I lost the entirety of today's blog post. I don't have the energy to write it again. I'm sorry. But according to today's intended blog post that no one will ever read, the blog post doesn't matter and as long as you care for someone and make them feel better. It also doesn't matter that you're going to die and the universe will forget you.
The post sounds like it would've been sappy and unfounded when I summarize it this way, but have faith that I scientifically backed it up and it came from a place of me really not believing it at all, which in a lot of cases means that I have very good evidence indicating its truthfulness. That's a post for another day. Either that or you should all read the parts of "World War Z" that talk about the "tenth man" concept.
So instead, here's an elegy I once wrote for I star that I speculated was probably dying (albeit millions of years ago).
Elegy for a Star
Here I am
Encased in cloth and goose feathers
Braced embryonic against the cold
I slip into my packrat pillow stacks
Tonight.
Tonight, I’m gonna try that “sleep” thing
Oh, to view the daily grind through rested eyes.
Sigh…
And suddenly, a white light
A rift in the vast, patterned cavern of the night.
Shouting
Sucking my droopy eyelids wide open.
It’s not the usual…
The fear of growing old,
the anxiety,
the heavy, racing heart that waits until the
Exact.
Most.
Inappropriate.
Moment.
To say “hey, hey kid”
Hey.
Think of me now.
Think of me now.
And lie awake for hours.
No.
Not tonight.
Tonight is a funeral for a star.
What?
“You’re so tired, Ophelia
This isn’t even real.”
You know what, brain?
Tonight…
Screw you.
So here’s a star.
A very, very bright one.
To your credit, brain, you’re sort of winning again tonight.
You’re here.
And you brought your weapons.
Thanks a lot.
This isn’t just a bright star.
Yes yes.
So you keep telling me.
It’s bright
Because it’s dying.
So it’s 1 a.m. and I’m watching a star die.
Everything else disappears,
And it's just me and the star in the darkness
Its eons of dying breath outshining the rest of this universe
Shrinking
Drifting closer to nonexistence every time I look away
I don't know what a star wants when it's dying
Ah…
What do I do?
No hand to hold.
No eyes to close.
But here I am weeping.
I'll be dead long before it vanishes from my sky
It's only an echo of a long-gone light
A bygone tragedy
But….
My heart aches when I try to rationalize.
I'm sure it would start to feel peaceful after a while.
It’s 1 a.m. and I’m going insane
My pillow nest a makeshift padded room.
This is when death usually becomes a strange and comfortable fever dream
Usually.
But tonight….
Tonight I have to look away.
The vastness of it is so
So
Hard to know.
And It makes me afraid.
I'm tired.
I'll try to sleep.
And I’ll pray that I can be at peace
With the stardust
The soul of my dearly departed
Watching over me
Breathing into the atoms that compose me
Even as I grieve the stars I came from.
Watching my own essence
Explode.
Burn.
Slowly…
This fragment of time
Traveled billions of light years
So I could see it ending
And there's a feeling I get
That I can't grab hold of
I'm floating in this cosmos
This starry sphere of creation
Founded on improbability
Emptiness
And fullness
Gripping each other for dear life.
And my mind is flying away to my star
Rushing to its side
To press its desperate ear to an endless final heartbeat
Dear dying star
Teach this stardust creature to understand.
So there you have it.
Today's question would have been "what does caring for people really do to us? Weaken us or Strengthen us? Something else?"
Write your answers in the comments.
I leave you with an image of the Aurora Borealis
Go forth and be wonderful.
