The Thousandfold Notes of Alejandro Benjazar

[Don Nadie]

Wanting

She was right. I was wrong. For all my bluster and my inspiring calls and my love and my kindness. It is Aubrey who was right, and I who was wrong.

Pessimistic and conservative, that was how they saw the Tale I wove, when trying to talk of the Sandstone College. I suppose I should've given it a different ending: the girl who joins, who shows the artist to love. The new, stranger forms that bloom, a garden of flowers wilder and brighter that anything conducted with deliberation.

"We should be open to others learning from what we did".
"Helping them grow their own way", I said.
"If they surpass us, a joy still: for there is better, and more in the world."
Their expressions, however, unmoved.

Maybe even the happy ending wouldn't have worked. I am, perhaps, the only one who'd rather have a garden of wildflowers rather than one of roses.

Then She walked to the podium, angry.
(I have never seen Her angry.)
Her dissapointment was like flame.
(Everything about Her is a flame.)
(And I felt I was burning in it.)

"There are days", She declared, "when I thought to fall on my sword".
Not so unlike one-another, She and I.

A speech. A speech about lost homes, people we stole from, compromises made that brought our solitude. She wanted us to lead, to inspire, to conquer. She invoked your name, Lynneth, called you pilgrim. Is that not beautiful? She called you pilgrim.

She was, of course, lying, Lynneth. She wasn't close enough to see your endless compromises, your politeness when you bit your tongue. But it's fine, and beautiful, and well. You're no longer a person, Lynneth, but a fiction. And She, perhaps, knew it too. And chose to lie to herself, and to others. So many shimmering lies...

What could I say? When we were asked to name a Lyrist amidst our number?
I was the first to spoke. It was clear.
"...Aubrey would be the one"
For Aubrey was right. And I was wrong.
And all I wanted was to become smoke, and dissipate sweetly.

Aubrey rejected it, of course, left the College there and then.

"Is there a Lyrist among you?", She asked again.
Perfunctory, Her glance.
Evident, Her dissapointment.
"No. I think not"
"Prove me otherwise, my Balladeers"

[Don Nadie]

Forever

On top of it all on top of all else on top of the Grandmaster and the wildflowers on top of it all she's gone now to plot and sabotage the irony I'm sure she relished the irony and They do too between the empty stars oh how one longs to be empty too and between the stars sometimes when the air is thick with smoke and the mind thick with regret she loved me she said she used me I think I also used her too I also loved her too but I do not know how I felt how I feel about her now about her being gone forever oh how one wishes that time stood still and there was but the second suspended of ecstasis forever I would choose what would I choose forever forever when she kissed my brow forever when we spoke of trust forever when he let me hug him through the armor forever when she returned from the dead forever when he took my hand in his and kissed it forever when she filled the Cup and I drank till it was empty forever oh forever between the stars perhaps all it takes is a step in the right direction a step from the top of a cliff to the bottom a step to make it forever.

[Don Nadie]

Metaphor

A bad day to try guile, for my dear Aurelio. His plan was smart, but I had fallen too deep into the mire of my own despair. I ceded my spot, missed what was no doubt an incredible trip. Perhaps it was for the best.

No. It was for the best.

We spoke, him and I.

"I think you are ill, my friend", he admitted, Drinking.
His lips red like the blooms arround us.
"A djinn haunts you and it eats what happiness you find", he said.
And he did, of course, do the most knightly thing he could,
when confronted with a monster:
He decided to slay it.

"The heart", I said, "feels like an endless well, sometimes"
"Never to be filled", I sighed.
"And yet always brimming"

At that moment, it struck me like lightning. I could but laugh.

What may crack but never stay broken? What is frail, yet glorious? What is full to the brim yet needs, desperately, to contain more? What spills and spills, yet never empties? What holds, within itself, the promise of Bel-Ishun?

What is D Q W R ?

The metaphor, of course, self-evident:

The heart.

[Don Nadie]

A Matter of Imagination

Falafels on the rooftops.
A classic, really.

"I thought I was becoming better", he said.
"I failed", he added. He didn't sound sad.
(That made me sadder than his failure)
"But I am becoming necessary."

