A dragon's leaving

A bad day for the college of the wyverns. And to leave on my birthday too!

What an utter irony. I wish the vice-principal well.

A Fall

Pycha: The joker cries in passion,
The jester damns his thoughts.
The crowd in their depression,
And all their work for naught.

The question in expression,
the way the thought was brought,
Now leaves a deep impression, in
the path the exile sought.

Now lies the situation
That he himself has wrought;
'sit falling or ascension?
Tomorrow shall report.

To be unable to help

Synd: And what is it instead that ails you this time, O Pycha? It seems to me that of late you have had more to ponder over than usual.

Pycha: Of course. The waltz is never a fast one, and dancers step three to every measure. The prologue, the conflict, the resolution. The hamartia, the peripeteia, and finally the exile. Will anagnorisis exist for the exiled? Will there be cartharsis for the audience? The saga is in its early stages, Synd, and much more will be in progress.

Synd: Then for what do you ail for, Pycha? What role could you possibly have in this great unfolding of a play but of the audience with its feelings of transient revelation and understanding? The audience will mourn for Othello as he stabs himself over Desdemona's dead body, but soon after the couple lay in eternal peace they shall wipe their tears in their exeunt. Surely you shall eventually act like them, will you not?

Pycha: It is indeed what role I will play in this very saga that has me pondering, Synd. What is my role in this world for a stage? Shall I be the Faustian king, lording over all who wish they were remotely similar? Shall I be Shylock, and claim that they too shall suffer as I have had in the past? Shall I sacrifice myself to help them, to love them, and never know the true feelings underlying those I help on their quests? Unlike Medea, I am no demigod, Synd, and I can exact no divine exit; I am confined to the world I exist in and the relationships I have with the others. But what I can do in my very context is to ponder, to hesitate, to wait. All while Denmark goes to Fortinbras.

Synd: Do you seriously have to consider your position in the saga unfolding before you? Does your trust for your peers end up so shallow? Is it impossible for you to ever see them on the same level as you? Others may very well regret that one like you would have such a personality; it matches in too well with their own stereotypes.

Pycha: It is a sad state of affairs to hang out with the rest currently while they discuss the fallen. Who shall fall? Who shall face exile? Who shall find themselves no longer in the kingdom for their sin of imperfection? Their questions head but in one direction. Yet it goes further - they live in sympathy for the exiled, for they know how it feels like to fall. What place have I there? To be stared at as the counterpoint? To be remarked against by "If only this man helped" and countless other overdue wishes and reminiscences?

Synd: Have you no sympathy for the fallen, then? Surely you know what it likes to be amongst the fallen. You have been there as many times as I have.

Pycha: Yet it is by virtue of my current state that I may not show my sympathy, is it not? I am no lord, I am merely the jester who knows more than he lets on, and mocks more than he can handle. Who finds magnanimousness in a jester, I ask you? In fact, I ask you another thing. What if it had been me instead amongst the exile?

Synd: By virtue of who you are I cannot accept that, Pycha. It is even beyond you to allow yourself to be in such a state as to be in risk of exile.

Pycha: Then for argument sake assume I go for higher ground; for greener pastures and brighter lands. What of them then? I tell you what I fear: That they bear no sympathy for me by virtue of the excuse that "This is what is good for him". The old lie, isn't it?

Synd: What sympathy would exist for a man reaching higher heights? Your argument is vain, Pycha.

Pycha: And my point uncaught by you. Does it matter if it's for the better? Might it not be for the better that the exiled learn their place? Yet it isn't so - it is the bonds that are shattered that are mourned for. The friendships broken. The time together discontinued. What then for me? Does reason suddenly turn its head to kick the emotional aspect away? Why do the teary eyes of sadness become the lifeless stares of judgment? Because it would be for the better? Hypocrisy, I tell you, that the same situation bear differing outcomes by virtue of the man. Shall I bring it further? What if I were indeed amongst the fallen? Will the same outcome occur as if I left in high flaming chariots across the sky to the sun as Medea did, the deus ex machina?

Synd: What are you talking about? These are all mere possibilities, Pycha. That they turn to reality is but a farce that Iago has cast upon you! Your mind plays tricks on you, Pycha. The world sees you the same way it sees everyone else - a part of it all.

Pycha: Then what role do I play, if not a necessary villain, Synd? Without a representation of motive, of humanity, of any aspect to myself, I am but a one-dimensioned character, am I not? Perhaps even a man who gets it all without even trying in the least bit! Perhaps then it is my duty to be the antagonist! To mock! To laugh! To never bleed! Perhaps then they might be driven to beat me, for otherwise I may very well be unable to help.

Understand, Synd. A new fear has been placed within me. One that has shown to me the fraility of my current self. You're right, Synd. Everything is a mere possibility. But if I were ever to be in that state for a good cause or not, there exists many possibilities as to what may happen. And now, I have to make sure that for the sake of never allowing the possibility of the many possibilities to exist, I must continue on this path. And if I am viewed as I am, I must never let anyone have the chance to see me as anything apart from what I have been perceived by them to be.

Synd: For your own sake I pray that this does not turn out the course of action.

Pycha: We pray with similar intentions.

----------------------------------------------------------

In retrospect, the very fact that I can write about Pycha is rather disturbing in itself.

