Photograph: Time Life Pictures/Getty Images
When they were born, in quick succession,
he knew they would obliterate him. He might not
have known how or when but it was clear:
when they created worlds out of the aether,
Angria and Gondal pitted sibling against sibling.
Fairytales and wars played out on the floor, sheets
billowed overhead, snapping a rhythm only he could hear
but the call to march wasn’t enough and he rusted into
a hero, sword pleading to anyone who would listen.
But his sisters plugged their ears with inkwells, blackness
dripped down to pool in their collarbones; he knew if he
dove and curled up into them, he would drown in
paracosm after paracosm, floating away as inhabitants
staged a coup, abandoned their Creator to lapse. So
he shoved the papers and rules of the world underneath
his childhood, ebbing from the pub back into the past
when they chose their saviors out of the twelve soldiers.
His sisters laid claim to the best and he named himself
Bonaparte, knowing he was destined to live out his days,
alone, an island, until he threw himself over–interred.
Lauren T. Davila is a Latina writer currently pursuing her MA in English at Claremont Graduate University. She holds an MFA in Fiction Writing from George Mason University and dual BAs in English and Creative Writing from Pepperdine University. Her writing has appeared in Granada Magazine, The Paragon Journal, In Parentheses, Voyage Journal, and Poets Reading the News. She lives in Claremont where you can find her writing in any of the local coffee shops. Find more of her work at http://laurentdavila.com.
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