His entire life confined to a tower in the clouds, Icarus had never learned to swim. Everything he knew about the outside he had only read about in books. As Icarus plummeted from the sky into the sea, he began to learn what could not be put into words: suffering and despair. As the cloying, calamitous sea conspired to consume his soul, Icarus recalled all which he had read about the Underworld. Afraid of everything he had read, Icarus succumbed.

Resigned to surrender his soul to Hades, the boisterous voice of Dionysus jolted Icarus awake. Encouraging Icarus to tell his tale, Dionysus thrust a goblet of wine into the boy's hands, then eagerly poured one for himself. Though merely a Demi-god, Dionysus exuded an air of overbearing pride, so much as to be ostentatious. Immediately, Icarus yearned for his father.

His father, the esteemed yet enigmatic Inventor Daedalus, had always been mysterious, even to his son. Days would go by without a word between them, with Daedalus quietly devising his next invention while Icarus contentedly scoured the bookshelves. Yet Daedalus had always looked out for Icarus. This realization made Icarus grieve, for he would not have found himself in his situation if he had heeded his father. Being confined to his father's side, Icarus had never been alone, nevertheless expected to make it on his own.

Aided by the goblet given to him, Icarus recovered from his despair. To Dionysus he confessed his situation and the corrupting influence of the confines he had escaped. Upon professing his remorse over not heeding his father's exhortation, Icarus was interrupted by an imprudent Dionysus. The glossy red of his cheeks no longer prominent to his bellowing voice, Dionysus emptied his goblet with a flourish and vowed to reunite father and son.

It was whispered on the wind that Daedalus had finally come to roost. Following the demise of his son, Icarus, Daedalus had prayed for fair winds and safe travel by offering Apollo tribute: his wings. Still, his flight from King Minos control was far from over and so his whereabouts were to be kept secret.

Beseeching Apollo to reunite him with his father, Icarus traveled to the temple in which his father had hung up his wings and reclaimed them as his own. Upon returning to the sanctity of Dionysus, Icarus encountered Apollo, who had merely followed the trail of molted feathers. Despite Apollo's short temper for insolence, Icarus was spared Apollo's wrath as Dionysus divulged the boy's tale over an evening of libation.

Having spent life aloof at sea, Dionysus was held captivated as Apollo expounded on Daedalus's ingenuity: the wooden bull, the labyrinth…and the wings strapped to Icarus's back. Daedalus, in name, had reached Olympus and the Gods had destiny in store for him. However Apollo confessed it was not until Daedalus had offered him the wings that he had heard anything about a son. Apologetically, Dionysus offered the boy a goblet to revive his doused spirit and the night proceeded.

Despite even more libation, Apollo refused Dionysus's pleas to help Icarus reunite with his father. Adamant, Apollo admonished Icarus, warning him that having spent too much time by a god's side had set him apart from other mortals. He explained how Olympus considered relationships between mortals and immortals taboo, and how Icarus was as good as dead.

Refusing to take another sip offered from Dionysus, Apollo stuck to his decision, stating the dead were forbid to contact the living and an attempt to reunite Icarus with his father could not be abetted. Dispirited to be turned down, the surly Dionysus refused to abandon the boy, and the fight continued into the early hours of the next day.

At last, the two gods and mortal boy came to a grudging consensus: Dionysus would not be forced to cast Icarus away if Icarus were to be cast into immortality.

As an immortal, Icarus would spend the rest of his youth looking after his father. During these years, Icarus returned the guidance and protection that Daedalus had lovingly given him. Unaware until his passing, Daedalus would fulfil the Olympians' prophesies under the gentle hand of a son who could only reach him through dreams.

Even in death Icarus could not reunite with his father as immortality had spared him the realm of Hades. However by then he had grown into a proud, independent young man, content to dedicate eternity as Dionysus’s pledge and faithful companion. As word carried of the pair's egregious escapades upon the sea, their territory became known as the Icarian Sea, despite Icarus never having been known by any mortal other than his father.

Daedalus could do nothing but watch as his son spiraled into the sea. His own wings were also beginning to falter.

My only son. My pride and joy, swallowed by Poseidon's unforgiving jaws.

He would not let it happen.

But as he flew forward, there was a loud ripping sound.

No. Not enough time.

It was him or Icarus, and Daedalus couldn't make the choice. His heart got in the way, so he gave it up. His brain made the decision: self preservation.

The part of him named Daedalus died that day. He was no longer the father of Icarus, no longer the man who helped the weak and punished the strong. He was a broken man.

And far under the waves, Icarus opened his eyes.

Memories are hard to make, and even harder to keep. When Icarus woke up in the middle of the sea, instinct told him to swim, to run, to flee or die. But when he opened his mouth and breathed, he did not die. Again, instinct told him this was wrong, he shouldn't be able to breathe underwater.

But he could. And he had no memory of who he was. Only the barest hint of instinct was keeping him moving. If it weren't for that instinct, that animal sensation, the barest remnant of a past consciousness, he would have forgotten how to do anything. He would be dead.

In front of him was a man with skin as gold as the sand, and eyes as blue as the ocean, and an outfit with every color of coral there was.

The man told Icarus that he was Poseidon. The name sounded familiar, but even that, Icarus did not fully know. The man also said he had saved Icarus. That, Icarus also did not know. He'd been plunged into an underwater world with no memories, no idea how to survive, and a strange man with a familiar name.

