O, dreary wrist!

Why stumble in Suspension stating
you've lost your way in Passing mist?
Despite the nearby Neighbor bating
Escape from unseen list?
Inside the Dominant heart of scarring foes,
Relentless Deception hides finality:
There is a Tonic for your woes.
A Contrapuntal cleansing for reality.

The Craving

A crimson drop ran down the wall of a stainless steel sink before merging into the little puddle formed at the bottom, swirling around, and disappearing down the drain. Looking at his pinpointed pupils through a bathroom mirror, Steve unclamped his right hand from the edge of the sink and rinsed it under the flowing water. A little piece of flesh, hanging off his pointing finger, danced furiously in the flowing stream. With a sharp, cringing inhalation, Steve pulled his hand near his chest, cradling it with his left hand. His eyes met with his finger and he assessed the damage. The flesh between his second and third knuckle hung onto his finger by the smallest amount of skin. Through the bleeding he could see the bone in his finger. The skin around the injury carried the markings of teeth.

With a crisp inhalation, he grabbed the piece of flesh. He exhaled as he yanked. The skin didn’t tear off until peeling past his fingernail. Steve swore as he threw the bloody piece into the hole in the counter. With a deep sigh, he finished rinsing the blood off of his hands and splashed a bit of water over his clammy face. Then he noticed the indiscreet red stains on his shirt.

Damn.

Loosening his tie and unbuttoning his polo, he noticed the stains had soaked through to his undershirt.

You’ve got to be kidding me.

Steve buttoned his shirt back up and sloppily fixed his tie.  With a wad of paper towels pressed to his finger, he cracked the bathroom door open and peered around. The coast was clear. A cringe of pain shot through his hand as he pushed the bathroom door completely open and hurriedly walked past a pair of secretaries. One of them looked up to greet Steve, but stayed quiet. He didn’t make eye contact.

Relieved at covering the short distance back to his cubicle, he plopped into his chair, bumping into his desk as he did so. His computer’s ‘ribbon’ style screensaver deactivated, revealing an unproductive afternoon’s work. He took a look at the unfinished performance report, the cursor blinking mid-sentence. The last word on the page was “unsatisfactory.”

That’s just awesome.
                He pressed ‘ctrl + s’ then ‘alt + f4,’ saving and closing the document.

Steven rolled opened the top drawer in his desk, removed the white plastic organizer, and pulled out a small first aid kit.

-

Due to his firm’s reluctance to higher more employees than necessary, overflow mail often found its way into the cubicles most near the mail room. Steve’s desk just happened to be one of those lucky individuals with frequent mail duty. The mail would pile up. He’d barely have a quarter of his week’s work done by Wednesday, just to have some unattractive woman in a denim dress drop a bin of mail in his cubicle.

“Opened and sorted by 5,” she would say.

I’m a data analyst, not a mail boy.

And so Steven’s work would suffer, and the mail employees definitely didn’t owe him any favors either.

But eventually, he outgrew his hate for mail. When the stress of his usual work relentlessly piled up, the mail provided a nice distraction from tedious work. He bought an envelope opener and perfected his sorting movements. He became the mail woman’s asset. Although he felt opening mail wasn’t resume quality work, he began to take pride in the gigantic stack of empty envelopes he would produce in a short period.

Late one day, near the end of a particularly large stack of money orders, Steve had somehow managed to cut the tip of his finger off his the envelope opener.  He bled furiously, nearly ruining a stack of checks as he stood up and hurried to the bathroom. He bumped into his boss as he turned out of his cubicle, bloodying both of their shirts.

On his way home that day, Steve stopped by a convenience store and picked up a first aid kit.

-

With his finger wrapped up, Steve glanced at his desk clock. Its inner workings were exposed through a glass frame. The roman numerals and hands were gold plated. There was a diamond at the tip of the pointers.

What a dumb gift. I hate my mother.

He squinted to see the blurry numerals. 4:39. He immediately clocked out at his computer, stood up, and began to walk towards the exit hallway.

Certain enough, Steve’s boss found him as he approached the door.

“Where are you going?” he said with an aggravated tone. They were shorthanded enough. “It’s not five yet!”

