Shhh

flickering candle, will you be my light
in the dark and distant places I hide?
night ever drags me through doors
of broken bone into lost, tragic rooms
made magically alive by a dying star
bleeding through the dusty window,
and my trailing fingers: dot, dot, drag,
draw two button holes and the button-bottom rim
smiling, the ashen glass; beaming, the candle
if you must be lost, might as well find yourself
lost at home,
asking questions of the loquacious faces in the walls:
do you understand how I forgot the world?
it was all there: hands, face, smiles
so you know, then, also
how the world flew away - do you?
it's difficult seeing another's world,
when your own grows too large before you



In a fantasy novel, were I a character, I think I may be the tragic villain. Not out of spite or anger at humanity, but a childishly competitive craving for knowledge. After countless hours in the library, I'd stumble upon some devilish volume no one had found for centuries, and I'd eagerly devour its pages. Already, my burgeoning magicks would have revealed themselves to me, and my cravings for continued prowess in conjuration and illusory tricks would entice me into a dangerous dive through terrible secrets.
It wouldn't be malevolent, believe me. But eventually, I'd conjure something that would consume me, or that I'd fallen too far to escape. Of course, it would have been prophesied long ago, and I'd be a perfect host for some evil djinn, having already mastered the many magicks of whatever world. In a strangely different universe, perhaps the hero finds me and drags me into the painful light of day, or a master discovers me and trains me in boring uses of the art without competitive aims. But I'm no Ged, and I'm no Kvothe, and I'm certainly no Harry Potter - I know where I stand. Maybe if I was fortunate, I'd be a Rincewind - at least then I'd be (Douglas Adams) mostly harmless.
I realized recently I wanted to write a novel that wasn't fiction, fantasy, sci-fi, or any of these, but actually non-fiction/essay. I started the other day, and I'm enjoying the process immensely. It will take me a while, perhaps, because I'll want to write it all down on paper before I transfer everything over to digital, but for once I'm actually really enjoying that process of conception and research.
I almost wish that I had chosen a more researchy major. Maybe I just wish I could be in school forever. I had a really great monday, all things considered. I think it will be a full week, but a pretty enjoyable one.

Silent Night

It's quiet, or the voices are, though the electric furnace burrs, the fan drones like the rotundest of grumbling bees, grandfather pendulates and wags his finger in time, the magic laundry box judders, the dish gremlins gurgle in their plastic house, a distant faucet drips as a river gone dry, wheeled monsters with bright eyes roll past with noises like masticating gravel, snowflakes drop with a serenity of mind, and the wind nibbles softly at the trees.
I stare up toward the stars betwixt the slats of the blinds, past the condensation on the glass, through the window and the screen and the branches of the trees - there are no stars, tonight. A night without moon, only clouds invisible and mute, like the house on this night of nights. But I imagine the stars: lions, old ladies, and bears, sitting and fighting and chasing their tails. How can all those animals fit? I asked. Won't the bear and the lion, the wolf and orion, the fox and the lynx, the dragon and the phoenix - won't they jostle and spar? The sky is so crowded with their lines and points.
Maybe they do, and some leave the sky for a season or two.
I dreamed that someone had come and replaced all our stars in the sky. I was immersed in a new universe with everything the same except the arrangement and names of the stars. They were named after the saints and fathers of Christendom: Paul who always points west, Peter, walking on the milky way water, Abraham, leading his son Isaac up the mountain, Israel staring up the ladder into heaven, Mary with her halo bright at the annunciation, and many more. No matter how they were explained to me, I was lost in a different sky beyond my understanding. I knew this world was beyond my ken, just because the stars were foreign - it was never meant for me.
But I awoke, and the stars fell in unique flakes to settle against the earth. They are not fire, as claimed, but ice, and soft as heaven's feather.