#In that gaze I dissolve like a speck in the boundless ocean

[thinwhitedoc]

WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT | Martin Freeman as Iain MacKelpie

[wersypoo]

Lonely Star

The universe stretches endlessly, yet not in the way one might think. It is not a boundless expanse, but a fabric of spacetime, ever-growing, ever-shifting, a cosmic breath unfolding upon itself. We exist somewhere between dimensions, caught between what is seen and what is only felt. But cosmic objects perceive existence quite differently, don’t they?

Radiant, a furnace of beaming gold and heavenly fire, that is our Sun. But can we truly call it beautiful? We cannot even gaze upon it without being burned. Perhaps its beauty lies in the moments it is not itself - when it kisses the horizon, dissolving into hues of rose, ember, and indigo, painting the sky with the remnants of scattered light. A Ballad of refractions and chemical reactions, a final gift before it vanishes beyond the curve of the world.

And yet, despite its brilliance, the sun feels an ache. It has given light for billions of years, but no one has ever truly seen it. Not directly, not without shielding their eyes, not without looking away. It wonders - can something that blinds ever be called beautiful? Can something that burns ever be loved?

But the planets, wrapped in their own quiet sorrows, have little comfort to offer.

Mercury, the smallest of them all, sighs. "You may feel unseen, but at least you exist as a giant. I am but a speck, a whisper of a world, so close to you that I am scorched and shrinking, in comparison to you. I wish I were larger, something more than just a fleeting shadow in your fire."

Venus, veiled in swirling poison, murmurs, "I wish I were not suffocating in my own brilliance. My clouds shine like polished pearl, but beneath them, I am a furnace of despair. If only I could breathe. If only I could be so much as a bit cold, even for a moment."

Earth, Silent. It does not answer right away, as if hesitating. "I'm a bearer of life, with oceans, mountains, rain, and wind. And yet… You think to carry all the life, all the hope is graceful? Perhaps. But to feel it? To hear it? To watch it grow… and then wither? I am home to children who love me, yet they destroy me. I hold within me billions of dreams, and billions of disappointments. And still, I continue to orbit"

Mars, rust-red and barren, grumbles, "You lament that no one truly sees you? I am seen - oh, I am stared at, examined, probed. Yet I am dead. My rivers have dried, my skin is cracked, and my bones hum with radiation. If only I could feel life again."

Jupiter, the great storm-bearer, speaks then too "You speak of isolation, but at least you are whole. I am a tempest without a surface, a kingdom without land. My heart is a secret, buried in crushing clouds, lost to the storm that never ends."

Saturn, adorned with rings of ice, muses, "I am beautiful, they say. I am admired. And yet, my adornments are not my own. I am nothing but a ghostly core, wrapped in borrowed light, encircled by what does not belong to me. If I lost my rings, would anyone still look my way?"

Uranus, tilted and distant, sighs, "I am forgotten. I spin sideways in an endless twilight, neither day nor night, neither here nor there. My sorrow is the silence of being overlooked."

Neptune, whispering from the edge of the void, hums, "At least you have warmth. At least you glow. I am lost in the cold, in the endless deep, my storms howling into nothing, so far from everythin. Even my winds, the fastest in the solar system, cannot carry my voice far enough to be heard."

The Sun listens, Drowning under weight of silence, heavier then gravity. Its own pain feels small in the face of sadness of others. Perhaps it is not suffering as much as it thought. Perhaps it is only exaggerating something that is not worth dwelling on.

The first law of thermodynamics: Energy cannot be created or destroyed, only transformed. The Sun has been transforming, for so long, so terribly, painfully long... Giving itself away, devolving, breathing hydrogen

But what if it didn't want to breathe anymore... Would it feel better? Would it be able to look at?

And so, imagining it's dream coming true, it stopped. Its heart trying to ignite helium on it's own, lasting only a fraction of it's lifetime

Its core will shrink into a dense white dwarf, while its outer layers drift away into a nebula, a final kiss of light. Only just a glowing shell, shimmering for thousands of years. The Sun, scattered among the cosmos, will look upon it one last time, fragmented in space, before dissolving into nothing

Ashes of something, in hopes to be seen, to be beatiful, a lonely star, once was