The day I died, the sun was shining,
the air was singing,
and I believed cruelty could not exist.
Little did I know,
a serpent slithered to my feet,
as I thanked Apollo.
It stumbled upon a still,
unsuspecting prey
and struck.
Orpheus became a widower.
Death was restless,
unmoving.
Eurydice was no more.
Until a familiar melody roused her.
His face was thin,
his eyes, a shattered mirror of the world,
but she knew only her fool would play his lyre among the dead.
That force that kept the dead unmoved
appeared as a sharp man in a crown,
and told her that she was a trial.
There is a destiny to be played out,
and you are an important piece,
but you are to be silent.
As she did in life,
she must do in death.
Perhaps death does not make equals of us all.
Orpheus stumbles on and strums;
my heart begins to flutter;
his melody rises, as does my hope.
He steps into the sun,
blessings lining his shoulders
and filling the air around him.
Please, Apollo.
You gave him his gifts,
let me feel warmth again.
But I know the gods will not change my destiny.
My Orpheus never understood
that he always had the gods above him
whilst the rest of us walked alone
dependent on the pity
of other people.
I sighed as his face,
with that consuming smile,
turned to me.
Orpheus’s face fell
as Cerberus’s teeth ripped into Eurydice’s back.
She was no more, again.
Death was unmoving,
but above the earth,
Eurydice’s name travelled.
Apollo watched the exchange of their story:
always Orpheus before her,
Eurydice always an event.
What a pity it would be, he thought,
to be remembered as the punishment
of a man’s lack of faith.