Archive of Our Own ^beta

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for you, a doorway
wardrobe, cellar, mirror
the gateways to our stories, 
the ones we hear, the ones we read, and then the ones in which we write ourselves
they teach us to be courageous, and kind, and keep our promises,
and some of us will trust them, 
and then they'll break our hearts

for you, a doorway
wardrobe, cellar, mirror
for me, the patterns in the bark and leaves, perhaps a bird up high atop a chestnut tree,
my gateways to the worlds
invented, not discovered, but the ones to keep 
when growing up became a certainty, and not a choice

i heard i was supposed to build myself a fairyland
complete with castles, princesses, 
perhaps a talking horse and dragon fire
my worlds had rockets, guns and dinosaurs 

i had a true imaginary friend when i was six
he flew a spaceship from a bright blue star
(i only had to squint to see the color)
as soon as i convinced my friends of his existence
their parents started calling mine 
i promised not to tell the stories
i swore, as in an old folk tale,  
that it was not real, was never real, and not intended to be real
my heart remained intact
back then reality was just a word, a world to be avoided
destroyed in battle after boarding rockets to a dream 

to dreams within dreams within dreams as i grow old
and all my dreams are lucid
a spiderweb of memories and histories that span decades
for use as private gateways
it took me years to realize my father dreams of stories too
our dog-eared favorites have always shared a taste for heists and darkness
and now i wonder if we've ever met in dreams
before our dreams become the only place for meeting

we might presume to set proud anchors in reality 
but in the end we all painstakingly create our worlds 
by stacking up our worries, doubts, and wistful promises
that world where everything confirms your fears of being worthless 
one where your sharp retort came late and you remained unscathed by the fight
another where you didn't dare to snatch that kiss
another where you did, and it did not transform 
into an avalanche that falls from lips in daily quarrels
the worlds discarded every time we've made a choice

for you, a doorway
wardrobe, cellar,  mirror...

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You think you're giving me the world:
It runs on gears, and steam, and wishes.
All three in short supply these days.
I'm making do with domes and hydroponic gardens.
I'm known for new varieties of strawberries.
I lost the taste at our wedding.
I'm serving them as you walk in, your jacket pockets stuffed with lasers,
An ancient orrery in hand.
Back then a single solar system was sufficient.
The planets used to ride on rails.
Now Mercury is missing, Europa hanging by a thread. The rings of Saturn bent.
I see you're anxious for approval.
It does befit a husband
To come with gifts that must have cost a fortune.
It does befit a wife to proclaim her extraordinary luck
In having found a husband who brings her orreries to fix.
I take it to my room.
I know I only need an hour and it will run like new.
An hour drowned in smell of soldering and music of the engines.
They used to say there's nothing that I could not fix
Before, when time was always short,
Before, I rarely think about before, when our galaxy ran small for me,
When I was wishing for stability and titles.
I got my wishes, left my life of gears and steam, did not look back.
Do not look back, but down into the model,
My face reflected on the side of Jupiter. Unrecognizable.
I used to make ships run. These days, I run our business like a ship.
The first to give commands in an emergency, the last to leave.
They praise us as a team.
We are efficient, and ambitious, and in love.
With every satellite we buy and sell I wish it turned into a falling star.
I wish it brought a hail of meteors, a hurricane of solar flares, a flood of liquid helium.
A storm to swallow wives and engineers alike.
But businesses and husbands have a constant need for schedules.
I tell you I have lost my knack, it's been too long,
The orrery remains in pieces.
I lock the door and cut my fingers straightening the planets.
You've given me the world. It's only fair you took mine in return.

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There was a king who had three daughters, the youngest was a desperate, unruly child...

Stop. That was a mix-up. There is no place for you in fairytales.

Let's start with rockets. (You always start with rockets.)

Like silver locusts raining down the Martian skies,

Or landing in your backyard to announce you've been selected for a rocket-man...

(You never failed to turn it to a -woman)

R was for rocket, S for space, you added K for kosmonaut yourself.

You memorized their faces and learned to read Cyrillic for their names.

You took your heroes from the skies, not from the stories.

Would not admit how often you imagined that it was your father who became a spaceman,

That you were searching for a dome on Venus on the rainy days.

