WildWolfMoon94

There’s a selfish sort of grief when one of the close-ish die. A neighbor, a distance relative, a friend of a friend that you could have been friends with yourself, if life were different. Close enough to chat, maybe add on FaceBook, but not close enough where their absence is a truly defined loss in your world. You can pretend, at least for a while, that they still exist, somewhere. A friend in another continent, a relative in another state, a person you knew in high school who moved away – their close-ish deaths are bizarrely easy to accept, because the world might be lying to you; they might not be gone. Who are you to know? So

You have never been bold. It is a statement, a fact, something all-encompassing and universal. You are bright enough to realize its validity, and to recognize your own inherent lack of drive to confront it. It was true when you were six and will just as true when you’re eighty, and there is little to nothing you can truly do to mend it, if it is a problem at all. It’s okay, you justify. You’re not bold, unable to say what is in your heart and on your mind, but you are kind, and can make good chocolate chip cookies, and you’re good enough at English that people pay you to help edit their essays – which makes you

“I hope you’re happy,” Failure mumbles glumly, slumping over the rusted railing. The sea is restless tonight, shifting irritably, prowling along its shores. The faint spray rests lightly on the bridge of Failure’s nose, and he shuts his eyes heavily. Exhaustion pulses in him like a second heartbeat, rattling his bones and pounding at the sides of his skull. He has never felt young, and nights like this only worsen the brittleness in his body, until he feels fragile enough to fall into a million little pieces at the brush of a feather. “Of course I’m happy,” the universe replies, wringing out a nebula

It comes in shades of purple. Amaranthine (waking up to late winter sunshine) Lavender (flowers in spring) Lilac (kisses on the cheek) Indigo (star smeared sky) Amethyst (lurking in the depths of the earth, at the heart of everything like the eye of the storm) In shades of purple, she falls in love. In paint store-sample chips, her heart flutters like a baby bird’s, and in the colors of the sunset she tastes desire, hot as lava, on her tongue. Her heart is melting, liquid heat down in her toes, and everything is as fragile as crystals and as unyielding as diamonds. Because his voice is soft and tinted with orchids, and he cradles

In the spring, lovers canoe in cool cerulean waters, watching the sunlight ripple off the waterfall and passing each other shy glances through their eyelashes. Flowers crown the surrounding hills, the wind buttery daffodils and blushing roses. The sun is lazy in spring, heady on the scent of the flowers, on the song of the returning birds. In the summer, children shriek and splash, tumbling into refreshing azure waves, splashing each other with glee. The sun filters in through the droplets as they soar, trying to defy gravity and reach the calm sky. The remnants of childish picnics, consisting of popsicles and lemonade, languish on shore, wa

At the end of everything, the stars burn themselves to smoke and whimpers, lying in reality’s abandoned ashtray – the stubs of something no one will ever use again. The universe gathers her shawl and fixes her hair, vain to the last, even though no one is there to admire her. She is wizened and wrinkled, more than ready to collapse into a point, sink down into the protective embrace of wherever it is universes come from. At the end of everything, the galaxies have shattered on the floor, scattered as pieces of broken glass. Lonely atoms shiver and shake, alone, rattling in the empty space between dead planets where water used to