An elegy to effigies

Kneeling into the abyss, I offer my condolences

And gaze upon the gemstones, glittering despite the thickened darkness.

The last embers of Their lives are cast against the stones

Forged lovingly by divine hands of grief.

This testament to art, teasing the boundaries of mortality

Sealing, suspending their Fate in this mosaic of the moment

The moment when everything collapsed.

An ever-burning torch illuminates from nothingness

(Oh, could that power not cast its skill across the stones, bringing the breath of life

Allowing them to re-enter the Flame?)

Accentuating the terror

The hatred

The grief

The love

The passion

The diligence

Carved eloquently on Their faces

How can pain reside within

Facades of purest perfection?

And yet, there it all remains.

I set out my offerings.

A maddeningly weighty inventory

A burden, no mortal should ever bear:

quit

Penned by my hand on the 14th of Valnuary, in the year 659 AF.