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There are dreams in which I hold your hand, only to wake up to the real, damp reality.
It was of man’s first grave sin, that of giving in. Pleasure and Fear, always so demanding, so arrogant; how I yearned to feel them. To feel human, to know where I to hold my palm, that it would be solid, real. But such luck was an even bigger stranger.
I felt fear once, when I first glanced at you, back then we thought we had a purpose, and I saw those flames in your head, overbearing and aggressive, lashing uncontrollably, I was scared. Terrified. Had I looked into your eyes, I would have seen that same fear reflected, but I wasn’t looking into your eyes, I was looking at destruction. It turns out fate planned for us a recital on irony, and as such we played our parts splendidly, all, so it could lie upon us the greatest irony of all, but I wasn’t ready for that just yet.
It seemed the more we realized it was this temple that yearned to destroy us, that that initial fear minimized, before vanishing entirely, like vapor, or an extinguished flame. As many times, I saved you as you saved me. At one point I didn’t look at those flames anymore, I looked into your eyes, and in them, I saw your trust, in my eyes, you saw the same thing.
It was then when I first yearned for love, a love that is arrogant and greedy, one that goes beyond stares, I wanted the pleasure of touch. Your hand in mine, solid and real, a naive child’s dream, an unreachable light.
You and I are not human, we’ve never been. Love is not meant for us, and we are not meant for each other, water kills fire, fire kills water, what we called ‘Love’ is but a mere loop of destruction. We are in a merry-go-round of illusion, moving in a circle that goes nowhere, perhaps that is what allowed us to be happy, but that distorted image of love faded, it burnt, it evaporated. All that was left was destruction, or perhaps salvation, maybe both.
So what was the end of it? We thought we could love, also thought what we did had meaning. Did we ever die? I think we did, once twice or ninety times, but we were always back in the temple, those doors we opened, again and again… the never-ending maze of rooms and halls… was it all there was? Was this the only place we could exist as we do now, pure water and pure fire? Was this our eternal purgatory? Were we being punished? Was this love?
I had no answer, so I didn’t say anything, maybe I walked into a sea of flames, it didn’t matter, I was back in the temple, it didn’t matter. I looked into your eyes and saw emptiness, in mine, the same. We embraced as lovers, once, thrice, whatever, it didn’t matter.