ichor;

i. penelope stands all alone in a wide mansion, glancing at the expensive fur rug and the expensive paintings and down at her expensive diamond ring. she lets out a sob. what does it matter? she is waiting for a man who is fighting in a war he may never return from. ii. orion tracks down beasts and wounds them for rich adventure-seeking men to steal the breaths from their lungs. take a picture, they demand between clenched teeth, and he complies. i caught it,they tell their families back home. orion wonders about the day there will be nothing left for him to hunt. will it come soon? it sure looks so. iii. electra saves people. with golden hair, and in the right light, she almost looks like an angel - they tell her this all the time, accepting everything she has without a glance at the hollowed shell she is barely keeping together. she likes to play goddamned mother teresa, and yet the only person she can't help is herself. iv. hector finds himself in the cold of the courtrooms, surrounded by liars, murderers, cheats. but he is the worst sort - he is the one defending them. he curls his lips into a sneer, his hands into fists, and shakes his head in deprecatory laughter. he clears his throat, says a few words, and another guilty man walks free.   v. atalanta runs in circles on a blood red track that seeps into her tired bones and drips between her aching joints, always starting at the crack of a gun. bang, bang. she does not know if she can keep on winning. bang, bang. she does not know if she wants to anymore.

we bear the cross of being human in the way we set fires to the trees and hear the choking of the wild and see the blood of creatures who roamed this earth years before us stain the ground crimson -- we are human because we choose to live ignorantly in bliss while the green in this paradise fades to black.