You used to watch the Milky Way down in the country, in your grandma's garden,

And made your wishes on the shining galaxy instead of falling stars.

Eventually you decided you moved on, felt so sophisticated and dreamed of California.

In your imagination it was just about as far as Mars.

You live in California now, and think of rockets.

You spent ten, fifteen, twenty years on careful discrimination

Between the topics that were dreamable, and those that would inevitably break your heart,

And then one summer all the walls came down without a warning and turned your life into a jumble sale

Of quarter century of rocket dreams, of wishes coming true and heartbreak always hounding them in shadows,

You'd never had a place in fairytales, although you tried to build one once,

Had read enough of them to know there'd be a price to pay,

But, in the end, you'd never want a happy ever after if there was universe left to explore

More beautiful and terrible than any story could conceive.

You clasp your hands and still your breath to watch the rocket launches,

And listen to ignition sequence as a magic spell,

You wish upon the galaxy to have a hand in Martian Chronicles, the documentary edition

And look at stars for the creation and the afterlife.

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We memorize the rules and skip through cracks.
Shut out the wolves,
and scare away the ghosts.
The chains inside the walls would creak in cheer, if anybody were to listen.
And far below our feet, there is another story.

She lost the power of her word, her secret name,
fair price for the survival.
We build whatever homes we may when fairytales run dry.
Though secretly she still believes she is a witch,
does not belong inside the tent unless it grew a rooster’s leg and hopped into the forest.

Under the bridge,
(a troll) (a toll) to pay.
A penny for your thoughts,
a penny for the news,
into the shaken cup.
A fair price, this,
pay up,
or beg,
or borrow,
there’s nothing left to steal.
When counted, called and weighed at crossroads,
and empty lots, and overpasses,
by glamours guarded, we may yet make it through
the blessings of the day, the curses of the night to come.
Familiar, familiars, fiercely held against the darkness,
conceited city rats and pigeons strolling by
a sleeping figure in the doorway.

The eyes to pierce,
the wings to ride,
the tails to hang on,
the tales for which to hang.

The cracks to fall through, as she drowns.
Because the water never holds a witch,
and neither did the streets.

The city rushes overhead. What’s in a drowning?
No matted hair, no grimy cauldron, no cackle, and no curse.

Suspicion glimmering inside the cracks just at the edge of focus:
How deft your cantrip,
How delicate your charm,
How quick your hex,
How strong is your conviction,
How will you end your quest?

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They’ll never ask why I went out to dance.

Sneaking on tiptoes past my parents’ bedroom, barefoot, carrying my shoes,

Red like a rowan-berry, like rubies that I only knew from tales of princesses and witches,

Red like a warning, red like rage, like lipstick, like desire.

They’ll think they know the reasons why I ran into the forest

Alone, afraid of being followed, and stepped into a fairy ring.

In daylight, it was just a bunch of toadstools in the middle of a meadow.

At night, I kept my eyes half-closed, made magic out of moonlight,

Pulled tight the straps and gingerly began the steps.

I didn’t know them, though my parents had pushed me to attend the dances.

The only time when someone asked me to join in, I was a full head taller, in my bright red heels.

I took them off, danced in my socks, white turning grey with dust.

He was the fool of our village, the only one who would still bother asking me to dance,

The only one who’d talk to me outside the classroom.

He spoke of falling stars that did not disappear once they had reached the ground,

Of strange ships glittering at night above the forest.

We all knew better than to listen to his ramblings.

I only closed my eyes and smiled as he kept dragging me around the floor,

Imagining the Milky Way surrounding us, and wishing, wishing,

So hard I was surprised to see the same decrepit schoolroom at the end,

Trussed up in bright red garlands and silver tinsel for the feast,

My sister’s face squished to the window, she was too young to dance.

The next day, I took her to the forest,

I found the fairy ring, and told her to remember where to bring our parents,

And told her not to mourn for me, and count her wishes, and never be afraid of anyone or anything that threatened not to make them true.

She was so young, I’ll never know how much she understood.

She was so young, and this is why I had to dance in my red shoes.

For her, I told myself, to build a legend of a rebel sister she could secretly admire

Before the real one was inevitably crushed by the demands of family, and faith, and custom.

I know they’ll say I went out dancing with the devil, and devil took his due.

