O' Happines

O happiness,

I long to feel your touch. You are a beautiful maiden lingering on the horizon, amid amber fields of wheat. My hand reaches for you, yet you are too far to hold, though near enough that my eyes can still make out your beauty. My gaze clings to your alluring smile, a beacon of hope against the darkness, a bastion of warmth.

Yet with every step I take toward you, you step farther away, as though I repulse you, your smile still firm and inviting. How long must we play this game, O happiness? When will you no longer flee from me?

I dare not look at the ground as I press onward, for it is filled with holes, vermin, and every crawling thing. My eyes remain fixed upon you, for I would be frightened beyond my strength if I held anything but your gaze.

Darkness comes. I fall wishing no longer to continue, yet your voice hides within the gusts of wind, like a siren beneath the waves. Will you drown me, O happiness, in the depths of Hades?

Alas, I cry out, my spirit failing. I weep for your warmth, yet only darkness comforts me. My laments are but empty attempts to draw you near, yet only the lost souls, drawn by your call, come closer. In the emptiness familiar to them, they find a strange comfort.

“Curse them,” my heart says.

Yet their weeping burdens me more deeply than the tempest you unleashed. I have little beyond what I carry, but I give freely, hoping my agony might come to an end sooner. The souls receive it with hungry joy, and there, among their faces, I glimpse your warmth.

Are you there, O happiness, not upon the horizon, but in the warmth of another within the darkness?

My hands move to give, and alas, you are near. Your warmth revives my soul.

In the darkness, I hear them. My soul leaps for joy at the flicker of warmth among those who were lost, yet found through a giving hand. My feet dash into the darkness, and my heart cries no more. There, among the lost, you stand, O happiness, no longer upon the horizon.

Through the darkness I shall walk, and soon I will see you among them. The abyss will take me piece by piece, until nothing remains but the soul you nurtured..then, alas, I shall finally lay down beside you.