Above us, the stars, twirling,
the emptiness between them, too.
I could imagine she was smiling, forever.
Destroyed by deceit, forever.
Gone, in that moment, forever.

"You can always be a better person", I responded.
He took a moment to think, his eyes on me.
His answer was fatalistic, yet surprisingly kind.
"I do what is required", he said.
"So you can keep singing, silly and cheerful"
I could but smile, at that. What fictions one weaves.
"That's me", I lied, "silly and cheerful"

Here I was, again, tending to wildflowers.
Instead of planting roses, perhaps.
Not Her vision, perhaps. Maybe.
But wildflowers have such strange, beautiful colors.

"Becoming better", I said, "is all about imagination"
My words like seeds, planted in hope.
"Figure it's something people are born with", he answered.
"Nonsense", I replied. My best, most balladeeristic tone.
"Each of us can be an artist, brimming with creativity"
"and with the possibility to do something new, in the future"

I smiled. So did he.
Perhaps that is the secret of being better, I thought.
Being brave enough to imagine that things can be different.
Imagining alternatives.
Then changing.

"We're always growing", I quoted, in a whisper.
My eyes upon his.
"But not always straight".

And for a moment I thought I could imagine it.
Below us, this city of lies and deceit...
This city, a garden of possibility,
blooming beautiful and strange and wild
the flowers of Bel-Ishun

[Don Nadie]

A Moment

We had a moment to cramp the room. A moment of play. A moment of reunion, and ghosts finding one-another, and love found again. We had a moment, really, and for a moment I forgot all else. For a moment, even if my head still hurt and I felt worse, and more inadequate than I ever had. It was a moment, yes, forgetting that I no longer read what I once read, no longer hear what I once heard. For a moment it vanished, the desire to vanish in the moment, the desire to cease to be, the desire to be otherwise and fade into nothing. The regret went off, for a moment. For a moment, all was fine, and a moment is forever.

And there, towards the end.
A moment of radical imagination:

"Maybe you should find Her wanting, instead"

[Don Nadie]

Broken Things

I invited him to pray. To speak.
It is, after all, a Balladeer'smy duty to tend to the heart.
And his was so broken.

"She would want you to go on, Khalid"
"H-he knows", the priest stuttered.
Our knees on the ground, our eyes on the altar.
My hand on his shoulder.
"It doesn't make it any easier", I admitted.

Bellow us, in the streets, people came and went.
Above us, on the sky, clouds drifted forth.
Never stopping, never stopping.
Above, forever. Below, forever.

"As something of a local expert on heartbreak..."
"It never stops, the pain".
A sigh. Hard to be inspiring, upon so broken a man.
"You were and and are loved", I insisted.

Somewhere, a child laughed.
Somewhere, a man cried.
Somewhere, the merchant sang his wares and the beggar his ills.
Somewhere, the world moved forward.

"Your heartbreak would only make her love you more"
"For she did love broken things"

[A prayer has been tucked at the end of the page. Tear-stained]

Praised be He who made the Tale, and shared it, and built it.
Praised be He of endless stories, of paths past and future both.
May my Tale be worthy.

And may I be worthy of a Tale.

[Don Nadie]

To Start Walking

We went to the rooftops, to smoke.
A self-destructive vice or two, I've found, really helps with the screams.
And cigarettes are less self-destructive than mizzar. I'm told.
I sat atop the battlement. For once, looking down on him.

And up there, he told me his Tale.
It wasn't pretty.

"That is a bad story", I admitted.
"With a lot of bad actors. Yourself included"
He smirked. Self-satisfied, it seemed.
Did he want it so badly, proving to me he was a wretch?
"Guess I'm not the hero of his play, huh?"

I stared at him, a long while. Hot smoke burning my throat.
(The soft, hushed pain, such a relief. If not enough)
For the heart is a seed, and words are waters.
One must find the right ones, to make it bloom.

"You weren't the hero", I declared.
"You can still be"

The smoke twirled upwards and upwards.
Climbing towards the clear skies.
A ladder to the heavens. If one could only follow.

"The heart holds endless possibility", I said.
"We are all a few steps away from being the best we can be"
His expression ironic. He flicked the cigarette behind us.
"Think even with my steps, I'm more than a couple away"
I smiled, tender.

