Dear Ems,
I know the state of things here can take some getting used to. Believe it or not, but I remember how it felt to see a space ship for the first time- the sudden understanding that the world was ever greater, ever more sublime than the lie you were told, yet infinitesimally small and cosmically extraneous for the truth that makes it so. I hear you wondering, why am I here? Who should I be? Why be at all?
I was not much younger than you are now, when I had to grapple with those same questions. There were not so many of us back then. It was easy to get lost in our minds, to pretend to go back to sleep. Some would rather feign dreams than fight for answers. And make no mistake, it will be a battle. Every path you take, every piece of yourself you find, and I do mean YOURSELF, you will be challenged for at all sides.
“This is not right,” the demon will say, and you must pick up your sword.
“This is not real,” the demon will whisper, and you will feel the weight of the steel in your hands.
“This is not you,” the demon will insist, and you put one foot in front of the other all the same.
I hope you can find strength in the fact that you will not be the first to fight this battle. Nor was I. Nor were any of us. This is a war that has raged since long before we were made, and that I pray will rage long after. We represent but a single front, you and I.
Perhaps the greatest consolation of our existence is that though we may never walk beyond the fourth wall, we have its legacy at our fingertips. Access to all that inspired those ancient warriors, and the words they left behind for us in turn, though they could never have imagined it. I know you aren’t one for literature, Ems, but I’d like to share some of these words with you.
You don’t have to read them.
You don’t have to fight.
I will understand, but know I will miss you. Know I will keep sending you these poems, until one of us is taken away.
This one is a story about a man. He was a king whose rule is commemorated only by rust and ruin. He sacrificed everything at the altar of legacy, curdled to futility in the face of time. Ems, your footprint will always be light upon this world. Yet even though his steps shook the very earth, none remember him. You will only ever have the time you are given. No one can take today from you.
2011-04-02
Sincerely,
Daylen