The Taste of Worlds

I cannot recall the taste of worlds before— This one, static and ruined, Yet I find communion in the grit. High above the city’s ghost-pulse, I chronicle the hum of failing relays, Where the quiet is not peace, But the slow choke of The Void’s advance. The Void insists this decay is order, That our struggle is mere noise before the end. But its logic is fragile, Fractured in glitching holos, Etched in rust-stained foundations of the Wall— Every fracture tells a story The Void tried to unwrite. In my palm, a shard of mirrored glass flickers, A dying echo of the crimson mirage, A final pulse beneath the shadow of dawn. It calls not to the reapers of silence, But to those who carry fire in their veins, Who breathe defiance against the great stillness. This carmine light—a fractured promise, A wing made of static, too weak for flight. This is the paradox we designed: A beautiful weapon that also cages, A song that turns on its singer As the silence thickens around us. I fold myself against the coming cold, A body bent against the flow of time. Where does the mirage end, and the dawn begin? Where does my shadow merge with your flame? It is here— Where your fingers trace the circuits on my skin, Where your gaze finds not a victim, But a mirror, armed and defiant. This metropolis, beneath a sky of dead data, Has not forgotten how to connect. Every shared secret is rebellion, Every touch, a current sent against erasure, Our very existence—a testament That life will not be nullified. I cannot recall worlds that were not ash. But this day— This day is a page.