Actions

Work Header

Rating:
Archive Warning:
Category:
Fandoms:
Relationship:
Characters:
Additional Tags:
Language:
English
Collections:
tolkienshortfanworks
Stats:
Published:
2024-08-01
Words:
150
Chapters:
1/1
Comments:
8
Kudos:
21
Bookmarks:
3
Hits:
64

Though I keep this from my children

Summary:

Morwen, whose view of the world has been permanently darkened by past sufferings, is concerned for her children.

Notes:

The tagged implied/referenced character death is the canonical death of a child (Lalaith).

The piece is 3 x 50 words according to MS Word and was written as a fill for the formal challenge at the tolkienshortfanworks in July.

For more detail on the poetry prompt see end notes.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

The world is more than half terrible, but Morwen is resolved to keep this from her children. And at first, as long as Hurin has hope enough for two, it is easy to believe she is succeeding—especially when Lalaith arrives, whose joy is so manifestly undimmed on any day.

But then Lalaith dies and Hurin stands weeping bitterly, cursing Morgoth. Turin awakes, after long watches at his bedside, and asks for his sister—and Morwen finds that all pretence has slipped away from her. But she also recognizes that Turin, so like her in some things, was never deceived.

Any faith in the world’s kindness Turin has was gained from others, not her—this beloved son who understands her too well even when they do not speak. She cannot comfort him. She cannot ask his forgiveness for pretending—for bringing him into a world even more than half terrible.

Notes:

This was also written for the poetryfiction mini challenge in July (on Dreamwidth and Tumblr). The prompts for that challenge were quotations from the works of Maggie Smith. This particular quotation was: The world is at least fifty percent terrible,/ and that's a conservative estimate. (From: Good Bones). The rest of this poem is available at the Poetry Foundation (linked above). The title is taken from it.