Steve made an involuntary gesture towards his right hand, cradled in his left. Blood was beginning to seep through the gauze.

“Oh, I see,” Steve’s boss said, lightening up. “Lose a fight with the envelope opener again?” He let out an obnoxious laugh.

Go fuck yourself.

 “Get yourself stitched up, I expect to see you in early tomorrow,” he said with a tone of purpose. With a condescending pat on his underling’s shoulder, he took off in the direction Steve had just come from. He stopped and began attempting to flirt with an attractive young secretary.

-

As Steve approached his car, his bleeding had finally completely saturated the gauze on his finger. He lifted his arm into the air in an attempt to allow gravity to pull his sleeve down and away from the soaked pad. Instead, blood dripped into his forearm. The metallic odor wafted towards his nose, and he began to salivate.

Steve looked around, ensuring no one was around to see him. After he had triple checked, he lifted his sleeve up to his elbow and licked the blood from his skin. He could taste the iron on his tongue.

Images of blood, flesh, and organs poured into his brain as he began to fantasize about all the carnivorous possibilities. A warm, bloody steak. The hearts of freshly slain cattle. Brain straight from a four-legged kill. Intestines from the bowels of euthanized fowl.

Snapping to with drool hanging out of the corner of his mouth, Steve quickly unlocked and entered his car, which was not anything other than modest, and began to drive.

Swerving between lanes, he sped from light to light, navigating a blurred landscape in an effort to reach the nearest grocery store. His heart was set – there was only one option in his mind.

I’ve got to stop this before it’s too late.

After several near-misses and about midway to his home, Steve reached his destination. In a nearly hallucinogenic state, he entered the grocery store. He turned right, and stumbled toward the refrigerated meat.

-

Steve’s sister, who was 3 years his senior, turned twenty mid-May eight years ago. She wandered around her parent’s home mingling with aunts and uncles, grandparents, cousins, and friends.

“Hey birthday girl,” said an uncle as he cut open a package of cheap steaks.

“Hi,” she replied. Their brief conversation spanned through the elements of any college student’s life: school, job, love, future aspirations. In his distraction, the uncle made a minor cut to his fingertip, and a small amount of blood dripped onto a pile of waste fat he had cut from the steaks.

“Ow!” he said, and turned towards the sink to rinse his hand. When he turned off the water, Steve’s sister told the uncle he could find band aides in the hall bathroom, inside the vanity’s bottom left drawer. He thanked her and disappeared down the hall. The sister finished the uncle’s job. When she was done, she threw the fat away in the kitchen trashcan.

Steve sat alone in a secluded part of the home, trying to figure out what pleasure his sister found in cramping up and already sub-sized home with so many people. Quite frankly, he didn’t find any of the guests as important elements in his upbringing or lifestyle.

With a sign, he stood.

I’d better make an appearance, lest I be the subject of parental lore…

The moment he reminded his mother of his existence, a bombardment of chores flooded forth. Between each request, he made certain to insert a clever sarcastic remark, gesture at his overall discontent, and then make a mental note of the chore.  After a few minutes of bantering, his mother found a distraction and went on her merry way. Steve dragged his feet as he collected all of the trash from the smaller proximity trashcans that had been places throughout the house.

He picked up a few paper plates and plastic silverware that had fallen out as he tried to consolidate all of the trash into the kitchen can. He put the trash on the top of the overfilled can before compacting all of the garbage into the bag. The subsequent gush of air from the can carried a foul odor. But some element of the smell aroused Steve’s brain. Immediately, he felt an insatiable desire for something – but he just couldn’t put his finger on it.

Before he had much time to think about it, his uncle threw open the kitchen door.

“Dinner is served!” he said with a large smile on his face. His hands held a large platter, piled high with thick slabs of meat.

Soon enough, conversation had nearly ceased as all the guests began to dig into their meals. It didn’t take long, however, for the complaints to begin.

“I think you should put these steaks back on for a few minutes,” someone said.

“Yeah, they’re kind of undercooked,” someone else agreed.

Without the use of silverware or table manners, Steve ripped his meat to shreds, consuming the entire thing within a moment. He stood, flesh hanging from the corner of his mouth, and approached the giant platter. With a smile, he grabbed a steak in each hand and furiously tore in. His animal like behavior stunned his family.

