01-03-2016, 02:15 PM
But I won't rot, I won't rot. Not this mind and not this heart.
Perhaps this prelude has been the longest.
He cannot remember, because no matter how long, it was always too long. Too close to flirting with the threshold of forever – far too often threatening an eternity in place of a mere decade or so. When they are together, it is a diminutive glimpse of a millennia, drawing every second dry to the bone. Extending every touch and every breath as long as possible. They have become too out of time. Too unfamiliar now with the true nature of its second and minute hands – as sure as they have kept themselves in life for longer than either of them would have thought possible, so are they they still subjects of reality. Of physics, of gravity; of maturation and of senescence. When he dreams of falling from the sky, it is not a mere nightmare, but an omen. A promise. That one day like her shoulders and cheekbones will be chewed away by the force of wind and nature, ground to dust; so will his wings cease to carry his weight, a death as good as anything biological and total. So this may be the longest of their separations, and maybe that is why when she calls on the specter of death he simply makes a hm sound in his throat. Acceptance (accepted long ago) and macabre curiosity.
And a bit of longing, almost perceptible, for a fair ending.
They are too old, and death scares neither of them. At least, not the mention of it. That is a mercy of age, to be able to look at the inevitable and smile – if not with full acceptance, at least with a sweet saudade; and they have much to smile back on. Though it does not seem like much, and even between the two of them they were unlikely to recall a full picture, it is all there. If not in specifics, but in the soft recollections of their senses. And that is most powerful. In the telling scent of pre-rain, and in the petrichor thereafter. In the touch, and with some sadness and shame from him, in the fruits of their union – two, in theory, neither of whom he has met, and that perhaps would be his biggest regret in the end.
He could ask her about them – he wanted to, but like a child stayed for fear of reprimand, he is wary to admit his own misdeeds as a father. And, because he is afraid of any underlying sourness or disappointment she might have felt of him, as sharp as a knife to the shoulder blades. Because they are not his only, when they should be. Almost all of the others are the tokens of the intemperance borne of loneliness.
He has not always been proud. But he has never been cruel.
He inhales, feeding his mind and heart, too long caught in the grip of famine. ’We die.’ He looks at her, without rain and without the sharp sudden revelation of lightning. Maybe it is the moonlight that softens her, or maybe he does not see the tightness of her flesh and bones as anything more than a lovelier angle in age. ’We’ll be lucky if we go together.’ This delivers a strike, and his brow furrows together. ’We’ll be lucky…’ He abhors the pessimism, the insolence of it to intrude on them, here! But he cannot help the anxiety that creeps up the knots of his spine. “Then we’d best keep close, my dear,” He mutters sadly, feeling her touch on his wing and he remembers what it is there for. He lifts it up, moving to stand rib-to-rib with her, a place to lean. He drapes it over her back and down her side, the wind brushing the broad, black secondary feathers against her belly. “That’s the only shot we’ve got.”
And he cannot belie the doubt in his voice, and the utter heft of longing for her vision to be their reality. They deserved that and more; a time-machine, the will to settle down together, enough respect for their love to let it stay. But they are wanderers. Piteous creatures.
He cannot remember, because no matter how long, it was always too long. Too close to flirting with the threshold of forever – far too often threatening an eternity in place of a mere decade or so. When they are together, it is a diminutive glimpse of a millennia, drawing every second dry to the bone. Extending every touch and every breath as long as possible. They have become too out of time. Too unfamiliar now with the true nature of its second and minute hands – as sure as they have kept themselves in life for longer than either of them would have thought possible, so are they they still subjects of reality. Of physics, of gravity; of maturation and of senescence. When he dreams of falling from the sky, it is not a mere nightmare, but an omen. A promise. That one day like her shoulders and cheekbones will be chewed away by the force of wind and nature, ground to dust; so will his wings cease to carry his weight, a death as good as anything biological and total. So this may be the longest of their separations, and maybe that is why when she calls on the specter of death he simply makes a hm sound in his throat. Acceptance (accepted long ago) and macabre curiosity.
And a bit of longing, almost perceptible, for a fair ending.
They are too old, and death scares neither of them. At least, not the mention of it. That is a mercy of age, to be able to look at the inevitable and smile – if not with full acceptance, at least with a sweet saudade; and they have much to smile back on. Though it does not seem like much, and even between the two of them they were unlikely to recall a full picture, it is all there. If not in specifics, but in the soft recollections of their senses. And that is most powerful. In the telling scent of pre-rain, and in the petrichor thereafter. In the touch, and with some sadness and shame from him, in the fruits of their union – two, in theory, neither of whom he has met, and that perhaps would be his biggest regret in the end.
He could ask her about them – he wanted to, but like a child stayed for fear of reprimand, he is wary to admit his own misdeeds as a father. And, because he is afraid of any underlying sourness or disappointment she might have felt of him, as sharp as a knife to the shoulder blades. Because they are not his only, when they should be. Almost all of the others are the tokens of the intemperance borne of loneliness.
He has not always been proud. But he has never been cruel.
He inhales, feeding his mind and heart, too long caught in the grip of famine. ’We die.’ He looks at her, without rain and without the sharp sudden revelation of lightning. Maybe it is the moonlight that softens her, or maybe he does not see the tightness of her flesh and bones as anything more than a lovelier angle in age. ’We’ll be lucky if we go together.’ This delivers a strike, and his brow furrows together. ’We’ll be lucky…’ He abhors the pessimism, the insolence of it to intrude on them, here! But he cannot help the anxiety that creeps up the knots of his spine. “Then we’d best keep close, my dear,” He mutters sadly, feeling her touch on his wing and he remembers what it is there for. He lifts it up, moving to stand rib-to-rib with her, a place to lean. He drapes it over her back and down her side, the wind brushing the broad, black secondary feathers against her belly. “That’s the only shot we’ve got.”
And he cannot belie the doubt in his voice, and the utter heft of longing for her vision to be their reality. They deserved that and more; a time-machine, the will to settle down together, enough respect for their love to let it stay. But they are wanderers. Piteous creatures.
I won't rot.