The Lantern Keeper

Before the breath, before the sea,

before the roots of dawn were sown,

a single spark was given me—

a borrowed blaze, not mine alone.

I cupped it close against the wind,

its whisper warm, its weight divine.

It hummed of all that lies within,

of every life that would be mine.

The Wellspring stirred beneath my hands,

its silver veins began to sing.

From darkness rose the light’s commands—

to guard, to guide, remembering.

I walked where night had never slept,

through hollow stars, through veiled design.

The flame I held, the flame that wept,

became the heart of every sign.

It burned through grief, through grief it grew,

its light a promise yet unmade.

I was the first, but not the true—

for every keeper must decay.

So when my hands grew ash and air,

I set the lantern in the stream.

It floated forth, a prayer, a pair

of memory and mortal dream.

And still it drifts through time’s abyss,

through all that ends, through all begun—

a lantern born of nothingness,

still searching for the second sun.