If you’re reading this, I’m already dead.
My dear Sophia, even now I miss how the refracting rays of sunlight illuminate your fiery red hair, and your beautiful brown eyes that look with so much understanding upon the suffering and the weak. It has been years since we parted, though physicality is merely an illusion of the senses, for no distance could keep us apart. Every breath I breathe I feel you, every leaf trembling in the passing breeze I see you, and every sunset is your smiling face.
Oh, my dear Sophia, how kind you always were, and how precious to me and so many others. It was upon your passing that the whole world wept. Those starry-eyed children we used to watch playing in the fields, toiling as if nothing else in life mattered. But you taught me better. Yes, my love, we knew of the dreams and all the myriad reasons behind the toil, that life could be free but for those who yearn for power. And no one seemed the wiser — a slight by the jester in this valley of death.
The gardens grew bounteous. The mighty trees, with oh so much knowledge and hidden power — all from a single seed. Yet from that divine blueprint springs life eternal, the knowledge of Good and of Evil, and the multi-faceted nature of all the ten-thousand things. And you are their mother.
But there is only darkness now; not even the jester’s toil could stave off this dark night, this cold, lifeless, wrenching blackness that consumes human souls. The philosopher’s stones were created to quench the thirst of those who refused reality, who refused death, who yearned for more power than the world contained. And the world was their sacrifice. Oh, all that needless suffering at the hands of fools! I talked to God shortly before my passing. He spoke calmly, with a deep sorrow in his eyes and a strained voice which poured down on the desolate, barren landscape of yesterday’s dream:
“Sophia, where did you go?”
I railed against the darkness, raised my sword and roared until my voice was shrill, but no one could hear me. not a single soul wanted to hear of your tales, the ones you told me on those sacred nights by the fire. I did not go gently into that dark night, I gave it all I had, but it was to no avail. And now, with tear-stained hands and cheeks as I write this, my final ode, I’m struck by how simple it all could have been, how beautiful life used to be, and how much I loved you — how much you loved the world. So I poured out my soul and what remains of the ecstatic visions and terrifying silence of my own heart’s secrets, I have composed here, that perhaps one day it may be seen, and better times may be remembered by those who’ve only ever known suffering.
My dear, sweet, Sophia, how life used to be brilliant. Perhaps I write this not for those who will come, but those who have passed — nor even for them. Perhaps I write it for You, and for beauty, and hope, and happiness, and Love. But as the soul of the world dies, so grows my vision weary. I can feel it’s final breaths, know it’s final thoughts (though how, I cannot fathom), and upon my dying dreams lay the foundation for a blasphemous world, a world without compassion, or joy. Or You, Sophia. A blueprint that arises out of human ignorance and greed — and fear. And I fear that as I pass, you will cease to exist. Perhaps such is the fate of a species such as ours; one seemingly unable to rise out of itself and into others, one doomed to base instincts even in the face of greater knowledge and freedom. My heart weeps, terrible and bone-wracking sobs, for all those innocents for whom life is nothing but death. Have we failed the test — failed each other -, or will a day still yet come when the beautiful sun shines once more, and the trees begin teaching again, and you breath life anew?
I know not, for how can I? But for this moment, I rest. I grow weary with the passing of each second, and my body is heavy with sorrow and the passing of years. What could I have done? That’s the one thing you could never tell me. Of all your secrets, mysteries, and beauty, that’s the one thing you could never show me. And I apparently could not find it on my own. The hour is late, and my mind grows dark. I have told the world of your beauty — as if to a blind man — and they would not hear it. So what, then, am I left to do?
Sophia, in the wake of your passing, the whole world weeps, and future generations will weep for not knowing as the world stands still…
Cross-posted on Medium (https://medium.com/@gostudent7676/sophia-and-days-not-yet-passed-93acfbaef383)
