HOW YOU SHOULD KNOW US

DEATH, DEFEAT, AND FEAR

We do not die.
We do not fear death.
Destroy the Body, and the Animus is cast into The Darkness.
But the Animus returns.
But we are not all brave.
We feel pain, and fear it.
We feel shame, and fear it.
We feel loss, and fear it.
We hate the Darkness, and fear it.

The Scamps have small thoughts, and cannot fear greatly.
The Vermai have no thoughts, and cannot fear.
The Dremora have deep thoughts, and must master fear to overcome it.

THE CLAN BOND

We are not born;
we have not fathers nor mothers, yet we have kin and clans.
The clan-form is strong. It shapes body and thought.
In the clan-form is strength an purpose

THE OATH BOND

We serve by choice.
We serve the strong, so that their strength might shield us.
Clans serve by long-practice, but practice may change.
Dremora have long served the dreamer but not always so.
Practice is secure when oath-bonds are secure, and trust is shared.
When oath-bonds are weak, there is pain, and shame, and loss, and Darkness, and great fear.

HOW WE THINK ABOUT MAN

Perhaps you find Scamps comic, and Vermai brutish.
How then do you imagine we view you humans?
You are the Prey, and we are the Huntsmen.
The Scamps are the Hounds, and the Vermai the Beaters.
Your flesh is sweet, and the chase is diverting.
As you may sometimes praise the fox or hare, admiring its cunning and speed, and lamenting as the hounds tear its flesh, so do we sometimes admire our prey, and secretly applaud when it cheats our snares or eludes pursuit.
But, like all worldly things, you will in time wear, and be used up.
You age, grow ugly, weak, and foolish.
You are always lost, late or soon.
Sometimes the prey turns upon us and bites.
It is a small thing.
When wounded or weary, we fly away to restore.
Sometimes a precious thing is lost, but that risk makes the chase all the sweeter.

MAN'S MYSTERY

Man is mortal, and doomed to death and failure and loss.
This lies beyond our comprehension - why do you not despair?

I remember the day we first met.

Two scrawny, energetic young scamps too excited to make the transition into our education.
From day one, we were together.
All day, every day.
People asked us if we were brother and sister.
And everytime, our answer quickly escaped our grins...
                       Yes.

Let's fast-forward to the third grade.
Our heads were still innocent enough not to know the flaws
we would eventually have but I was still mature enough to know
that when you walked up to me that morning with
tears and terror streaming down your face,
letting the words "My mom left us" seep through your painful gasps.

I was nine years old when I first saw someone's heart break.
I tried to sweep the pieces back up and glue them back together...but I failed.
It wasn't until later that night that my mom woke me
in the middle of the night to explain that your mother didn't leave,
but went to prepare a safe hiding spot from your father's fists.
We talked on the phone every night until you came back.
The stupid chatter of whatever a nine year old even thinks about
tying up the phone lines for hours at a time.
That was the first time you told me you loved me
It was the first time first time I ever believed it.

Now let's fast forward to the seventh grade.
Junior high.
A boiling *** of hormones and hate.
By this point, I hadn't talked to you in two months.
The judging panel of life had already confirmed what I knew was to happen.
Bubbly, boy-crazy blond girl rises to the top
Insecure, boy-crazy ****** boy sinks like a boulder.

I was thirteen when I first felt my heart break.
My eyes were opened to the **** life was ready to dump on my doorstep.
I knew that lines were to be drawn
I just never would have guessed we'd be on opposite sides.
I got called ******.
You called yourself silent.

Next, let's talk about year that ended everything: senior year.
A year of endings.
Graduation from the hell hole that was high school.
Leaving my mother for the first time since birth
Leaving my friends since the first day we stepped onto the playground together
thirteen years earlier.

We started off strong.
We were determined to end our school years the way we started them: together.
We would go off to the same college, get an apartment,
and everything was going to be fine.

Six months had passed
We hadn't spoken for one of them.
You had me pegged as your sworn enemy.
I was terrified to wake up in the morning
because I knew I would have to look at you
instead of seeing you.

I was eighteen when you broke my heart for the final time.
Your army of farm-town morally upright teenagers
had done their best to destroy me.
But I still walked. I still dragged myself around,
****** and bruised from your attacks.
I thought things were cooled down.
I just wanted out.
Then you said it.
That final day.
You called me a ******
and said you hated me.

Now, almost a year later, whenever I think of you my eyes start welling up.
Your words, spoken and unspoken, still sting.
I know that I hate you.
But I don't know why I still care.

What I do know is that I don't need you.
I've met the most wonderful group of people
far greater than I could have ever imagined.
But still, whenever I'm with them, I'm thinking of you.
Wondering what I need to do for them that I didn't do for you.
I just hope their feet are more stable than yours.
I can't handle anyone else running away.

I'll have you know the movies love me,
they love my lovely face in silhouette
and they say, 'oh you are the reason we do what we do.'
I think you should know the sidewalk loves me,
they heave my great weight effortlessly
and say, 'oh, it's such an honor to hold your burdens up.'
You should probably be aware
that waters love me.
they ****** me in the most intimate places
and say, 'oh how can I not tickle you so?'
and luck, she burrows in the meager coins in my pocket
while she seduces a golden deity
to give me baby prosperities.
Blessings, those scamps, they just adore me!
Ringing and ringing their bright silver bells
so that only I can hear them...
throwing  butterflies down with the rain so the drops
fall
Softly
Down
against
my
skin
because
Time, he seduces me.
He takes me into the strongest hold and tells me stories!
Oh, the stories Time will weave just so I don't leave his lap and-
I'll warn you, the stars are mesmerized by tracing the shadows in my face.
They love to play hide in seek,
they hide in my eyes for days and I can't find them.
And Laugh!
Laugh thinks I am her playmate
and she shares whispers with no other.
With no other that is not
me.
I am loved the universe wide,
I am loved
Far reaches of the sky,
I am loved.
Beneath the sticking blades of grass-
yes, loved there as well.
I am loved,
Now hold my hand and
Love me too.

Sahn
3/11/15

breezing 70 in the blue three on the tree
65 Dodge Dart down I-75
to Toledo from Detroit
with my eyes  to
America dreaming, running to or from
concrete approaching,
maybe the nearest exit
may be my  abutment
or my future the worn torn bench seat -
fixed mind eyes concentrated
like frozen  orange juice canned-
blurring exits with on-ramps
my mind's eye constipated
violet lamps illuminating,
where convicts and scamps and
confused gather to try to ride
tires to nowhere to find
no signs of life
here but the slant-six cylinders
firing

Furry feet and floppy ears, so adorable it can bring you to tears. Whimpering and yipping all hours of the night. Chewing on your favorite shoes to your sheer terror and delight. No matter what the breed no one can resist. A sad eye puppy with a cold wet nose. Warming and loving no matter what your day was like. It is willing to lick your feet even when nothing else might. Such playful scamps that take up space on a rug. With all of our emotions we want one, it must be puppy love.

Scallywags, scamps and *****
Loki, Ladies and lust
Crowley, Lana and rust
Dandies, pirates and trust

Hobbler, the crow, was lame
but he had game, and props
being a few other birds, not game,
city birds, begging and scavenging
savaging, all the same road ****
chill when humans came close
they became verbose, false bravado
for weightless bags of bone and feathers
whether or not noticed, scurrying
ducking under benches, cars, then
flapping half a bird lap up, down
around the service lamps; the scamps!
Their pirate leader does its one leg hop
and one can imagine a gang plank stop
with a heave-** flank and up they rise
into the market sky and to return
short of a ****** but gang none-the-less

-cec