A party guest grabbed him by the shoulder and yanked him around. With a condescending tone, the guest asked what “on earth” he thought he was doing.

Steve dropped the steak and fell to the floor, convulsing.

He awoke in a hospital bed.

What happened?

-

Steve pulled his car in recklessly, bumping into his bike, which was parked near the back wall of the garage. He grabbed the T-bone steak from the passenger’s seat and exited his car, leaving the door wide open. He stumbled to the door and opened it, nearly falling over as he entered his home. He made it halfway down the long hallway before slamming his right shoulder into the wall and sliding to a sitting position. He looked at the bloody steak and opened the package.

-

The thing tore into the steak in a blood-fed frenzy, biting into the Styrofoam packaging before finally grabbing the cold meat in his hand and digging in. It squeezed the steak so hard it shred in its hands, the T-bone puncturing skin. Warm blood oozed down and drenched the already saturated gauze pad. Licking the blood running down its arm, the thing took a deep, satisfied breath. It dropped the steak and pulled the bone out from its hand. In an aroused state, the thing nibbled on the pad, pulling it into its mouth. It sucked the blood out of the material. The thing’s eyes rolled back into its head, and its back began to arch. It could feel a state of sedation beginning to take over.

But then it heard a bark.

-

Steve’s dog had a sense of confusion about it. He saw his master, but there something wasn’t right about him. He smelled putrid and his movements were clumsy and primitive. He barked, and the thing looked up at him with fiery eyes. The dog’s tail shot between its legs. With a whine, it turned around with a startle and looked back to see what the thing was doing.

It stood with a hunched back, its bloodshot eyes dead set on the animal.

It leapt forward, and after a short chase, caught the Chihuahua in a corner in the kitchen. It picked the whelping dog up and held it over his head.

-

 The thing brought the dog’s head down hard onto Steve’s kitchen counter, killing it immediately. Blood leaked from underneath the fur, the thing licked it up as fast as it could. The gush was too fast to keep up, and blood poured out onto the floor. It bit into the dog’s soft, warm underbelly. More crimson fluid dumped out, the metallic smell and taste deepening the already established frenzy. The thing swallowed the liver in one go, it slurped on the intestines like spaghetti.

Face, teeth, and tongue red with blood it chewed and chewed mindlessly. Even when there was little but bone left on the naked carcass, it continued to chew into fresh meat. When it paused to breathe, it looked at its right forearm hanging by a few ligaments at its elbow. Hemoglobin pumped from his arteries onto the table and floor. It tried to cup a pump of blood in its left hand, but failed. It wasn’t more than minced meat and bone.

Frustrated by its failure, the thing let out an aggravated grunt and stepped back, slipping in the pool of blood on the tile floor.

It tried to catch itself as it fell, but with no right arm or left hand to support its weight, the thing fell hard. Its head struck the tile floor and died.

It's Monday

If e'er I find myself alone with hate,
I'll plant a seed among the dankest soils.
The ones inside my morbid garden's gate
Will soak the ground's sadistic oils.

If e'er I walk a dismal fray but twice,
And fight my violent shadows with a swollen heart,
There's nothing for me, not anything nice.
I'm left afraid, alone, and ready to dart.

If e'er I find myself along side love,
I'll harvest the best and tend the rest.
The seed will feed my thoughtful, caring dove -
Although I'm stuck with feigning best.

The dove, unempathetic creature, flees;
Now it has left for me an empty cage:
A memory with myself on humbled knees,
A memory with not but unbottled rage.

If e'er I walk a saddened way but once,
And fend my sullen shadows with a heart a-bend,
There's nothing for me, not anything nice.
I'm left afraid, alone, and ready to end.

-

A yard with browning leaves has plagued this street.
Afar, the owner's just a bag of scum;
An evil person no one wants to meet,
An alcoholic stuck upon his rum.

An evergreen nearby, both bare and grey,
Stands out to those who make to frequent here.
Yet none can peer to past's unbridled day
So warm and bright they'd be worth holding dear.

But long ago, a life in black and white
Held that which he would take a bullet for.
And now a yard, once green, is stuck in blight:
The loss of what he cared to adore.

