Under Indifferent Stars

Under Indifferent Stars
© Surazeus
2026 02 14

Despite regret for how life has panned out, 
based on each strange choice he refused to make, 
half-blind Wagat limps on hot river shore 
to ask Willow Witch secret of true love, 
but her skeleton lies tangled in roots 
though her young ghost still shines bright in the sun. 

Squinting through half-blind eyes of lethargy, 
Wagat imagines in haze of despair 
that he sees three tall angels in white robes 
bearing swords of flame that glint in their hands 
as they float down from hot-air balloon disk 
and speak to him with celestial thoughts. 

Grumbling in his short guttural speech of fear, 
Wagat explains to divine messengers, 
who came down from glorious clouds of light, 
that his housemate Willow Witch died last month 
and her body dissolved in tangled roots, 
but her soul should dwell in the clouds with them. 

The tallest angel with long golden hair 
explains with ethereal voice of soft wind 
that chimes with sweetness of morning birdsong 
how the world of land and water was made 
by hand of Lightning Ghost in thunder clouds, 
or so Wagat imagines he might say. 

Gasping in shock as tall angels of light 
bind his body with thick harness like theirs, 
Wagat wriggles to escape as he shouts 
when they all ascend high above the field, 
and the willow tree shrinks small as a bush 
beside the broad river that sparkles blue. 

Peering up at vast blue sky of Glow Clouds, 
Wagat sees disk of the hot-air balloon 
shudder in sudden gusts of freezing wind, 
and he howls to see the great mountain peak 
that always loomed high where the sun-eye glows 
now jut below his feet as they drift past. 

Gasping for breath as he tries to stay calm, 
Wagat stares surprised at towers of stone 
that gleam on the cliff high above the sea, 
vast maze of streets full of people and carts 
which appear to him like ants in stream beds, 
till they land on plat of the pyramid. 

Trembling as he walks with angels in streets, 
Wagat hopes to meet his lost Willow Witch 
in halls of Heaven she told him about, 
but they teach him how to pull two-wheeled cart 
so he works each day taking trash away, 
then cries each night under indifferent stars.