"All the more reason to start walking."

[Don Nadie]

Bad for You

The isle was strange.
Eerie, to walk that shore again
without Snorri's heavy footsteps.

"You are chainsmoking", she said.
"It's bad for you"
I smirked at her.
"I hear it's better than mizzar"

Climbing higher and higher, without him.
Noticing the clues, without him.
Reading the tablets, without him.
The boat back, without him.
How strange it all felt, without Snorri.

"I'm trying to protect you, you idiot"
I had found her, later on. The first place she was bled.
"Jamileh, do you think I need protection?"
"Yes. Of course you do", she seethed, "You are my son"
I gritted my teeth.
"I'm not a child".

The smoke of tobacco, not enough.
Not strong enough to carry the soul away, for a bit.
To a place where one can see peace, for a moment.
And above us, the sun. It blazed.

"I can fight, and I can help you", I insisted.
"Yes, and get killed in the process"
"So what?", I snapped, furious.
"I lost one child already, that's what"
I glared at her, I felt so angry.

"I'm gonna get killed sooner or later", I said.
"I'd rather die for you than the fucking Rose."

It is not smoking that's bad for me, I felt.
It is having a heart.
Every other self-destruction? A mild irritant.

[Don Nadie]

The Contours

I could see, below us, the gate of Sands.
Above us, the stars.
The fresh wind of the evening rustling my cloak, her abaya.
I wondered, for a moment, if her uniform felt as heavy as mine.
I knew, of course, that it was weightier.

"I was found wanting", I admitted.
She seemed unmoved, her smile was gentle.
"Surely you are not surprised, Alejandro..."
"That they should fail to see your value?"
I did not knew how to respond, I felt struck.
"Surely you do not believe their eyes unclouded?"
She looked a me. How tender, how pitiless, her gaze.
"The Lyrists, perhaps", I admitted. "But the Grandmaster..."
"She is a knight", she said. "Not a seer"

I shivered.
Was it the night? The coldness, the sadness, the fear?
Was it the loneliness of those ramparts, us alone?
Was it the desperate thirst of oblivion, pulling me deeper?

"However, in certain respects they are not wrong"
"I see that weakness still"
"And perhaps they judge you for it", she added.
"Even though they have no right to do so"
I did not knew how to respond. (What do you respond?)
(What is a flaw, so deeply ingrained as to become your heartbeat?)
"This weakness must be expelled from you", she declared.
"If you are to become what Fate calls you to be."

It felt like an honor. It felt like a sentence.
Her words, so many things at once.
What I was. What I could be.

"A true knight, bathed in the mystery of the Vine."
"Whose sword is raised and lowered only in service of Paradise"
"I see it in the air about you, the contours, the outlines"

The stars twinkled above, writing the endless drafts of Fate.
Between them, possibility, forever.
Ahead, possibility, forever.
Forever felt, for a moment, so strangely at hand.

"I shall tell you a secret", she whispered.
"One which you already know, and have carried with you in your heart"
And she pronounced what cannot be said.
Mummers and songs and the weight of Dakhwar.
Revelation, scarred deep upon the flesh.
Known, before it was spoken.

"One day", she concluded,
"You will prove more worthy than the Grandmaster, of that cloak"

[Don Nadie]

Don't We All

Without her cloak, she seemed diminished.
She looked wistful at her old home.
Sitting by habit, reaching by habit.
Finding the habit beyond reach, now.

"I would bid you to find an anchor", she said.
We were done speaking, I suppose, of politics.
"Find someone, or something, which you can lay confidence in"
"Uncorrupted, unbidden"
"It can be a small thing or a mighty thing", she insisted.
"But find it, darling, yes?"

I smiled, with as much stillness as I could.
I lit another cigarette, wondering.
Wondering what it would be to be her.
Wondering whether I pitied or envied her position.

"Thought I had it, hm?", I replied at last, "In Domhnall"

A smirk, ironic, as I brough it to my lips. As I lit it.

"You deserve better", she said.

Something, in her, resembling tenderness.
I took a puff of smoke and it was something, but not enough.

"Don't we all".

