Tsoa Quotes

Achilles' eyes were bright in the firelight, his face drawn sharply by the flickering shadows. I would know it in dark or disguise, I told myself. I would know it even in madness.

I conjure the boy I knew. Achilles, grinning as the figs blur in his hands. His green eyes laughing into mine. Catch, he says. Achilles, outlined against the sky, hanging from a branch over the river. The thick warmth of his sleepy breath against my ear. If you have to go, I will go with you. My fears forgotten in the golden harbor of his arms. The memories come, and come. She listens, staring into the grain of the stone. We are all there, goddess and mortal and the boy who was both.

I saw then how I had changed. I did not mind anymore that I lost when we raced and I lost when we swam out to the rocks and I lost when we tossed spears or skipped stones. For who can be ashamed to lose to such beauty? It was enough to watch him win, to see the soles of his feet flashing as they kicked up sand, or the rise and fall of his shoulders as he pulled through the salt. It was enough.

He knew, but it was not enough. The sorrow was so large it threatened to tear through my skin. When he died, all things swift and beautiful and bright would be buried with him.

The rosy gleam of his lip, the fevered gleam of his eyes. There was not a line anywhere on his face, nothing creased or graying; all crisp. He was spring, golden and bright. Envious death would drink his blood, and grow young again.

He did not fear ridicule, he had never known it.

No one would remember his glory, or his honesty, or his beauty; all his gold would be turned to ashes and ruin.

Above us, the constellations spun and the moon paced her weary course. We lay stricken and sleepless as the hours passed.

Will you come with me?' he asked. Perhaps in some other life I could have refused, could have torn my hair and screamed, and made him face his choice alone. But not in this one. He would sail to troy and I would follow, even into death.

I let him hold me, let him press us length to length so close that nothing might fit between us.

he buired his face in his hands and did not speak. i held him and whispered all the bits of broken comfort i could find.

And then I remembered, he will never be old.

i did not care. i would have no need of her. i did not plan to live after he was gone.

i do not know this man, i think. he is no one i have ever seen before.

the never-ending ache of love and sorrow. perhaps in some other life i could have refused, could have torn my hair and screamed, made him face his choice alone. but not in this one. he would sail to troy and i would follow, even into death.

his beautiful body lost to bones and gray ash.

No man is worth more than another, wherever he is from