I dusted you out of the closet and brought you out into the light. It’s been a long time I’ve kept you locked up in there, in that little corner of nowhere. It makes it easier on the both of us, I think, to keep you out of sight. But, I thought, I would allow myself one hour. One hour to indulge myself in what was, what is, what could have been. To feel the pain and to feel the burn and to feel other things as well. There are other things, even through the burning, even after all of this time. After all of this time.

Time is a strange thing. I wonder what drove Einstein to understand it. Was it simply the faculty of knowing, or was there some motive for his study? Did he quest with purpose, some ulterior motive to know more? Some secret desire to not only understand but to manipulate? To strive against some wrong, to undo some mistake, to alter what came? Is this why he dreamt long the dreams of madness, of science, of parallel worlds, of time immemorial? Is this what drives men to understand?

We danced all night, in that memory. It never happened that way, I know, but we did. We danced to music heard and unheard and we drove with the radio through hours of darkness, nothing but the rain. Drip drip. I still, to this day, fail to carry an umbrella when I can. Because the rain touched my skin and washes away the tears. Why do I think back, why are you still in my closet, gathering dust?

I stand strong because of the strength that you gave me. In dark times you were there for me and now, I burn, as a light, to make my own path. But the world beyond is murky – I lose my focus, I lose my drive. You were never good at getting me to focus on anything, and yet things were so clear. This is addiction, this is pain, this is loss, this is the bottle. My hands dust off the bottle like an old lover meeting her again and pop. The cork goes off. Your smell fills the room. Pop, the cork goes off again, and again.

There’s a hole in the world. It feels like we should have known.

When I’m down and my hands are tied
I cannot reach a pen for me to draw the line
From this pain I just can’t disguise
It’s gonna hurt but I’ll have to say goodbye
Up in my lonely room
When I’m dreaming of you
Oh what can I do
I still need you, but
I don’t want you now
-The Coral, Dreaming of you

It’s not cold, even though it’s December. Decembers are never cold, even though I feel they should be at the time. There’s a jacket – a suede jacket… no, that comes later. There’s a breeze. That quiet breeze of ominous destiny.

This is the day the warrior was born.

He was conceived a long time before. He was conceived in a chess match. Two minds met in the battlefield of ideologies, and they struggled. Two minds met because they saw through the impurity. They understood the mentality of the people around them. And they understood each other. Twins staring into a mirror: light and dark. Though who was whom was hard to say. The warrior was conceived in a chess match.

He was born with a kiss.

The kiss, mind. The one that changed everything. The one that opened Pandora’s box.

The boy was no angel before that. But he was one of the good guys. His soul was largely untainted. HE did things because they were the right thing to do. He fought because nobody else would fight. He played chess.

He conceived a warrior while groping her under a desk. She kissed him and gave birth to the warrior.

Like all creatures of mortal origin, the warrior was useless at birth. He was but the surfacing of an ideal. Something that would strive at some future point, a blade that had no edge. Just a piece of carbon steel, waiting to be shaped and molded into its future shape, or to sit and be corroded by the passage of time.

He doesn’t remember now why he was in that room. Was he looking for her? Maybe. But they were alone. Alone in a room for the first time. The lights were on. She kissed him. He kissed her back. And she left.

The warrior, conceived a pawn in a board of chess, was born.

Ex Mentis

A man lies, thrown back in his chair, the glow across his face that of some forgotten ecstasy fulfilled. His eyes are closed; beneath the lids the waxy haze of those who search, tiredly, inwardly, throughout for some forbidden truth. Who knows what those eyes search for, what the man tries to find, by giving in to the truth of the destructive path, the path of flesh.

His smile is lost, forever, never showing itself through the experience, beyond a contemptful sneer. It’s the vain smile of the modern age, a snooty and hateful look which replaced the warm and dulcet vibrancy of the old age. Ruin and decay are the children of this inequity; the putrescense growing from the age of discontent to the dreams of those who had come before and will come again.

This man envisions that future, lost inside that ecstasy which he has long lost and is long searching for again. But his memory will fade, as all memories fade, because no great understanding can survive a day’s worth in the mind of the average man, the man who destroys himself, and lets himself rot away.

Ex Memoriam et Impraesentiarum

Darkness. It lies beneath the surface, beneath the cold exterior. What is the face but a shell for the truth of what lies underneath? But beneath the shell, the darkness, for the light refuses to shine, refuses to rise. A setting sun does not consent to rise until it’s time is due.

Light. He lies in blessed light, naked all throughout, in skin and beyond skin, lying peaceful, dreaming. He’s never been so happy in his life as he is now, sleeping, quiet. There is nothing to disturb him, no thoughts, nothing but peace, peace and a smile, knowing that this is his place.

Rage. That is all that remains, the fires of the burning rage within. That and the remains of the conflagration – ashes, scars and broken flesh. Broken, beaten, dead, diseased, that is all that remains. Except the rage, the burning fire. Fire with no fuel, so there is no flame.

Peace, the kind he’s never tasted, lying there in softness. It is perfect.

It is dead.

Ex Memoriam

He holds her, glad to finally see her after after so long a time. She takes him, fully onto her, still not sure if he’s really here or if this is just another dream, another mad and crazy dream. But they are solid, whole, flesh and blood. Warmth spreads as skin touches skin, separate after too long, two halves become one.

He’s smiling. For the first time in a long time, he smiles unburdened, unworried, uncaring. The smile is because the wait is over, because he’s finally arrived precisely where he wants to be. It is the smile of a man who knows that all is right with the world. She’s smiling too. For all of the same reasons, because her travail is over, because she doesn’t want him to see her cry.

Cry, which is what she’s done for all the world, hidden away, and crying. Because he wasn’t there, because he had to go, because he couldn’t stay. He cried too, but he wouldn’t admit it, would never admit it in a million years. Because he’s the stronger one, and it is his burden to carry in silence, to go on in that tepid silence.

There are people staring, watching, waiting. They wonder about the weather, and they wonder about their business, and whether or not they left the iron on or the stove. But they also wonder about the couple hugging, for all the world to see, and what it is that has brought them so happy, happily together. They wonder if he cheated on her, they wonder if she slept with someone else. They don’t wonder if they’re related – that’s not a sibling’s hug, and those aren’t sibling’s tears fighting in her eyes. For all the world to see, they belong there, in that hug. And it makes them smile.