Notes from the Burning Age

Here's the history of the world for you. Here's what the burning left behind. You want gods, and all you get are people.

Grief never leaves, but life layers itself on top of the pain

I want to take him down, down, to the cold archives beneath the temple, to the tunnles where we keep the past, to show him selfies and pictures of food, jokes and terrible puns in dead, archaic scripts, tell him, look, look - look at people living. Look how beautiful it is to be alive.

You do not fix grief; there is no pill. You only wait, and be there, and let time pass.

As children, we look to adults to be perfect and say the right thing. Mama Taaq, face streaked grey from dust and tears, should have replied to her shivering, shuddering child: “You did everything right, my darling. You did everything you could and none of this is your fault. Later she would say those words, but later was too late, because that night all she did was cry and turn away from her still-living daughter to try and find her dead one. These things are entirely natural and understandable – just not to a child.

They said I was worldly. Too concerned with human things. There was this man in the archives, working with me - 'working.' He didn't do anything. He just talked and talked as if he knew things, talking to hide how ignorant he was, and I did everything and then he talked and took the credit. And when I complained, they said no tree envies another the light. They said it like it mattered, like there was some great meaning in it. Platitudes. Little sayings, said in a certain way, to disguise the fact that they don't believe, they don't care, they don't ask questions. This is the way it is because that's how we do it. Honour the stones, they said. Each stone lives, and we lay them down and walk upon them, so give thanks to the stone beneath your feet. What does that even mean? I just wanted ... I just wanted them to make people do their jobs, not treat their laziness like it was interesting or okay. I just wanted them to acknowledge that I was better.

[I]n that instant [I] understood the need to scream, not in fear or hysteria but pure frustration, pure inexpressible grief that this was it, this was how it ended, a thing without words, all the things I'd never do, never be.

Why I joined Temple!" Lah would say. "Tea, nice music, decent architecture!" "And the devotion of your life to awe, gratitude, compassion, and respect?" "Yes yes yes - all that stuff too.

I always had you down as a seaside kind of man. Rolled-up trousers, an oversized tome about philosophy in dappled shade while drinking fruity concoctions.

Well,” he sighed. “I was hoping to die better.” “How better?” I asked. “You know when you fall asleep after sex?” “Seems harsh on your sexual partner.