Prometheus Broken

~ I cannot celebrate my little deaths any more ~

“Lost Together” acrylic on canvas Farida Haque

I CANNOT.

Or the grand lies I tell myself on pain-filled days the verdigris of which I’ve polished to a bright cherry with an alchemy of my own conjuring, or perhaps grand theft of medieval moments snatched by the arm of imagination. Or thud into tragic mythologies of demi-gods and creatures of vengeance.

Where and when does it end, this role thrust upon me of a mistaken Prometheus whose innocence saw nothing to steal, let alone share, yet gods presumed and deemed me worthy of divine wrath. What did I give away that was so precious? And I often wonder if it is the same ancient eagle-deliverer of nondeath, refreshed every time by immortality or a hatchling hastened into feather and form readied to feast upon alizarin crimson of liver and bone.

There are days when no matter how much you try to muster up countenance or grab at a semblance of joy — a full moon, one of millions gone and a rosy sky with kites endlessly circling in a lazy vortex and laughter of kids rising up like caramel, silhouettes of trees planted by dead hands, trees which still flower and bear tired fruit, all this and so much more sits like tar in my lungs and I cannot breathe.

The pain is too much. This, my broken life, nobody’s Kintsukuroi, broken into clay shards which cannot be unbroken, and soldered with gold or pewter, or even gathered by a wanton hand to gently rest in a cool corner, and it just doesn’t add up to any algebra of peace.

It just cannot.

Farida Haque

Michael Stang Vaishali Paliwal Shringi Kumari Jeff Suwak LB Adam, Diabetic Cyborg Dennett Bridget Webber Stephen M. Tomic William Spivey Zainab