FIRST FRAGMENT
Once in a great city, green and kind,
There lived a gentle demi-god(dess),
Big heart, strong mind.
Any and all in pain and flawed
May seek and find
All woes their voice corrade.
No matter the guilt,
No matter the pain,
The misery will wilt.
This hero they had a love far away:
A divine of poesy, who at midday,
Spake rhymes of love and tales of play.
Today the hero had tasked a friend,
Their closest, most dearest, most cherished friend,
A task so particular, necessary, crucial
That they dare not trust
Anyone other
To go their lover,
The next kingdom over,
And deliver this poem of love:
My Divine of Poesy,
Forbidden wisdom woman,
Speak to me your words of gold
and in blood will I cover
your rhymes.
Speak to me unspoken words:
unspoken to any lover, any suitor, any one
who came before,
and my blood shall remain in my heart,
ever rich, ever yours.
The hero took care to warn their friend,
Their closest, most dearest, most cherished friend,
That if he muttered amiss word once,
Slip once, one 'stake,
Just one and one only is all it would take!
To dismiss the poem's divine divinity,
As if spat of mortal's mind
And not of trans-mundane other.
"Take care to remember the poem, my closest, dearest, most cherished friend,
for if you deliver a mortal love
to her Other soul,
With no hesitation, no pity, mercy, nor pride,
She will strike thee down,
And I will hear that you have died
Delivering my love to her."
Their friend departed right away
For the next kingdom over,
And at the end of each day,
By the river he sat to recite the poem:
"My Divine of Poetry,
forbidden wisdom woman,
speak to me your words of gold
and in blood will I cover
your rhymes.
Speak to me unspoken words:
unspoken to any lover, any suitor, any one
who came before,
and my blood shall remain in my heart,
ever rich, ever yours."
There he had it! He remembered each line!
So onwards he rode in confident stride
To show the Divine with honour and pride
The love of her Hero's divination design.
Before the goddess he did recite,
Each word shook wall; they shook! O, might!
The Goddess herself, she rose in height:
"These words I bite,
I chew and chew,
And taste of you,
but none of my light!
What have you done!
O no, O blight!
"This love is of mortal,"
she sobbed in fright,
"And I am of Other!
O, cold! O, night!"
Her arm she raised; it blocked the light!
And downward descended two fingers pinched tight;
She plucked up the Hero's most dearest of friends,
And on her tongue dropped,
He met his requite:
O shamed end.
--------
Back in the city
The Hero caught word:
"What a pity," one said,
"He is dead."
He is... dead?
"O, madness! O, shame!
My Goddess did maim
my bestest, most dearest, most cherished of friends,
And I am to blame!"
Right in their place the Hero's body fell lame,
And there they still lay,
day after day
after day after day,
until one day,
The King himself descended to say:
"My Hero, it pains me to see you this way.
Leave this Kingdom before next day
and find your will, your heart, your ray,
to help these people,
your city, your play.
I gathered your things,
and I cast you away.
"Goodbye, my Hero.
I await your most certain return."
Into the ground their fingers sank deep.
Hand after hand the Hero did creep
for weeks and weeks,
red pain did reap upon each creek,
each rock, each twig
they ever did meet.
Finally, at last,
They found a cave!
A cold, uncaring, uncomfortable cave,
but shelter, sweet shelter
from the sun, O! shade!
And there they did lay
for weeks and weeks
'til one tired day,
a traveler peeked in
and sat dow
SECOND FRAGMENT
n to say:
"O hello, good stranger,
What are you this way?
You have clearly
O so clearly!
come a long way!
"Here, have of my rations.
It'd do you some good
to nourish thyself;
You look as sickly as one ever could."
The Hero lay still, not even a peep,
no stir, nor talk, nor breathe too deep,
simply ignored the traveler to sleep.
"Well, in case you find thyself in need,
here I'll leave for you some goods.
Farwell, Hero, and good sleep."
Hugh's eyes fluttered open. He heard the sharp pattering of gravel off the side of the car as it drove along the way. From his reclined position, the surrounding forest's treetops were all he could see through the window. His mom was focused on the road, steering gently. Despite the dryness of his voice after his nap, he croaked, "Are we here?"
"Oh, hun," Angela blinked herself out of her trance. "I didn't realize you were awake." She glanced at Hugh through the mirror and smiled as if strings lifted her cheeks that way. The pattering stopped, and Angela took off her seatbelt. Hugh sat up to see their surroundings. He looked down at his feet.
Angela reached back and touched Hugh's knee. "He'll be so happy to see you."
Hugh's face softened. He grabbed his book bag and slung the strap around his shoulder.
"Let's go, then." Angela patted Hugh's knee.
The gravel crunched beneath his steps. He focused on the ground. Small baldes of grass pushed through the pebbles to greet him. They leaned with the passing of a gentle breeze, and then a stronger wind came through and flushed the hair from his face. The trees' leaves roared in the gust.
Angela sighed and took Hugh's hand. "Come on, honey."
He didn't look up to meet her eyes. Hugh followed Angela down the row. So many beautiful vases and bouquets of flowers decorated headstones. Some were fresh, and some had withered away. Hugh wondered why people wouldn't just plant them instead. It made more sense, he thought. He couldn't help but wonder why all graveyards weren't gardens. They would be the best ones.
They stopped in front of a headstone. J. Croft. March 20, 1979 to September 21, 2018. A small tree seedling had pushed itself from the soil, right by the crevice where the headstone's base met the earth. Its baby leaves were sweet honey green and glowed in the sunlight. Its happiness was infectuous, and Hugh smiled.
Hugh dropped his book bag onto the grass and sat down. He watched his mother do the same as everyone else had. She prepared the bouquet of white roses and lavender in a tall, ceramic vase and placed it on the base of John's headstone. She lit a few small tea candles next to it.
She stepped back to admire her arrangement, or maybe to critique it. She smiled. Her lip quivered and her face contorted. She collected her composure for Hugh's sake and kissed the top of his head. She sat in the grass with him. "So, are you going to show us what you were so eager to find in the forest yesterday?"
Hugh's face lifted. He pulled a tattered leather journal out of his book bag and flipped through its tea-stained pages until he found the page he sought. "This!" He planted his finger on a messy sketch of a large, fallen tree. Above the sketch was Secret Garden scribbled down. Beneath it, Hugh had drawn a series of mushrooms, seedlings, saplings, and flowers.
"Wow," Angela said. She rustled Hugh's wind-blown hair. "Impressive find, kiddo. And amazing drawings! Where was it?"
Hugh smiled a little. "Not too far into the woods. You can't really see it in the drawing, but it was huge!"
"Oh, I bet!" Angela smiled and laughed as she examined Hugh's drawings. "What kind of tree do you think it was?"
"Probably an oak." Hugh threw his hands into the air to imitate the tree's hugeness. "Because it was so big that it must've reached higher than all the other trees when it was standing."
----
My pocket compass told me that the large oval hole in the forest's canopy was east of the house. It dug into the sea of treetops that otherwise continued uninterrupted as far as the eye could see. There was a perfect view of the clearing from my new bedroom's window. It caught my attention after I brought my boxes up.
My journal's name is Johnny. He's been my companion in all of my adventures. He remembered where things were so I wouldn't have to.