Exam results

And so it would appear that I get a rather high score compared to the rest of my class. Which is rather annoying - I've been called a bastard by random classmates here and there. My score isn't that high in the first place when compared to whom I should be comparing to, but apparently I shouldn't be complaining in my class since there's no one to compare to in the first place.

It was the song that I heard around me that I realized was true - That we who conquered the small hills around us have yet to reach the summits of the mountains. And though we seemed to have conquered something, the insignificance of it all just showed to us that we were nothing. Those few points shows the difference between the sky and the ground.

From the songs I heard that it was us who had to keep our silence - except in the realm of the like. It is too much to admit to the rest that you saw yourself above them. But it has to be that way - the silence and the viewpoint. Without the viewpoint you would never have to prove yourself right, and without the silence you would never prove the necessity of the viewpoint - you would either be proven wrong and mocked at the burning stakes, or you would just be seen as the arrogant rant who was smart enough to mean what he said. The importance of the viewpoint is one to be kept in silence.

"You think you're stupid because you keep comparing yourself to him" and so it is that I will eternally be stupid until I best him. That is merely the facts speaking, unadulterated by the deliberately tinted glasses. How can it possibly be a sin to compare yourself to those above you? Your sin is that there are people above you in the first place; and it is merely responsibility that you at least try - in fact, I'd call it basic courtesy.

It isn't pride, if I have to put it this way. It's dissatisfaction. That I fail to be better. That I fail to triumph. That I fail to be amongst the headfirst in leading the crowds. That I have as much a right to my annoyance as everyone else to theirs.

I look at my results and wonder at times. From a practical viewpoint, I always stood by the idea that whatever a man has done in something, he has forsaken in another thing. It's the simple idea of an opportunity cost in an action. An alternative forgone.

How many things have I tossed aside in order to aim for the view at the top of the uphill climb?
Just to aim, in fact! Not even to gain! Who knows what else I'll toss aside by the time I gain it. Who knows if I'll even gain it! Who knows what I'll have tossed aside just to learn yet another time that conviction is no replacement for talent?

This blog is but one of the many things strewn in the wake of my vain ascent. My time, my thought, the person I sought, all for the heights that they come to naught.

Ok, that was actually more for deliberate nice-soundingness than actuality, but ah well.
But seriously, who knows? Can I truly call myself "me" the way I am? Have I finally put on a mask that fitted me too well? Might I soon forget what it has felt like to have a maskless face? The feelings of the past? Will I soon create a new identity to forge across the original?

Why even bother? What shall I say when I finally reach it? A one-liner? A long speech? Shall I thank my parents and friends and teachers for bringing me up to the place I longed for? Shall I warn my juniors to the perils and sacrifices to be made on the path? Or shall I just keep my silence against the crowds I may very well step on just to get there?

Who knows. But time is of the essence.

Little Dots

Synd : What do you see at the top of the hill, Riezz? The view is great only for those who seek it with meaning. No glass is lucid, no crystal is clear; and no clarity will show the truth in the tinted eyes of yours.

Riezz: Isn't that obvious? I see people.

Synd : What interest is there in seeing them from so far away? Do you intend to see them as distant beings, separated from your life and self? Do you intend to look down on them, mocking them from the high end you are? Do you intend to seek out those who have long forgotten about you, eyeing them from above like a hawk does its prey?

Riezz: Certainly not. I see them as people. I see them in a way that I could not possibly have seen them as while I was down there amongst them, Synd.

Synd: And what of it? I fail to see any good perspective brought from the top of the hill.

Riezz: I see them as a network, Synd. One you can only separate yourself from by coming all the way up here, and one you reenter upon returning to the streets. Say, Synd. Have you ever thought of the people you know as dots?

Synd: Dots?

Riezz: The little kind, obviously. Perhaps you may think of it as a gigantic series of lines and dots connected together. People make up the dots, and relations make up the lines. Everytime you talk to a person, you form a little line between your dot and his or her dot. And no matter how long it takes, the line fades ever so slowly.

Synd: And what of that has to do with coming up?

Riezz: Fascination and awe, Synd. Look down there. Along the 3rd street lies a gambler with a pair of dice, cards and a coin. At the church lives a girl whose name is of the bells. Far out in the distance is a traveller who follows the stars. Somewhere you'll find a pair of siblings walking around, learning about life. Outside on one of the roads less travelled lies a coffeeshop with the rarest treat you'll ever get. Right now, even Pycha is probably at the academy deep in his studies. The thought of whether I'll get to converse with any of them again is a wonderful thought in itself, Synd. I'm sure that given the opportunity, I'd even find Saisell somewhere out there and be able to talk to him again.

It's a far-away feeling that you can only get by being far-away, Synd. The problem with being close to people is that you take it for granted that you're close to them and you get the chance to talk to them. Isn't it so? And when people disappear you just fill it in with new people. But from here, Synd, you can see everyone. The new, the old, the past and the present. Well, sum it up, I'd say you see the future.

Synd: The future, huh.

Riezz: The future indeed. Have you had conversation with acquaintances of the past? There's a slight warmth to it that isn't exactly found in everyday conversation. Maybe it's self-conscience. But it's warm. Ironic, isn't it? To be colder the closer you are to a person. Well, not exactly, and it's a skewed point, but I suppose you understand me.

Synd: Perhaps there is a period of time before I ever will.

-------------------------------------------------------------

I'm blurring the line between monologue and conversation these days, it's rather annoying. I feel quite sad for Synd - he's such the minor character.