Some swear there’s magic in the fairy rings, it’s older than our church and all the devils there.

I did not care who’d come for me: the ships from falling stars, or fairies, or the devil.

I was prepared to bargain for my soul, to reap contempt and scorn.

I said it would be for my sister. I knew it was for me.

The only chance to get away, in my red shoes.

Red like defiance, red like madness, like cherry wine, like blood now slowly trickling from my toes,

My ragged breath the only sound, my eyes wide open, my feet a splash of color in the fog,

Red like the lights now flashing right in front of me, so close I could reach out a hand and touch them,

The searchlights of a starship, the fire in the devil’s eyes.

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How long did it take you to get here, they ask

(Meaning: we see you were not born here. Meaning: we want to know your story.)

You cannot answer. You do not know how to measure desert:

It moves, and shifts, and swallows, and gets under your skin

(Forever. There’s sand behind your ears, and in your belly button.

Long years from now, you will wake up and feel it grate between your teeth.)

You’ve measured it in steps, in headaches and in tea stops,

In shouts, in jokes, in words.

(In tales, in myths, in stories. The distinction has been lost on you.)

You say, a long time. They ask you – do they have…

This food, this tool, this custom – do they have it too where you came from?

You smile and nod and think, only the very young will dare to ask me what we had,

What it was truly like, wandering the dunes,

This food, this tool, this custom,

The desert-craft, the wind-craft, the sand-craft…

You teach the children, but the adults are never far away.

Were you unhappy? They ask you gently.

Were you? Oh, but you never felt you truly were at all, much less unhappy.

You heard there was a world beyond the sand, and could not rest

Regardless of how much they tried to keep you close,

With tea, with family, with love, with stories.

You turned and ran, following a trail of words like crumpets.

To empires built on salt and snow and silver,

You chanted in your head the night you said goodbyes, and slipped away

From sand to water, your passage booked by weaving ropes and telling tales

Until you heard the cry of gulls and saw the cypresses around the gates

To what they called the Southern harbor,

And knew that you, the desert traveler, were lost forever,

To freedom of goodbyes, and shivers in the sunlight (dim beyond compare),

To cities North, until you reached the snow (all empires have fallen).

You asked for food and shelter, told stories in return,

Until you learned there was a place for such as you

(Who always found the world too small. Who never had a place that felt like home.)

She let you in, and brought you honeyed wine, and told you that she knew this thirst,

For words, for worlds, to build and to explore.

You stayed. The city slowly grew around you,

You learned to haggle with merchants for their books.

(Sometimes, from deep inside the desert. You knew their worth.)

You learned their tongue, and taught the children in the morning,

And wrote long commentaries on the lore

She (The Queen, you said aloud. Your friend, you whispered to yourself) lent you messengers

And had the keys cut out for you, a cabin built inside the yard.

Some of the townsfolk frowned at such excesses,

But many more would bring their children to listen to your tales.

You slept and woke with words, with worlds inside your head,

(And sometimes, sand beneath the eyelids)

Your childhood turned to stories.

Before too long, bewildered parents came to you to ask about their children,

Who had gone South, on trail of words like crumpets,

In search for gold and sun and sand, they said,

A world to fit them where this city was too small.

That was when you first realized you have lost your thirst for journeys,

With walls of stories, roof of memories, you have built yourself a home. You have arrived.

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with thousands of worlds at our fingertips, we shall not be complacent

we will harness the sun to our sails and follow Polaris to watch our galaxy rise,

it will take more than one lifetime to build our cathedrals from humble foundations,

but with the heavens wide open before us, who could expect us to stay,

and if cold calculations demand our home as the price -

-       we will pay.

you will ask me, who gave me the right to play games with our visions,

stake the world on a rattle of dice, and love on a draw of a card,

there are no tricksters in war, no gods to lead us to victories,

as I plead, and I rage, and I paint us a future so blindingly bright,

it will shine as a target to be fastened right over your heart -

-       we will fight.

so grind our bodies to ashes, to be launched towards the stars

our hands into soil, our hearts into dust and our minds into glory

no memory will be so sweet as our first pomegranates on Mars

that will sprout from our toil and our dreams and our deaths and our skills

and though I know I will not be alive to continue the story -

-       somebody will. 

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