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I fell into love of a gentle kind
With a flower on top of a high high cliff
In a forest deep I sank and I knew
I’m a charred and dirty forbidden fruit
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Wistful • Dreamy • Sincere • Pure • Demure • Gentle
Naive • Melancholy • Insecure • Lonesome • Quixotic
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❝ There was a philosopher who once asked,
"Are we human because we gaze at the stars,
or do we gaze at them because we are human?"
Pointless, really...
"Do the stars gaze back?"
Now, that's a question. ❞
The Prince is a curious creature; borne not on the plains of africa but far, farther, farther still, and long ago, longer, longer still, in a burst of cataclysmic immensity by the standards of the pale blue dot suspended impossibly far in the spilled ink of the dark infinite he was brought into.
He was by all means, a small star, small and curious, and simple, he was not like the celestials who wore the forms of big cats from their inception and who were, despite their apparent immortality, still prone to the petty bickering and trivialities one associates far more with fleeting, mortal things; Absolutely not. He was simpler than that, innocent, and perfect.
Well, almost perfect. For though he felt neither anger nor sorrow, fear or envy, he was at the core an insatiably curious spark, and he did so enjoy to observe the distant world that he leaned in further, and further, and further, and then a little further still, until he simply...fell
Now, a star which falls to earth feels inevitably frightened and furthermore exposed, having gone from the considerable emptiness of space to the claustrophobic everything of the earth. And the star prince felt no different when he crashed into the boglands of africa and into the startled petals of so many water hyacinths, leopard orchid, and river crinum, among so many others. In fact, he felt so exposed that the first thing he did was craft himself a mask and cloak, and this mask and cloak looked just like the languid felid creatures he had spent so much time observing.
So much so in fact, that by all means it was impossible to tell that he was in a disguise at all, for it worked every bit like the body of any other living thing, save of course for the fact that instead of a heart there was and is simply him, pulsing in the cage of foreign ribs.
Which is not to say he looks like a normal lion, for clearly he does not. He is a cat who wears a coat of many colours, all the colours of africa in bloom, his topcoat is the kiss of a rainbow, the fluttering breath of a garden. Beneath this however, he is stranger even indeed, for in the shifting colour is a reflection of the night sky itself, rich blues and flecks of nebula, twinkling memories of each star he left behind, each distant fire that is and was and will be on dazzling half hidden display.
Even his eyes are unnatural, wide, and longing pools of liquid bismuth. His expression is a distant one, and nothing reflects in the windows of his eyes when stared into save for the slow shifting of galaxies unseen from earth.
His guise would be imperfect even in the colours of dust and sun so common to lions, for he is not built quite the same and certainly he does not look like any large male pride leader most might bring to mind, his form is soft and slender, and though there is great power beneath his dazzling surface, he looks every bit lithe and long, prancing elegant lines between what one expects of lion and cheetah and perhaps so many other manners of cat large and smaller while not ever fitting the form of any. His is a strange grace. His is a strange life. His is a strange being.
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“Stars fall, and like angels, they certainly do not go up again”
──
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❝ He stared up at the stars:
and it seemed to him then that they were dancers
stately and graceful, performing a dance
almost infinite in its complexity. ❞
It was not long before the Prince was discovered, and though he had not in all his ancient existence ever had need of a name he allowed himself to be dubbed ‘Prince Ikebana’ by the lionesses who had need to call him something. They were quite entranced of the Prince, perhaps for his coat, or his strange manner of being, or perhaps it was that bit of leopard orchid he’d used when creating his guise. Regardless, the lionesses followed him, a strange and shining star.
It was not long before tales of the prince began to spread, curious lions and lionesses occasionally making journeys to his mossy kingdom to see if those stories held any weight at all. What they found was a softspoken, innocent creature, who listened gladly to their wishes and granted them where he could, weaving the bright colours of blossoms into the most humble of coats, leaving little traces of starlight in the hearts of those near him.
He amassed his followers more by chance than choice, and they are fervent followers, they preach of magic and wishes and gifts, of sired cubs who sparkle like galaxies on floral fields, of the leopard-orchid intoxication of his presence. As for Hyacinth, he does his best to live up to the expectations placed upon him, valiant in his efforts to protect his adoring pride.
Despite these many followers, he is an incurably, cosmically lonely creature, uncertain of himself and the world around him, uncertain of the love he receives, for he cannot truly say if they adore him for his being or the orchid perfume which follows him or the wishes they breathe between his bright colours. Yet despite this uncertainty he loves those around him with an infinite tenderness, assuring himself where he can that the loyalty he is given is as pure as that which he gives.
Ikebana’s is an elusive pride of drifting petals among an old and impossible forest, silent over the mossy ground and the green carpeted trees, for no star worth its shine has ever made itself easy to catch. Of course, as far as stars go, the prince is easier than most, for he is a mooncalfish, naive, new being who either does not or perhaps simply cannot understand truly the dangers or evils of the world.
Regardless, he does as stars have always done:
He Shines.
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“For so great a treasure, words will never do”
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