Young Writers Society

Act One*~

night time is not a time of day, you've always told me. it's when the lack of light stitches the cosmos together and mends those fraying ends.
when the hands of the clock stop stock-still and stare at the sky, you can see the world halt and then--
move faster.
it's a jig-saw, a game of dominoes, or maybe chess.
except that you're on the losing side.

"darling, you're always on the losing side."

i count the thrumming symphonies of water by the wayside; the blood that streams
in rivulets and perambulates your soul.
i can hear the gongs whisper in my ears like the lives that we've shaken and shattered and strewn. it hurts for me to whisper above the clamour, but all these questions
burn at my throat like bottled whisky.
so i rasp because the world will curse me if it ever knows:
"what is infinity?"

you shake your head and tell me that i'll know it when i see it and that maybe you'll teach me to catch it someday.
but for now, we're on the losing side.

"darling, we're always on the losing side."

Act Two*~

"you can't use a net when you play this sort of game. it's deadly, it's dangerous and many regard it as crude.
you can't use a net. you can't use a snare. you can clasp onto its tail with your fingers, but the comets'll only tear away at your skin
'til fragments remain, scattered like starships on the surface of Mars.
the only way to catch infinity is to run after it long enough, and if you're lucky, you won't die when it swims through your soul."

am i lucky? i want to ask, but the answer is something i don't really want to hear.

"ready?" you say, and you spin me through the air before i can answer. i feel
dizzy and the world strikes ratchets through my veins.
my pulse snicker-snacks like a sniperscope i've brought too close to my eyes.
i cling onto the fabric of space, but it tears through me and i glide through the heavens as if caught in a dream.
the world's burning up--burning up--i'm too exhausted to care--
the heavens fling me down; their swipes cut cesspools into my skin.
i watch it crack and bleed and i try so hard not to rip my lungs out with pain.
you taught me to breathe imagination and it's rupturing my alveoli.

itsrupturingmyalveoli
pleasestopallthepain
isthisinfinity--
suchgarbledconfusity?

i drag the world by my ankles as i walk; the air around me shudders and your eyes do nothing but weep.
i would call you useless. i'd call myself used.
but silence keeps me shackled.
i want to taste infinity.

Act Three*~

obsession.
it trails down my bones; it's clinging to my sighs. it grabs onto my laments and strings them through my hair.
it's a siren, a call towards misery, but i don't really want to care.
infinity's close and i can feel it.

i watch as moonlight pools in on your type-written glances, like vultures against the stark setting of the sun; your eyes are broken green-glass bottles
swept up by the tide. they're empty, somehow, and yet i search them for a flicker; a shimmer; one hint of understanding.
but all i see is fear.
you hide it like the sky shrouds the heavens with starlight; you can never see beyond the light's clacking nails.
you hide it like you've hidden the true spirit of infinity.
you have never defined--never described--never thought of telling me what you seek.
but you made the mistake of letting me be the bait.
you've let me taste infinity once and now i want it all as mine.
and i'll watch worlds die if that's what it takes.

i'll watch you die if that's what it takes.

Act Four*~

i have spent my life perched on these sidelines, watching the curtains fray.
you raise a glass of dust and i watch you gulp the atoms down; you've always struck me as infinite and i'm curious as to why
because as far as i know, your act'll come to an end.
the curtains pull open to reveal ramparts of gold, but the divine presence is enough on its own. it peers through the gloom and it calls out your name.
there's no knowing what it is but i can see it in your every breath--your sighs knit my bones and tear them apart.

infinity.

it tastes like light and darkness and all those immiscible substances when they collide. it tastes like the ink that drips down my wrist in scarlet webs of ivy--
intricate sails against a valiant storm.
it tastes of despair, lust, beauty and terror--it tastes of blood and the crackling of autumn leaves against lemon dewdrops.
it tastes of crescendo--decrescendo--
and it's colder than i'd have imagined it to be.
its hands gripe for your waist; you scream and i wonder at your cowardice. i feel sorry for you, but you're weak.
envy contorts my heart until my venae cavae swallows all shreds of humanity inside.
i scream. i thrash. i flail and i fight.
there's blood on the linoleum and silver spines carving down your throat. infinity pauses as it sees me and my heart begins to bleed.
golden streams erupt like multiple chains from my heart--figures of eight in uneven patterns, like ghostly trails of fire.

i reach out. infinity grabs me and i smile against the light.
the blindness is suffocating, and it hurts like nothing's ever hurt before. i want to scream--back out while i have the chance.
"leave me be!" i scream but infinity laughs, chains looping around my neck. the darkness reminds me of caves within caves within caves
'til there's nothing but vacuum, and vacuum is everything.
i grip tight to the world; it slips like sawdust through my fingers, or the lacy curtains that would bite into my flesh every time the needles passed through.
i've had my taste of infinity, yet i have not caught it. and i wonder if you ever taught me to catch it right.
for i know as time stitches me to its hem that i am a part, and yet not a part, and there are a million parts of a part--

infinity takes me for its own.