With well-known friends a plenty, rakes in hand,
A house in need becomes a loving home.
Despite the work, this group's a cordial band,
And soon enough: a shine that's never shown.

-

My heart is lost, the lights are out.
With fingers numb, a mind in doubt,
I'm left with nausea: thought of theft;
It seems that I will never find whats left.

Forgetting

For fun

From the greenest field I picked an ugly flower.
For who but me would show it love has power?
It spends a week inside,
In a vase for which it vied,
And now it wonders why it hadn't tried
to it's beauty more abide.
For this it would have cried,
If my ugly flower hadn't died.

Rhyme and Meter

My poetry, written in late 2010, 2011, and early 2012. These are in no particular order, and many of my early works reflect my at the time developing skill.

Goodbye my friend, it’s tough to go.

3 Months go by, the seasons flow,
And as the hours pass, I know
You’ll count each second patiently…
I already miss your grip on me.

-

It’s as if the sky were a screen
The sun a perfect hole which light shines through,
The ambient dust piercing the thinning veil,
And the clods a temporary shield as night approaches…

-

You can share a pair of shoes
You can share a white old hen
You can share some midnight booze
You can share your favorite pen

Oh, the joy of sharing stuff
Makes us owners one and all
Share those weights, they’ll make you buff
Share that rifle, serve the call

You can share a shining fork
You can share ideals and thoughts
You can share a plate of pork
You can share a can of Mott’s

But where’s the bliss in all this?
(Well) You have to share a kiss.

-

A seven-sixty two lies somewhere cold
Away from heated violence and war
Its lethal point sits patient, stuck on hold
The primer paces like a fiending whore
The fight begins, an ambush from the flanks
So ends the unity of bullet and brass
They rip and flay like crudely sharpened shanks
With fine finesse they pass through bloody mass
The uneasy price of life, so you are free
Although these selfless men face certain death
They hold together, their fear begins to flee
And in their valor comes a final breath
                Yet some at home have pitied themselves today
                They choose to pay the price the selfish pay

-

“December 19”

Upon a table stands a crystal vase
Inside rest stems cut freshly new
No leaves hang down, they never grew
Atop sits scarlet, thick, not few
Your eyes may see a perfect hue
But they are weeds compared to you

-

Meandering the darkened forest floor
(Despite the shining smiles of sweetened lights,
Exhausted on the luscious treetop moor)
And drowned by souls ablaze that itch to bite
An inner image passes word in mime
And through the fog it manages to say:
“To catch a somber ride with patient time
Will take the shadowed to a place away.”

-

Let’s take a tranquil walk around the block
And crunch through rosy golden leaves
As chipmunks run to put their nuts on lock
We’ll laugh, they think us to be acorn thieves!
Our stepping journey winds without a care
The amber treeline dances with the frigid breeze
So near we draw, until our warmth we share
Together, it’s just not possible to freeze
But when it’s time to head toward home tonight,
When dancing stars dilute the blackened sky
And this day’s acorns buried into blight…
When dissolved is our clean euphoric high…
                Let’s venture on and test an unknown myth:
                “The sidewalk ends,” so who will you be with?

-

Made blind by love’s full execution hood…
To lift the darkened veil and peer around,
Or let true love guide always, as it should?
…And sternly asked to leap a fateful bound.
An avid eye reveals a blackened pit
The ground gives way, and so begins the plunge
And too does fall a lover’s amulet
From whom it came, a rearward lunge
But blind a willing jump into the gap
Now falling in delightful ignorance
Not much unlike a posted watch on nap
Yet so remains the lover’s sustenance
                Preemptive thought and problem’s solved
                It’s better not to get involved.

-

I stand and freeze alone tonight in dark
Outside my foggy breath (the cold opaque
Obstructer of my view) is winter’s mark
Yet the stars to me do tell (what they speak)
“Find warmth in thy true lover’s eye’s this eve”
But how could stars fore see my hopeful fate?
Their logic seemed plain to much to upheave
Without relent does blow what I’m to hate
But here she comes (oh how I may rejoice)
Bright eyes of spring (they burn sweet love as fuel)
Now so close, what joy emits her voice
And so the night has brought a wondrous jewel
                In her eyes I warm myself so happily
                I could not stand to see her far from me.

