 ). .

I look up at the chaos around me
and see.
I see people saying their last prayers,
Waiting for their fateful endings,
I hear the church bell toll in its last call,
I feel the suffocating heat from the burning buildings,
I smell the smoke from the ignited city,
I taste the desperation in the air and the bitterness of regrets.

But in the middle of this tumult,
One thing stands out;
One person.

A little boy stands there in a tan attire,
dark gray ash contrasting his almost-white hair
and tears stains on his ivory cheeks.
A grim expression marking his features,
He shakes as if freezing
and although the heat has almost become unbearable,
he stands in the middle of the flames
barefoot yet unharmed.
A scythe lays at his feet,
and a pale horse stands by his side,
making his small body look even smaller.

As if feeling my stare,
he locks eyes with me.

And as the world burns down,
the reflection of the cataclysm in his brown eyes
and the look of innocent incomprehension he wears
is the single most heartbreaking thing in the moment.

Suddenly, I do not care about the screams and cry of the despondent goners.
I do not feel the harsh scorch of the burnt remains under my bare feet.
I do not mind the tears welling up in my eyes due to the fumes.
They are but a distant reminder of the atrocity surrounding me.
I can only focus on the strange guilt reflected in his warm eyes.

From those same eyes, a tear rolls down his cheeks
And as it reaches his dimpled chin,
he raises a little hand to wipe it away
And then waves at me.
I do not wave back,
too stunned to move or react,
But I could tell he did not expect me to anyways.

With one last look,
he picks up the scythe with an unusual easiness
and turns to walk towards the flames,
the horse close behind him.
And soon, they are one with the flames.

All roads lead here, the Conduit says.
You cannot count the infinite paths.
To fathom every touch is madness.
But, brick by brick, time after time..

This place has written its own history.

How can it be so, in such a small plot,
To spin the tales of so many?

To be the grand hall of tears and joy,
misery and folly, hope and fear?

Who would we be without it?
How are we so bound to a singularity?

We must marvel at the commonness of it all.
We must marvel and be thankful.
We must marvel but not dwell.

All places, in all worlds are the shapers of creation.

bursting through his skin, the insects crawling on the inside found their way to every corner of his soul, and he stood there wrapped in agony of a thousand burning suns, and the moon was ever present as it has ever been.

the battle was lost ages ago but only now the seeds were sprouting from the ends of a forgotten symphony, played by the devil, and groomed by the ills of a broken man.

the light of a thousand burning stars couldn't save him from this darkness, casted by the absence of one mere lonely ball of fire, barely big enough to leave behind a legacy that would survive the approaching end everything there ever was has to bear, and live with.

and in that moment of utter despair and pain, a song was sung, from across the different lands and seven seas, as far as anybody has ever gone, whispered out to the cold by the whisperer, seeking a final good-bye, one last of times, and as many heart beats.

the sound never dies, the swollen winds can find their ways to any who dares to listen, to breathe it in, and swallow it down.

as it did that one night before the spring, at that lonely hour, for the man in the dirt, fighting his brain from exploding.

as he lay there in trance, his face stuck to his knees and arms wrapped in a cloak, to keep the demons away and insects from taking the last of what remains, mumbling to himself broken words left clinging in the deepest corners of his diseased conscience.

at the very end, there's only light, for darkness will lose any meaning, any sight without a spectator, it would cease to exist.

and maybe that was the reason, or maybe it didn't have one, just like a million little tales flowing in every direction, on this excluded part of the universe, in depths of blinding darkness, barely visible to the naked eye.

but whatever it took, the magnificent sun rose as it has done, faithfully, for as long as anything can remember, to feed the tiny little speck of nothing, one more day in the awakening.

the spring had come, and the man was free,
and all that is left was stardust.

Ah, I remember her well.

She used to roam the woods brandishing her scepter of sticks
Commanding the creatures of the forest
The blue jays loved her, all the animals loved her, but, especially those blue jays
They brought her gifts.
And accompanied her on all her adventures
And watched her from the branches
In return
She gave offerings of bread and warm milk
And wore their feathers in her hair
Oh my,
her hair was a wild mess
Sticks
Pebbles
Feathers
And Braids
And somehow
That wild tangled mess
Made me smile
She made everyone smile

She took a particular liking to me
I watched over her
but
in reality
she watched over me
Imagine that
a little girl
pep in her step
and sparkle in her eye
taking care of a scarred man like me

We had a trade
a weekly occurrence
A story for a story
A tale for a tale
She would whisper a story filled to the brim with
fairies and trolls
and trees with purple blossoms
and golden roots
I would hand her knowledge about the world

She saw the truth in people
called them flavors
said mine was a cup of hot chocolate
spiked
with peppermint
I once asked her what her truth is
asked her about her flavor
Frosting and moondust
she said
with a smile

Now don't look at me like that,
She had her flaws
Even the most magnificent paintings faded with time.
What happened you ask?
She grew up

And everything changed
The winds didn't carry the scent of honeysuckle
And the crickets never sang.

She cut her hair.
And her smile was guarded
Weighted down by a heavy stone.

The Bluejays observed solemnly from the dead tree branches
As she withered away

The forest no longer hummed
And the town never felt so lonely
Even I lost a piece of me
When she got on that train
Without a wave goodbye

Maybe one day
The creek will chuckle again
And she will come back and
Finish that story
About the king and his butterflies
And I will tell the tale
About the origin of the moon.

But, perhaps that is just an old man's wishful thinking.
~

Herald of the sacred keep
Thunder in his gilded hand
Stirring all the souls who weep
Into realms of floating sand