Her voice vanishes to a whisper as if she herself were going to vanish,

Please, let him be soft.  I know you made him       with gunmetal bones      and wolf’s teeth. I know you made him to be      a warrior      a soldier      a hero. But even gunmetal can warp and even wolf’s teeth can dull and I do not want to see him break the way old and worn and overused things do. I do not want to see him go up in flames      the way all heroes end up martyrs. I know that you will tell me  that the world needs him. The world needs his heart      and his faith      and his courage      and his strength      and his bones and his teeth and his blood and his voice and his– The world needs anything he will give them. Damn the world,      and damn you too. Damn anyone that ever asked anything of him,      damn anyone that ever took anything from him,            damn anyone that ever prayed to his name. You know that he will give them everything      until there is nothing left of him          but the imprint of dust               where his feet once trod. You know that he will bear the world like Atlas     until his shoulders collapse          and his knees buckle               and he is crushed by all he used to carry.  Dear God,  you have already made an Atlas. You have already made an Achilles and an Icarus and a Hercules.  You have already made so many heroes, and you can make another again.  You can have your pick of heroes.  So please, I beg you– he is all that I have,  and you have so many heroes and the world has so many more.  Let him be soft,  and let him be mine.

She lapsed into a sort of sombre exclusion, a curious communion with mysterious powers, a sort of mystic, dark state,