his great-grandfather lives in him: in the the heavy shade of his nose, curved like a hawk, so similar to his father's it breaks his heart. these elongated fingers had once been his mother's, these are elegant hands, even now when they became desert-touched, and still, equally efficient in either exigence of empathy or execution. he has the same upturned eyes a woman from the 18th century used to look so reverently at the woman she loved, his large mouth is that of the grandfather he hated. this is the same dark hair his ancestors have been carrying from the beginning of this story, like dark wool, the very memory of softness. he is a museum. he feels liminal and distant.
his body is a hollow patchwork. there are many rooms, most of them empty, & he wanders from one to the other, an introspective nomad, the only ghost in the cathedral of this body; with countless eyes watching from behind the windows. there is only a dreadful, weighted silence that drags behind him, it is not grief, not anger, but the apathy that comes only with boredom, only with self-serving tragedy, which is not tragedy, just pity, like a dog curled in on itself, licking an old wound.
& these same ancient ghosts stare back at him from the child in front of him, he needs not his eyes to see them. they exist as permanent images, selves within selves, they cling to a face that could have been his own — but the hair, the ears, chani exists there, the last remnants of her hanging at the edge of a young boy’s face. ah, to inherit the sickness of the atreides is the knife in the back and then the disembodied laughter at the funeral and the peripheral silhouette of a ghost... the past, much like the future, is an inescapable animal.
tragedy lies in his indifference. he knows this is @mooonburn, his child. & he should love this son — yet he doesn’t. with unexpected rage and unexpected sadness, he says: ❝ you play dangerous games with dangerous dice ! ❞
