The Exile’s Lament: A Farewell Beneath the Veil of Stars
Upon an isle where twilight’s breath is spun,
A lone child treads, his shadow pale and thin,
Through forests whispering of deeds undone,
And waves that chant the dirge of kithless kin.
No hearth nor home to warm his hollow years,
No voice but winds to mourn his nameless tears.
Beneath the moon’s cold, ever-watchful eye,
He seeks the truth that shores and stars deny.
“What binds the soul to realms of dust and bone?
What thread weaves fate when all but hope has flown?”
The cliffs reply in echoes, bleak and drowned—
A chorus vast, yet void of mortal sound.
There, in the glade where spectral lilies bloom,
A flame-winged bird descends, its plumage bright,
And sings of kings entombed in jeweled gloom,
Of stars that map the labyrinth of night.
“Oh, child of sorrow, heir to exiled skies,
The truth you seek in shadowed waters lies.
Beyond the reef where shattered galleons sleep,
A crystal cave guards secrets old as pain.
But tread with care, for mortals oft who creep
Too near that light ne’er walk the world again.”
The orphan kneels, his heart a trembling thing,
And plucks a feather from the phoenix’s wing.
Through thorns that claw like time’s unyielding hand,
Past pools where serpents coil in jade disguise,
He climbs the crag where ancient stones command
The tides to kneel and comets to chastise.
At last, the cavern’s maw, ice-veined and wide,
Devours the boy, the feather as his guide.
Inside, the walls with starry sigils blaze—
A cosmos trapped in sapphire’s liquid glaze.
There stands a mirror, framed in frosted breath,
That shows not flesh, but phantoms forged in death:
A mother’s smile, half-lost to storm and strife,
A father’s hands, which bartered love for life.
“Behold,” the glass intones, “the root of woe:
All truths are ghosts that memory lets go.
Your kin, like leaves, were swept by fortune’s gale—
No anchor holds where destiny sets sail.
The home you crave is but a dream’s embrace,
A fleeting warmth no exile may retrace.”
The boy, undone by visions bittersweet,
Clutches the shard that pierces like a thorn.
“If truth is grief, then let the waves complete
What fate began ere yet my soul was born!”
He flees the cave, the feather’s glow grown dim,
And stumbles toward the cliff’s unyielding rim.
Above, the North Star pulses, cold and clear,
A silver wound in night’s unending veil.
“You led me here,” he cries, “yet naught is near
But void and vastness! Must all pilgrims fail?”
The star, unmoved, spills light like hoarfrost spread,
And paints his tears with hues of borrowed red.
Then soft—a voice, not wind nor wave nor bird,
But something older than the tides’ lament:
“You are the spark no darkness may inter,
The question asked since first the heavens bent.
To seek is all the answer life allows—
The rest, the stars keep folded in their brows.”
He steps, not falls, into the waiting mist,
His arms outstretched as if to clasp the sky.
The sea receives him, neither kind nor kissed
By sorrow’s breath. The star does not reply.
Far off, the phoenix trills a final note—
A dirge for truths too vast for mortal throat.
Now sailors whisper, when the moon hangs low,
Of shapes that dance where reef and twilight blend:
A boy adrift in luminescent glow,
Still chasing stars that neither rise nor end.
And in the cave, the mirror’s face grows cold,
Its wisdom locked in glass no hand may hold.
A lone child treads, his shadow pale and thin,
Through forests whispering of deeds undone,
And waves that chant the dirge of kithless kin.
No hearth nor home to warm his hollow years,
No voice but winds to mourn his nameless tears.
Beneath the moon’s cold, ever-watchful eye,
He seeks the truth that shores and stars deny.
“What binds the soul to realms of dust and bone?
What thread weaves fate when all but hope has flown?”
The cliffs reply in echoes, bleak and drowned—
A chorus vast, yet void of mortal sound.
There, in the glade where spectral lilies bloom,
A flame-winged bird descends, its plumage bright,
And sings of kings entombed in jeweled gloom,
Of stars that map the labyrinth of night.
“Oh, child of sorrow, heir to exiled skies,
The truth you seek in shadowed waters lies.
Beyond the reef where shattered galleons sleep,
A crystal cave guards secrets old as pain.
But tread with care, for mortals oft who creep
Too near that light ne’er walk the world again.”
The orphan kneels, his heart a trembling thing,
And plucks a feather from the phoenix’s wing.
Through thorns that claw like time’s unyielding hand,
Past pools where serpents coil in jade disguise,
He climbs the crag where ancient stones command
The tides to kneel and comets to chastise.
At last, the cavern’s maw, ice-veined and wide,
Devours the boy, the feather as his guide.
Inside, the walls with starry sigils blaze—
A cosmos trapped in sapphire’s liquid glaze.
There stands a mirror, framed in frosted breath,
That shows not flesh, but phantoms forged in death:
A mother’s smile, half-lost to storm and strife,
A father’s hands, which bartered love for life.
“Behold,” the glass intones, “the root of woe:
All truths are ghosts that memory lets go.
Your kin, like leaves, were swept by fortune’s gale—
No anchor holds where destiny sets sail.
The home you crave is but a dream’s embrace,
A fleeting warmth no exile may retrace.”
The boy, undone by visions bittersweet,
Clutches the shard that pierces like a thorn.
“If truth is grief, then let the waves complete
What fate began ere yet my soul was born!”
He flees the cave, the feather’s glow grown dim,
And stumbles toward the cliff’s unyielding rim.
Above, the North Star pulses, cold and clear,
A silver wound in night’s unending veil.
“You led me here,” he cries, “yet naught is near
But void and vastness! Must all pilgrims fail?”
The star, unmoved, spills light like hoarfrost spread,
And paints his tears with hues of borrowed red.
Then soft—a voice, not wind nor wave nor bird,
But something older than the tides’ lament:
“You are the spark no darkness may inter,
The question asked since first the heavens bent.
To seek is all the answer life allows—
The rest, the stars keep folded in their brows.”
He steps, not falls, into the waiting mist,
His arms outstretched as if to clasp the sky.
The sea receives him, neither kind nor kissed
By sorrow’s breath. The star does not reply.
Far off, the phoenix trills a final note—
A dirge for truths too vast for mortal throat.
Now sailors whisper, when the moon hangs low,
Of shapes that dance where reef and twilight blend:
A boy adrift in luminescent glow,
Still chasing stars that neither rise nor end.
And in the cave, the mirror’s face grows cold,
Its wisdom locked in glass no hand may hold.
