Glass Tear

Glass tear

Her heart a dark forge

slow burning

deep burning

The taffy glass she is melting undulates in the flames.

shifting

reaching

never falling.

quick turn of the wrist brings it round

it retains its form.

The heat warms her cold surface

snuggling up like a spooning lover.

Somedays she wishes....

she wishes...

just....

wishes.

She withdraws the glowing orb and set it on the edge

constantly rolling it as she waits for the glass to speak

to declair its true form.

nothing.

she reheats it and removes it again.

"oh I know what you are" she says aloud.

she hold the stick out like a septar and freezes.

slowly

ever

so

slowly

the taffy glass

drops downward

its roundness giving way to a pregnate belly

that

that

slowly

swells

and

then

hangs from a spiders silk

for a heart beat

and

breaks sending the moltan tear to the floor

to impact yet not shatter.

She stares at her creation.

marveling at the beauty and the symbolisum

and all the unspoken truths.

A smile slowly melts the icy mask

she hides behind.

She ponders how to capture that in a completed sculpture.

"ARRR WHAT A MESS" he growls "stop day dreaming and clean it up!"

she doesn't jump at his words, but rather withers inside.

Her face once again icy reflecting no emotion.

she stoops to the floor and sets to scape the glass tear up

when she notices the core is still shiney and glistening

refecting all that is magical

a childhood of laughter

tears

and dreams

she scraps with the putty knife and the tear comes loose.

She holds it up to the light and the captured moment inside

flickers

glosses over

and

becomes dull.

the light exstinguished.

she reluctanly sets it in the scrap bin

to awaits its rebirth in the flames.

How so like her life.

just so casually set aside.

honed to a delecate sculpture which relected no light

she kept the light hidden

safe

away from those theiving eyes who

steal with a flesh knife.

But a light did burn in her

deep down

hidden

Her heart a dark forge

slow burning

deep burning

a place where she stuffed all her emotions

and hopes

and dreams

hidden in the white embers of her nova.

Where they all melted and warped and became liquid.

When she stuffed too much into the forge

It grew hot and the metal creaked and bucked at the seems.

wanting to burst

and spew its contents.

She let off pressure the only way that made sence

( how can you make sence of madness?)

The stuffed and stiffled wails of pain

got lost in translation and when she opened her mouth to scream

only vomit poured out.

She stopped trying to look up

the weight in her head to heavy.

She was living on air and exsisting in shadows.

Yet each day she arose

put the rod into the kiln and waved it and made hauntingly beautiful works of art.

Her pain made her work more beautiful.

Everyone applauded her choices of arching and bowing pitchers.

how they held the liquid yet didnt touch it.

and her colors...

no one would ever guess that her own blood tinted her works.

They only sensed the presence of something profound in her work...

some untangale thing that called to them,

moved them to collect her peices.

She worried that her work would suffer if she no longer walked with the madness.

It made her resistive to the many hands who reached to help her.

The many hands who sought to steady her,

not hold her.

She set her rod down and rolled it slowly

watching the hypnotic jelly fishing of the glass.

Her mind drifting back to the glass tear.

From her apron she took her rake and sliced the glass

marveling at how it healed

how it simple melted back inwards.

why couldn't her flesh do the same?

"Your so talented"

The voice was so soft that for a moment she though it had originated in her head.

"Your work is so incredibley sad and lonely."

She turned to see a woman with a twisted cane and a foot in a brace.

"your work is very transparant, your soul shines in it."

she froze trying to blend in with the air.

the sound of a glass tear falling

broke the silence.


"Each tear you cry is heard" she spoke again, shifting her weight off her bad foot.

"no matter if it spills from your eyes, or weeps from your skin."

She blanched and looked around for some place to put her hands

which felt ackward and huge all of a sudden.

The womans gaze didn't waver.

At last she found her voice. "who are you?"

The lady again shifted her weight, her face revealing the pain. "doesnt matter. I was assigned to you to help you get out of the darkness."

she made a annoyed noise. "how can you help me?"

She pointed her cane at her, "cause I know the way out."

"I am going to fight you and not give up my hold on madness so easily. Its comforting. The pain is comforting and all I know."

The lady knodded. "no one is asking you to do that...well except you...funny isnt it? you want help but you fight it when its offered.

Her face iced over conceling the conflicting emotions beneath it.

"gotta bite all the hands that reach for you. aye?"

"broken trust is hard to revive" she spat and turned back to the forge and melted into the embrace of the heat. "again, who are you?"

"just a lamp post dear."

her brow wrinkled as she pondered the words.

The lady smiled and explained. "there are those of us who blaze trails. Those souls who hit the ground running living like their hair is on fire. They go so fast that they miss all the sublte beauty on the planet. Then there are walkers, casual stollers, meandering through life on the safe well exstablished trails. Then there are those of us who simply "get it". Their journey isnt one of forward motion but inward searching."

"so lampost is which one?" she asked.

"the fourth kind, the old damn fools who dont give a (deleted) and understand the true treasures / wealth / is the gems of the unique souls you meet on the journey...not the journey itself." She smiled as her eyes reved and danced.

her frozen face thawed for a second and she smiled at the spark the lady put off.

"We walk the paths looking for souls who lanterns have gone out, re-light them and watch them journey on"

"How do you do that?" her heart asked suddenly interested.

"listen to them, hear the silent screams, hear them ....see them...find them, let them know they don't stuggle alone."

She turned deep in thought, pondering the words as she scrapped the glass tear off the floor. She for a moment studied the hot core and its light stuggling to radiate outewards against the cooling glass that was slowly smothering it.

So much a reflection of her life. The constant smothering feeling of fighting againts the hardening shell, threatening to freeze her into an inanimate object, her life and beauty shatterable and fragile...waiting in anticipation of the blow that would smash it, reducing it to scrap.


She whirled at the realization, "I'm putting my own light out, to hide myself!"


The lady listened.

"I burn inwards to protect myself and in the process I am walling off, shelling myself away from everthing including myself. Glass cannot shine without the light to dance off its surface, I cannot life within the darkness in a world filled with light."

"the struggle must be be exhausting" the old woman said with eyes filed with compassion. "to have to keep both hands on the dampers so snuff the flames of your heart and keep your eyes clenched tight so no light shines in to warm you."

In silent agreement her hand crept to the tightness in her neck that choked her into submission around the clock.

For her heart was a dark forge


slow burning

deep burning

a place where she stuffed all her emotions

and hopes

and dreams

hidden in the white embers of her nova.

The old womans words gently called to her, "stop reflecting the darkness. You are a lamppost, you are ment to light the way, turn your inner mirror around and shine."

She jerked to attention and dropped everything in her hands. "what?"

"do you not spend your days locked in motal combat with your yourself?"

Her thoat withered as the truth assalted her.

The woman stepped closer and gently touched her cane to the girls shoulder. "this is who you should fight FOR, not with. She is not your enemy, she is someone of great value and worth the effort to reach."

The girl considered the words.

The woman continued... "you could not create such beautiful works of art if you were not reflecting the beauty of your soul."

"do not think me impolite old woman, but please go." she turned back to the forge and threw herself into her work.

in short order the glass she is heating undulates in the flames

and this time it cries with new tears

fresh born

refecting all that is magical


new found laughter


tears


and dreams

of hope

Thend