Work Text:
The Great Globe Itself
London, 2395
[Love] is an ever-fixèd mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken...
—William Shakespeare, Sonnet 116.
Bashir, if it were possible, seemed to get more beautiful with age, and, when caught mid-flow arguing his case in what he generally referred to as “this whole bloody Shakespeare nonsense”, he became even more so. Almost dazzling. A quarter of a century these performances had been going on, and Parmak – who had missed the first act but followed most of the rest of the play – enjoyed them every single time.
“—and therefore I have to conclude,” said Garak, “that this piece in particular is a minor work by a minor poet who for some reason has been claimed as the best of what your culture has to offer, by people who have by now surely experienced enough beyond the narrow confines of that culture to know much better—”
“And yet despite all that, you read him, you quote him, you debate him, and you even—” Bashir waved his arm to encompass the building around them “—come out willingly on a freezing cold night in spring to see his work performed.”
“Well, I wouldn’t exactly call it willingly…” Garak turned to Parmak. “Kelas, you understand my point, don’t you?”
“Don’t look at me,” said Parmak. “That’s exactly how I feel about Preloc.”
All of them, even Bashir, had drawn the line at standing amongst the groundlings, and so they were ensconced in one of the boxes, overlooking the stage. The sunlight retreated steadily throughout the performance and the wind picked up. The actors – who knew their trade, their tricks – worked the weather. During Act III, the sky darkened markedly and, when Caliban began her speech and the first drops of rain began to fall, you felt that they had more than earned this reward.
Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight, and hurt not…
Bashir responded to this, it seemed, instinctively, leaning forwards in his seat and resting his chin upon his hand. His lips had parted, and he seemed to be breathing the words. There was an artlessness to this, Parmak thought, a boyishness, that was profoundly endearing in a man of such manifest intelligence and undoubted accomplishment; one who, like the rest of them, was not now getting any younger.
…and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open, and show riches
Ready to drop upon me…
Garak had turned his head to look at him. Parmak did not need to see his face. He knew the expression that would be there. The one that said, My love for you is such that I would change whole worlds to lay them at your feet…
…that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again…
This situation with the three of them, Parmak knew, often caused bewilderment, bafflement, incomprehension. Led to questions which were generally sidestepped and went unanswered. And why indeed should they be answered? Parmak knew that what they had was not usual, to say the least, but still he did not quite understand the extent of the confusion. Born into a world of such violence and cruelty that love had struggled to breathe and had not always survived, Parmak had nevertheless lived long enough first to see that world annihilated, and then for the wreck to remake itself until everything around him was altered beyond recognition. As the years had passed, he had been steadily confirmed in his instinct that there was no limit to be placed on love. That in being seen, embraced, encouraged, love expanded not only to fill the space available, but transcended those spaces, abolished boundaries, struck out across oceans and through storms, to discover, in time, whole brave new worlds…
He looked with love at the two men sitting next to him, and then turned his attention back to what was happening on the stage. Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments, he thought. He had picked up a line or two, over the years, watching them perform.
24th March 2026