Work Text:
Frigid grows the heart of a nomad
Wandering through an icey wasteland
No presence but fate to keep him company
How could he miss companionship when isolation is all he’s known
Do you miss a memory you’ve never had?
Do you mourn the choice you didn’t make?
There is no room for such things in survival
Nature is uncaring, nature does not mourn
He is one with nature
He always has been
As ancient as the unrelenting rivers, ravaging the land
Leaving growth in the wake of its destruction
The man from Jorn is nature
Lonesome as the last green leaf of spring
A nomad
The nomad cannot mourn what he hasn’t known
An absence becomes abundantly clear within presence
What becomes of a frigid heart when it is given warmth
What becomes of that steely resolve when it’s molten and molded into something new
Fate has woven their threads into his tapestry
His unending journey of whites and greys
The monochromatic loneliness, broken up by threads of color
These threads of color become an integral part to the tapestry’s structure
Flashes of blue and yellow and green and red
Swirling together, patching the rips and tears
Expanding the tapestry into a blanket
Wrapped around the nomad’s shoulders
His frigid heart thawed with their warmth
With the steaming hot aroma of a cup of tea on a snowy day
With the soothing sweetness of honey from flowers sown with care
With the burning of spiced rum from a gilded flask
With the roaring of hearty laughter shared amongst friends at a campfire
Over time, his heart was released from its icy prison
Flourishing once more like the first flower of spring peaking through a snowy blanket
All it needed was time
Time, the one thing the nomad was sure he would not lack
He had seen civilizations fall and kings grow old and mad
Castles crumbling, returning to overrun ruins
As was the way of life
Nothing lives forever
The nomad knew this
He too would meet his end one day
Later than most perhaps
The nomad knew he had more time than others
While the fundamental threads of his tapestry frayed, his remained
The lifelines so integral to his structural integrity, snapping one by one
His life unraveling before his eyes
Helpless to stop it
The tea got cold
The sweetness became bland
The rum left a bitter aftertaste
The laughter died down to make room for silence
One
By
One
He could not let this happen again
His tapestry
His lifework
Broken
He could fix this
He would reinforce the threads
He would patch the rips and tears
His heart would harden
Never again would he stray from fate’s intended path
A presence is sorely missed in absence
What becomes of a heart so full of love when it has no one to share it with
What becomes of a heart whose warmth has been ripped away
It freezes once more