-

Perched in the tree
Bird sings to me
Its life free of disdain
At the cost of a brain

Scurry, the insect scatters
With a step it’d be in tatters
Simple minded, free of worry
Its quest nothing but to bury

And the tree,
It gives shelter free
To all willing
To inhabit its filling

And how indifferent
Is the sun, inherent
Of its task to light
Else we face blight

If only these things
Knew of human flings
Oh how they’d pray
Their animation stay

-

Below the pile of the tide of time
Where pressure builds and relentlessly lies
Am I who bears the burden of the grime
And beg the pack’d earth to minimize
Although reward reaps from such slavery
The toil day to day I cannot bear
Event of failure comes sure mockery
No apathy, I could not fail to care
Despite the pressures daily have applied
A savior have I found among the mass
The music for which I once strongly vied
Now lifts the spirit, turns the hourglass
                I view the pressures of the world afar
                For all is fie and well at home on the guitar

-

“Written on the back of some physics homework”

Last night I went for a run
Short distance of twice a mile
Though others might pray to be done
I could still go for a while
Simply cause running is fun

-

A forest never lights itself ablaze
Just drop a match and watch the golden flame
Engulf the barren wasteland, twisted maze
Of death. And watch the flame destroy and maim
The country side. And watch it clear the old
For new. Before the golden flame is through
Alas, here forms the clouds, though not so bold
Small time, the colder and darker they’ll start to brew
And now it rains, so gone’s the golden flame
The last remains are only smold’ring  embers
But so returns a long gone group, no shame
For they will wait for green, not ashen chambers
                Returned has life to this once barren land
                It seems this place was dealt a mixed hand

-

“Gold” (My personal favorite… glad I found this one stuffed away in my closet.)

When all the youth is drained from withered souls
Reflect upon days old, antique and cold
Remorse for all the deeds still left with holes
But satisfied with tasks done up so bold
The issues of the day left in the dark
To recollect regrets of all days past
And fail to live without a question mark
But somewhere lies support, a sturdy mast
For all the time you breathe this concrete air
There must be reason, perhaps conscious not
To push on time again, it feels not fair
For all these cursed holes fill thought with fraught
                But look to past with optimism’s eyes
                And light will fill the room before goodbyes

-

Relentless guts from nature's chilly bowel
Leaves all in wake with frozen ears and nose
So cold today, too cold for local fowl
That dew lies where the desert flora grows
And in the barren void of bird's sweet trill
The wispers of the wind have filled the hold
But at the price of even colder still
And wake of wind does kill the last of coal.
No desert shed of colored leaves about
No snow to shove, nor freezeing ice to melt
And what's to cause one selfish pout?
Just ask for life where ancestors once dwelt!
              So in the break of winter's daily dawn
              Rejoice in glory of happy, joyous fawn

-

Thanks for reading. Comments welcome.

A Work of Fiction

Read it, and then tell me you think it sucks. Because it does.

August 13, 1760

Lezajsk, Poland

Born into a musical family, I experimented with a number of instruments from an early age. My father, organist  at a local church, taught me the violin and harpsichord, the latter of which I became proficient in a few short years. I spent hours mastering my instruments, who seemed to share a mutual affection with me.  My early life was filled with the joy of family and music. How powerful the combination of the two had been!

My love for my instrument grew exponentially, my father lending his support to my talent.  At ten, I was performing recitals at the monastery. By the age of thirteen, I had begun composing my earliest works, and although sonorously crude, they were a clear indication of my innate musical ability.

On one humid August morning I found my brother sitting at the family clavichord. Through some brief bickering I learned he was composing a piece to be played at our late Uncle's funeral. What a marvelous idea! I immediately requested he forfeit his desire to me, for I knew my music would be more well received at the event. He quickly retaliated, claiming his superior age and musical intellect would produce a more refined work. Deviously, I left him to his music.

Unbeknownst to my brother, I consolidated with my mother, ensuring I had an opportunity to play at the funeral. In a matter of days, I composed a Fantasia so moving I could hardly believe what I had wrought. At the funeral, I stood next to my brother as he played, observing the crowd. A solid performance flowed from his fingers, but I was sure to outperform my sibling, despite my disadvantage.

