act v, scene i

Hamlet

Horatio

As I knew you,

The days where you were bright with youth.

Clever devil, armed with the turn of a phrase

Before the curtains ran red by your hand.

Rosemary for remembrance;

I confess I was not the maiden giving flowers

But the winter daphne of a dark-cloaked prince--

And dark he is, pacing in this garden of loss,

Frenzied and wild.

Could I pacify you with a press of lips,

An unbidden plea?

You whisper into the still air, crowned by death--

Hamlet

Horatio

--The answer already cradled in your hands.

I speak to you all the same;

I have chosen the losing side.

What does the daphne mean, pray tell?

Simply:

“I would not have you otherwise.”

my body shivering after the baptsim; already haunting me before your grave dirt had even settled.

the worst part of all of it is that i never really stopped believing in god, as much as i tried.

i just cursed at god instead, my only ambition in finding heaven being to rip him out of the sky

and see how he liked it.

i want to say the ugly part out loud

people have often loved me like i’m something else,

something that resembles the familiar without seeing the full shape of me

people liked me because i put on a good front, and that’s all. people liked me because i was there, because we were trapped in a stage play sharing the same scene

really, i’ve come to enjoy disappointing people.

if rebirth exists, i think this is my first life

or maybe my second; i feel like a different person than the one who feared you, and cursed you, and did everything short of denying your existence

now i believe in a smaller god.

i am loved for who i am by people who matter

singing duets in the car, creating a language of our own, wound around years of life and life and life

waking and sleeping and dreaming together, the days i cherish most

i love how you laugh when something i say catches you off guard.

the first reason is that heaven may not exist--that's an easy one. That doesn't bother me. It's the other possiblities that leave me stricken.

The second, for example, is that your god may be a vengeful and spiteful thing after all. Maybe he does hate people like me. And maybe I'm not worth saving.

But third is the worst of all. That god may be all that I thought he was as a child--forgiving and knowing, a maker that does not yield to injustice. That god might see the searing path of hate you followed and close the gates on you.

And could I blame him?