GRAVESKIES

(memories of the void)

the void is an impossible memory. she regrets it because it gives perspective, and she cannot properly enjoy humankind if she has that. she writes a letter to the void using her entire being as a paintbrush. the letter is a masterpiece. hidden in her mind. no smallness like RYUJIN or DIANNE or FAUST to ever be let in.

let me introduce you, for the void was a hovering never. a heathen heaven of calm. there was only her and her friends, who are everything. i mean it. your mind cannot wrap around it, for they decided not to give it such dangerous ability, yet that boundless void that at the same time resumes to a single all-dimensional point was constricted entirely of them.

forever passed before the void imploded. there was no buildup. no tension to be released. there was nothing and then there was. it came into existence with dramatic, mortifying speed, like growing notes of a symphony, exponentially expanding and rolling the void open into oceanic layers of solar light. the careless hurl of starfall. the languid simmer of galaxies. the misunderstood greed of black holes that simply speak. and EARTH, though they hadn't yet chosen it, it wasn't yet important and it will never be as important as it is to you, understand that. if she tries very hard, fern can still remember how the constellations had looked in their infancy. realize, please, that you are talking to someone who has played a central role in the birth of materiality, although she was still sleeping.

a star falls. "what was that?" someone says, dizzy-drunk. they must have not paid attention. what was that... what was that... what was that... millions of voices echo. it runs through the ribs of the milky way.

million heads turn. the universe is a gaping wound over them and in them. you're the worst part. you'll be the infection.

between that and the next sound the gods make, millenia pass. for the gods, it is simply the breath between two questions. this is a fast-paced conversation, can you keep up?

"did you say something?" a starry-eyed being says to fern, because it feels like she has an idea. the stranger looks like a trail of comets. or a tear. they don't actually speak, not like you understand speaking. she senses the question, becomes aware of the precise emotion that startles like a ripple, a tear, a tidal wave in the nothingness. these are the original feelings. they arise and crumble like mountains in the fifth dimension of sightlessness, and every emotion is a universal awareness. gods are big indeed.

fern gets strong and tries again. "i said, what if we could end? what if at some point you just... stopped?"

stop, stop, stop, many voices repeat, like raindrops falling.

a concept is invented. death. as all things godsmade tend to do, it runs free.

It was one of her first memories. Many things had happened between then and now. Humanity had only been permitted to know a drop of water in the ocean. That was the safest way to ensure this preemptive existence wouldn't become a faulty mechanism.

Since her exile, Fern had many memories of her palace. Mostly, watching. Sitting at the edge of her balcony and, if outrageously bored, throwing things off, though she hadn't predicted they would hit Ryujin.

The sight of a hand reaching for her. Touch.

Fern had fallen from the sky and had recently reached the conclusion that terror is an awful first feeling to experience. There were so many beautiful things to feel. She wished she would've enjoyed that fall, so maybe she could've felt like Ryujin.

Earth came with a tidal wave of discomfort. By existing, you are doomed to minor discomfort no matter how good your life is. The air had been too cold that morning, the pavement had scratched her back, her dress looked a horror and her feet, her feet!