I sat at the church's clavichord, set up my music, and began to play my work. My theme erupted into the room with unprecedented emotion;  my melody banished all the grievances of my Uncle's beloved. As I played, my technique became more and more powerful, and with it, my work began to transform itself from a mere Fantasia into an unrelenting barrage of uplifting joy and happiness. I finished the piece with an astonishing amount of dissonance, easing my audience back into their previous emotional state, which they could not escape following the conclusion of my performance.

That night, I saw the jealously in my brother's eyes. He failed to surpass his adolescent brother at the keyboard! How embarrassed must he have been at his failure. As the years passed, and I continued to outdo my senior brother again and again, I never saw anger in his face - only a burning desire for vengeance.

As I matured, so did my works. I spent my days at my harpsichord, composing hours upon hours of wonderful music, dedicated to my mother, my father, my school, and the church. Soon, none in my village could match my ability at the key, not even my father.

I could out key my father on any instrument, and mass at church clearly preferred my organ performance to my his. One individual once told me how my music had uplifted him so much on a particular Sunday that he became so motivated as to ask his girlfriend of many years to marry him! I took pride in my accomplishments and imagined what others had found in that morning's performance. My father did not appreciate my talent so greatly when the church offered me a full-time job composing and reciting music for Sundays. He began to avoid me, and our relationship deteriorated quickly.

Following advice I received from a priest, I tried speaking to my beloved father, but he refused to listen to what I had to say and retorted with disdain. Though I had decided not to take his job, his pride was hurt regardless. I was ashamed of the embarrassment I caused the man. As months past, I was forced to watch his health decline as my prestige as an organist exploded.

On December 12, 1754, my father passed away. My undying concentration into my music and dedication to my ability had caused my father so much envy that he could no longer bear to see what he had created. Why must he have been such a jealous being? The man to whom I owed the credit of my greatest accomplishments had only his death to thank me for. I had no desire to hurt my family. Instead, I managed to tear it apart doing what I loved.

The rest of my family rejected the idea that I had caused my father's death, that is, aside from my brother. Every day, he made it his mission to remind me of the grief I caused our father. Sadly, I had no option but to agree with my brother. He was right! I had caused my father's death. I was slung into a deep depression. I had disgraced my family. There was only one option for me - to run. One particularly warm evening I left my home and traveled in a southerly direction

After a weeklong journey, which I made only by the grace of God, I arrived in a northern German city. I found myself a job as organist of a new church. My first fugues were filled with misery, straight from my heart. But gradually, my condition improved. In time, I was able to compose the most joyful music that church had ever seen. The halls of the church seemed to glow as I played. In a matter of months, my name spread through the city. Within a year of my arrival in the city, masses of people from around the countryside came to my church to listen to my music. They would listen for hours as I improvised on the organ.

One afternoon I brought a woman home who I had met in through a mutual acquaintance. Her beauty stunned those around her, leaving only the strongest willed men with their wits about them. How I had managed to ask her home, I do not know. But fate would have her vibrant glow in my room. Her golden complexion gave inspiration to a new melody, and as she sat and admired my talents, a fugue was born. I decided to give it her name - and so it was known as "Aurelia."

I never failed to find inspiration for my music in the intimate moments we spent together; each melody borrowed the emotion of a moment and forged it into a tangible idea. Each musical idea spawned from our connection offered a new brightness to my musical repertoire. Hundreds packed into my church to hear the wonderful sounds of Aurelia's soul. My name continued to spread across the countryside.

After a particularly jubilant performance, I was able to meet my brother's acquaintance. I shook his hand, and a certain darkness fell over me. Resisting an urge to write an evil melody running through my head, I asked what brought him to my church. According to him, the word of my performances had reached Poland, and so he made pilgrimage to see what had become of his long disappeared brother. After he recited mother's regards, I invited him to my home for dinner.

That evening I brought my brother home, where my Aurelia had already prepared a hearty dinner. We feasted and shared many laughs about the past.