[Don Nadie]

How to Speak

We spoke, Khalid and I. Of how to speak.
And I did not knew how to weave my words.
Hesitating and stumbling at every turn.

"Speak your opinion, Alejandro", he insisted.
"You limit yourself unnecesariously."
I sighed, I gazed upon my desk, that tangle of loneliness and knowledge.
"I do not limit myself for the People", I admitted.
"But for a man."

He had come to get feedback for a speech on the Bellows.
We ended up deciding to bite our tongue, for him.

"We may yet have a chance to shift course", he said.
"Perhaps restore him as the man we'd believed he was"
"We could speak to him", he pleaded, "try our hardest to save him, one last time"

I smiled, tired. Oh, the ironies.
Not a moment ago we talked of weakness, and here I was.
Embracing it again. I suppose I am indeed an addict.

"One last chance to rescue the heart?", I said, with a grin.
"This is, as you can imagine, Balladeer-bait"
"The Waradim know a good story when one sees it"

So we went to him, we spoke.

"I was forced", he said.
"I wouldn't blame you if you hated me", he said.

I gazed at him, smoking. Quietly smoking, as Khalid spoke.
Until I noticed his distress. His hands, clutching so tightly.
And I could only reach out.

"Stop. Breathe."

(What is Art, if not reaching out?)

"So long as the heart beats, there is always tomorrow."

His hands in mine, firmly. A measure of comfort, offered.

"You can be brave. You can be bold. You can be good."

A measure of comfort, from me. Who needs comforting so badly.

"I believe in you", I insisted.

And when I thought he was strong, Rosie came. To undo our words, to call us losers, to spite us. To expell Khalid, as though he hadn't suffered enough heartbreak. And Domhnall watched quietly, and then left halfway through (other duties, I know, other duties), and I weighted my badge and I thought of throwing my badge and I couldn't quite throw my badge, for it would be like throwing my heart away, and him with it.
And I still couldn't do away with him.

Hard to see, I reflect.
The difference between love and weakness.

[Don Nadie]

Wanderin', Pardner

Once, there was a wanderer.
And because the road is lonely,
and the heart is bitting,
a poet joined him on a trip.

"Between you an I, pardner", he said.
"I don trust the College one bit, either"
I sighed. I tried to protest, but my heart wasn't quite in it.
"We're not the Rossa", I tried to say, perhaps weakly.
"When push comes to shove, though"
"you still stand with 'em".

And what is the road, if not discovery?
Of the self, of others, of the world?
Why does one leave, if not to explore?
And return, eventually, changed.

"If standing with the Rossa was the price of Paradise", I argued.
"Wouldn't you endure it?"
He grinned. So many scars, on so young a man.
(I hate seeing scars, but I admire how he bears them)
"Yer Paradise would still be made with bloody hands"
(I never could)

And so the poet returned,
new songs writ upon his heart,
new stars dancing in his eyes.
And the wanderer kept on going, freely.

"Perhaps one bears his bloody hands"
"The sacrifice of a few, to make Paradise for all."
He shrugged. To him, so simple a matter.
"Ain't that the choice", he commented, with a grin.

"But you gotta live with yorself, first"

[Don Nadie]

Burn the Letter

I have taken camp in this island. It is not pleasant, even if its peaceful.

There are desires one cannot satisfy in this place. Mizzar, Drink, cigarettes, music, wine, company, distractions, flowers; the pleasures of books, and of ancient artifacts, and of gossip, and of spectacle. So many desires burning, the hook that pulls the heart back to Ephia's Well, so strongly, so bitterly, one wonders if the city is, in fact, not the most dangerous addiction. If I was a fish I would not suffer, I think, as my feet dangle over the cliff and the waves, below, come and go and come and go. If I was not, I would also not suffer.

The waves come, the waves go. Abandon all desire and empty the heart, I whisper. Follow all desire, and fill it to the brim, I whisper. The waves come and go, and in their coming and going many things are whispered, and many possibilities thought that would otherwise not be. Could I live here, I wonder? Would it be pleasant to live here? An ermit, writing poems for the trees and the ruins, taking flight from time to time to join the seagulls?

"Yesnoyesno", say the waves. They are, as ever, noncomittal.

They make me think too much of home. Solitude, too, makes me think too much of home.

