from Thought Catalog
YOU ARE THE SUN
By: Stephanie
Georgopolus
Let’s play the
Universe game.
I’ll be a star cloud because
that’s what your presence reduces me to. A mass of luminosity and in those
moments, I’m impossible to measure mathematically. Not with the naked eye,
anyway. It’s simpler than that: you say my name and I’ll glow.
You can be the North Star,
burning bright and hot. You’re Polaris because you stand out, because you’re a
fixture in my sky. Because when I’m lost, I can find you and be okay. You’re my
point of reference.
Speaking
of Polaris, we can be the Big Dipper and Little Dipper, the Ursa Major and Ursa
Minor, the Big Bear and Little Bear – whichever name you prefer as long as
we’re partnered together in perpetuity. Our bond will know no lingual or cultural
or geographic limits. No matter where two people stand on this Earth, they’ll
look up and see us and know that we belong together.
We
can be whichever constellations you like, at least in the beginning. In the
beginning we’ll be all starburst and Andromeda and other striking sights
that’ll inspire envy; but it won’t stay that way.
This
is when the game loses its sheen.
Maybe
we’ll stop communicating. I’ll grow distant; I’ll grow colder like Mars. And
you’ll grow angrier, volatile like Jupiter. A mess of rock and metal and
discarded things will separate us, an Asteroid Belt of our grievances. But I’ll
overlook it; I’ll still sit by your side and will your storms to quit brewing.
Anything to make them stop brewing.
Or
maybe you’ll grow distant first. Perhaps you’ll become the Sun and I, the Earth
— turning in on myself to revolve around you because you are the light and what
keeps me warm. Me rotating around you. Your selfishness so belittling that one
day, I’ll become too small to be the Earth. So you’ll take my place, and I’ll
become your moon. This is a better fit because some days I’ll appear to be
whole but others? I’ll look like I’m half, or a quarter, or just a tiny sliver
of who I was. On rare occasions, we’ll still align. I will pass through your
shadow and bask in your sunlight; my face awash in gold and red and I’ll
remember the way things were. But lunar eclipses, they’re few and far between
and they’re not enough to save us.
Perhaps
one moon won’t be enough for you, eventually. Eventually you’ll want what the
others have, you’ll want eight moons or sixteen moons or more, so you’ll become
Saturn. You’ll have more rings, more moons than you’ll know what to do with.
And I will have no choice but to take the hint. I’ll be Pluto: downgraded and disregarded
and cast aside. “You’re not even a planet anymore,” you’ll say, and I’ll know
we’ll never be the same again. I’ll feel really, really small.
Finally
it’ll become too much, the heartache. So I’ll be a supernova, one who was once
a star but is now explosive, exploding, exploded. And it will be spectacular,
you’ll be impressed by the amount of light I had inside of me. You had no idea
just how much.
But
it’s of no consequence. Because you are all of the planets, and all of the
moons, and all of the matter; you’re all that matters. You are the sun; and
you’ll just keep spinning and spinning and spinning.
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