Shortly after I left, my brother managed to secure my father's old post at his church. He told me he much enjoyed his work, and the people, as they had done for me, flocked from around the country to hear his works. I was a bit skeptical of his claim, as I knew my brother never shared the same ability as me. When we finished eating, I showed him to my harpsichord. He played splendidly, his dark melodies sent shivers down my back. After concluding with an interesting trill authentic cadence, he stood and I took a seat at the instrument

I improvised a fugue around the melody which ran through my head earlier that day. The evil tones of my counterpoint darkened the corners of the room. As I reached the climax of the piece, I inverted the subject, and it grew darker still. Clouds covered the outside moon as I entered the final few measures - and I decided, ironically, to end the bit on a Picardy third. I turned to my brother, expecting to see a look of humor on his face. My smile was immediately neutralized by the jealousy in my brother's eyes. But it had been so many years! How could he still feel this way of my talents?

With grunt, my brother said his peace with Aurelia and me, then vehemently left my home.

Later that night, my dearest Aurelia asked me about the relationship I had with my brother. I finally told her the story of my childhood, and she was disgusted. On that night, and for many weeks afterward, I slept alone.

My Toccatas and Fantasias lost their jubilant qualities. Every note I played was a dismal representation of what happened to my relationship with my Aurelia. Though my crowds had not waned, I could not stand the darkness I had brought to my church. My happy disposition left with the brightness of my performances.

One night Aurelia and I shared a volatile argument. Back and forth it raged, my anger pulsing, fueled by the tears in her eyes. She screamed her nonsense at me. I soundly defeated her foolish logic, but she continued to prod at my heart. I had to restrain myself from violence when she mentioned how selfish I had been to run from my family. How dare she mention such a sensitive subject at such a moment. I cursed her, and she ran from my home.

Immediately suspicious of her activities, I threw on my night coat and left in her wake. I was careful not to be spotted by my betrothed as she journeyed towards the edge of the forest.

I hastened my steps as I fell behind, and tripped. I landed with a thud and a grunt, quickly returned to my feet, and dove behind a thick tree.

For a moment I was sure she had noticed me, but she soon turned away and gave attention to something else. How stealthy I was! The elation of my ability to elude Aurelia vanished as I realized who she was meeting: my brother!

Oh, how he had succeeded at causing me to feel his jealousy! Now I knew how he felt at the conclusion of every one of my ever-so-bright recitals. I had become so yellow at this sight and feeling that I turned and vomited behind the trunk of the tree I was perched behind. Aurelia jumped at the sound, and my brother turned. He walked feverously in my direction.

How foolish of me to have ruined my cover! I was better than this! I was paralyzed with panic and anger, unsure of what my next step would be. Should I run? No, what a foolish act to consider. Would he be sane enough to speak to? Not worth the risk, should he turn violent. I poked my head out from behind my cover to see the nearing footsteps - and there he was. I was brought to my feet by some force unknown to me, and knocked back to the ground. In an instant, my brother was on top of me. Instinctively I reached to stop his hand as it plunged toward me. I cut my hand on a blade in the process, but saved my heart from his cold steel.

Struggling, I fought back. It seemed the same power which granted me music superiority to my brother gave me power in this fight, and in an instant I had managed to take his weapon and pin him upon the ground.

I thought of Aurelia. How beautiful she was, the music she made. The masses came from far and wide to hear the sounds of her soul, and that soul... that soul was mine! The moments we spent together were nothing but in vain. And who had taken this from me? My brother!

Anger surged through my veins. Unprecedented strength forced my brother's blade into his throat. He squirmed beneath, his warm blood pouring onto my hands. As he choked his death, I found joy in the fact that would have never assumed his plan might turn out this way! My Aurelia screamed, and as her glowing aura neared, I had realized what I had done. My brother, dead at my hands! I could not return to town. My life as I knew it was over!

I felt a burning hatred to my Aurelia. Her incompetence caused this. She was the only one to blame for this death! As my anger welled, I began to feel lose consciousness. The death of my brother by my most beloved was too much to handle.

I fell into a deep darkness. As I fell, I could hear the culmination of all my year's work. How the melody soothed me so, took me from this place of grief and despair, and accompanied me into a place of happiness, joy, and jubilance.