graven

The stone is that last punctuation, the one that will not be followed by word or deed. The stone marks the long pursued course at long last ended, the abridged language of finality listing gently on a sea of shifting soil. It is a small spirit, a garden god, something cryptic and graven to seal the moment with-in your soul. The divine is mostly measured in the fickle and the profane. We populate the heavens in the same way we receive our laws, by the misdeeds we notice rather than by any sense that justice will be met.

Back in the land of the chosen, back among all those sharp tongues and dull wits, you try hard not to cross the line. Keep your own counsel, keep your nested secrets, watch the skies for any sign of smoke or storm or hope. So far every visitor has kept their feet on the ground, treading sod and kicking cans just like every one else. Nothing benign seems to fall close enough for you to bear witness to any miracle or take it as a sign. Things are mostly what they seem, and that alone is enough to make a criminal of you. These inverted virtues, the smug and sodden hordes that ache to plant their banners in your heart make you the enemy because you haven't lost your humanity yet.

The plan is not meant to keep you down: it is meant to keep you beaten. Kicked and dragged and bled out in small portions. Confused and irrelevant and on the run even when you are standing still. When words become the chalice, the wine will always turn bitter upon the lips. They tell you are a problem when you follow the coursing of your own livid blood. They tell you they hold the secret, that the world is wound around their spell and prayers. They tell you that you are dead, never knowing just how far you will travel to settle a bet. Never knowing that what they didn't know was all that mattered.