Tuesday, August 18, 2015
Wednesday, August 12, 2015
Moonshadow
The soft
moonlight fell upon his aged face. He
smiled. He had been in the moonshadow
for too long. The light reminded
him. His lady’s touch, in the end had
finally arrived. If only to guide him
home. He didn’t care. For a moment, it justified him. It validated all. He felt the surge of strength flow through
his bones so brittle. Desperate muscles
relocated their strength. Renewed blood
filled his veins pumping life to every corner.
For a fraction, he was again complete.
That was all it took. He was
ready.
Cervantes
wouldn’t tell you that. He never really
new this man from La Mancha. This is due
in part to the fact that Cervantes had a job.
He wanted to paint the man a fool.
He wanted to point out his actions as sheer folly. In long laden sentences, he labored to
present the Don as a simpleton lost in his own grand vision of himself.
Alonso
however, always knew. He was always able
to see the truth, but fought desperately to see it his way. What would you have of him? Would you have a cracked landscape so baked
that it was colored with the blush of the setting sun, or a verdant land in
need only of a hero? Would you rather
have dilapidated windmills, or leviathan dragons. Natives made joyous at appearance of savior
Quixote, or bent and broken peasants whose laughter tore at the man who reached
out to make them more. What would you
have? He saw both worlds you know. Alonso Quixote forever walked the line. For him it was never a delusion, it was a
choice.
This was
especially true when it came to Dulcinea.
Cervantes laughed. He made much
of the fact that she was only the simple Aldonza Lorenzo, a plain farm girl. As low as the beasts she tended. How the readers would laugh. How they would herald Cervantes quick wit. It turns out Cervantes was the fool.
Quixote,
ever the man of secrets however, let Cervantes think what he wanted to. Quixote knew her. He knew that so many found her to be only a
simple farm girl. He would play the
fool, he would perpetuate the vision if only it would save Dulcinea. For he knew that sometimes Aldonza believed this
lie herself. Quixote would not allow for this to stand. One thing Quixote could never figure out
however, was is love the greatest deception of all… the greatest truth… or
both? Regardless, he loved Dulcinea not
only for herself, but more importantly in spite of herself.
She was the
moon that reflected that all that was best back. He did the same for her. But something happened. I don’t know what. Cervantes certainly didn’t know. But the face of Dulcinea’s moon turned away
from Quixote. He became lost in the
moonshadow. The void. No reflection. He could turn to the true dragons that lie in
reality, or continue his masquerade. As
he knew both worlds he chose to forge his own reality. He felt the bites, the ferocious stings of
reality, but he maintained. He would
yell at the darkness, only to have it yell back. All in the hopes to escape the surrounding
moon shadow.
Finally, on
that night, he was able to break from the darkness. Bathing in the respite of the sudden celestial
gift, he smiled as he gave his last breath.
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