Above, the stars continue their dance, and I think of her. Between the stars, the promise of blankness forever, of peace, forever. The void seems so warm in its darkness, at those times, when my entire body seems to itch with desire (graps, consume, touch, have, be, see, feel, take, taste) and I can barely hold my weary heart. Such is life, I reflect. An itch of desires. I conjure some light in the darkness, I re-read her letter. The last thing she sent me.

"By Her grace might you be hidden from myriad harms", she wrote.
"Burn the letter", she wrote.
"I loved you very much", she wrote.

Honesty, in truth, is perhaps the thing one could least expect from her.
But honesty is what I got.

I suppose I have never been pious about Them. An alm to keep myself from harm, to keep my tricks undiscovered, my secrets hidden, my veils unparted. A prayer, when the heart was so full that one felt emptying it was the only option, the only chance. A whisper, when I hoped Mysteries would be revealed to me, and me alone. A ecstasic shiver when I felt, for a moment, that maybe it was so, that perhaps I was loved by the very stars, and all the world would make sense, if only I held the feeling for an instant longer... I suppose I got all I wanted, after a fashion. It was, of course, not enough. Is it ever?

I fold the letter back into my notes.
Impious, as ever, in keeping the letter, and holding it, and saving it.
Pious, as ever, in following the heart.

And the waves come and the waves go and the waves come and the waves go.
And one could be lost, and one could be found.
In the waves, by the waves, under the waves.
As they come and as they go.

[Don Nadie]

Vices

I was his Cupbearer, what a thing.
To carry the Chalice of silver and pure waters.
And fight our way through a sea of blood.

"You did well, Alejandro", he said, "It did not go unnoticed"

His tone was so kind and aproving.
I did notice the Student had told me the same, earlier.
Word for word. The kindest conspiracy, this.

"Let us all strive to shine in the eyes of the Grandmaster", he added.

And I, of course, lit a cigarette and forced a smile.
It was bitter, knowing how plain my weakness was.
That pathetic need for love, for aproval.
He then tried to give me coin for Waters, the beautiful idiot.

"You need it for your war, spare me", I said.
"Plus, others lost most of what you gained"

He gritted his teeth, he seemed so tired.

"I feel we are the only people ever doing anything in our College"

I sighed and took a puff, smoke curling within me, not enough.
What an insufficient relief it is, tobacco.
(I will have to stop. At some point.)
(It'll spoil my smile, and I am at least vain)
(Maybe vanity will save me from adiction, a flaw for another)

"How you endure it", he added, "I do not know".

His eyes fell on the cigarette.

"Or perhaps I do"

I shrugged, apologetic. Trying to act like I didn't care.
(I cared so much.)
(Wheel above, how I cared for his opinion, his judgement)
I shrugged, yes, trying to be ironic, dismissive, jestful.

"In Bel-Ishun", he declared, serene.

(Well-meaning, my beautiful, golden Aurelio)
(I shall break your heart, one way or another)

"In Bel-Ishun we shall no longer need such vices"

[Don Nadie]

Smoke

I helped her get her shelf, her instruments.
A jest, I made, about her strength.

"I do not feel strong", she said,
"Not in the ways that matter"

(Her sincerity, as ever, disarming)

"We trudge on", I responded, tenderly.

(How often had I tried to inspire her, like this?)
(Did she need me to, still?)
She looked at me. She glanced, then, at the Sister.

"Who can say where our paths will take us?"

From within, the echoes of distant prayer.
Distant secrets.
Mysteries, unveiled within.

"Sometimes I'm not sure they know what they want to be", I admitted.

From outside, the noise of singing. Our College, ever lively.

"I also get that feeling", she said.
"I enjoyed my time there, however"

I lit another cigarette, perhaps without thinking.
The twirls of my smoke joining the incense and the prayer.
Ascending, ever ascending.

"Do you still love it?", she asked.

(She should've been a sharpshooter, our Narwen)
(She always goes straight to the heart)

"I love many people in it", I said.

(No, not the answer I would want, either)

I didn't look at her as I said goodbye.
I was distracted, instead, by the smoke.
Cigarette and incense and prayer. Ascending, ever ascending.
Dissolving with everything else.