He did the only thing he could.

He took Poseidon's hand, and descended into the sea.

So began his life, not as an inventor, but as a warrior.

On land, strife began to dwell. A man known only as The Inventor had begun building a massive maze, one that mysteriously spread across the earth like a virus, trapping everyone inside, where they either went crazy... or died.

But under the sea, Poseidon and his warriors were unaware of such troubles. They trained, they partied, they danced. The boy who was once Icarus became Tahy, or One Who Lives in the Sea, and he lived well. He was strong and proud, and good at what he did, and he quickly earned Poseidon's favor.

Only once the bodies began damming up the rivers did Poseidon decide to intervene.

Of course, he sent only his finest warriors.

Five men and one woman. Four of the men were disgruntled that a woman was among them.

One of them was too focused on his mission to care.

And the woman?

She cared little what was thought of her. She did her job, and she did it well. That's all that mattered to her, and that's all that mattered to Poseidon.

They fought well. They had a strategy. They did everything right. But Daedalus's maze tore them apart, one by one, they were separated and killed.

All except one.

Icarus fought and he battled, fiends both real and imagined, flesh and machine.

Finally, the Inventor had to intervene. His precious creations, they were all he had left. He couldn't let this... this boy defeat him and destroy his life's work.

When he saw the boy, however, a small fire ignited in him The first thing he'd felt besides bitter hatred in a long, long time. He remembered flashes of a boy, flying into the sun, falling into the sea... remembered the face, the expressive eyes, so much like his own... those same eyes that stared back at him now.

He remembered, and for the first time in his life, he felt remorse.

"So," the boy said. "You're the one behind this."

"Icarus," said Daedalus. "Icarus, my boy..."

"I know no one of that name," said the boy who was two people at once.

Daedalus took one step forward, smiling and holding his arms out wide.

"Icarus," he says. "My son, come here..."

The voice was familiar, but not familiar enough. Icarus had been erased. Tahy was all that remained.

A single blow was all it took. A stab to the neck with a spear.

Daedalus shed a single tear, silver as the moon, and died, his mouth open as if he'd had one last sentence that he never got to finish.

Tahy returned peace to the Earth. The Labyrinth crumbled. But no one would know. No one would know of his victory. Of his triumph. Of his crime.

Because Icarus was no son at all, not really. Not flesh or blood.

Like his wings, Icarus was made of wax. His body became one with the ocean and he inhabited a passing water spirit.

His life was tied to Daedalus. And in his last triumph, it was also his last breath. His salvation had been his doom.

Poseidon picked up one of the small drops of wax off the dusty ground, swiping it up with his finger. He smiled, because instantly, he knew what had happened.

The wax melted into his hand, swirling into his skin like dye in water.

Icarus, or Tahy, or whoever he was was no more.

The boy was one with the ocean now. And the ocean doesn't care about names, or winners, or identities, or memories. The ocean merely takes.

Icarus was just the latest prize.

A fear of death can be a good thing, a very powerfully thing if utilized, but still, I think of death far more than what is healthy. I am not a religious person, and so I often treat the after as a canvas for fantasy worlds, and maybe that's a sin, to like religion for the story and never quite believe the tales, but I find myself unable to commit, because I don't think humans are capable of knowing a god the way most religions claim to, how could us mere mortals be able to comprehend or even know our creator when we can't even fully comprehend ourselves. If a god were to exist, then I don't think we will ever really know.

As to what I do believe the after is, well I know of this only as much as I know of life before my birth, nothing. I can only imagine that it would be nothing, I could fool myself into believing in an afterlife. But would that belief ever be geniune? I can never be certain, but right now, my belief is that the after is the same nothing as before birth, a belief that is no more solid than it's alternatives, but it's the only one that makes sense to me.

However, just because it makes the most sense to me, don't mean I like it. I would rejoyce if you came to me, a folder of solid evidence in your hands and told me 'Look, an afterlife does exist, or even reincarnation'. I cannot fully speak for why others may fear death, but for me, I fear death because I don't like the idea of nothing, yes, I won't feel or know anything. Nothing means nothing... But, I want to continue existing, I know it's irrational, I won't want for anything once I am nothing.

Still, I want to feel emotions, I want to feel the world around me and I want that for others as well. I don't like goodbyes, even saying it to a long time acquaintance is uncomfortable, so how could I ever begin to say it to myself.

To become nothing in death, would be to say goodbye to yourself.

i.

words are heavy

boulders in my stomach,

rumbling, twisting, and pressing

against skin and tissue

until i have been molded into

something new

ii.

a beast of all

my anxieties,

i am

iii.

anxious lines

worried into my bones,

carving away until

gooey marrow rises

up like meaty lava

iv.

red rings round

my neck like

bruising fingers

v.

--

heartbreak

weighing heavy on

your shoulders, crushing

breath from your accordioned

lungs, fish hooks buried deep beneath

the skin that tear your flesh from your

bones when loved ones lift you up, because

you cannot fathom the idea of being loved,

anymore, not if it leaves you both empty like

this, in the end, when the heart shatters you

both and leaves shrapnel buried in

both of your lungs, an aching

reminder of the hurt that

echoes each time

you try to

breathe,

again

--

Jheri was a skilled mercenary of indeterminate years, known to the city as the person you hired when you wanted something underhanded done and were willing to fork over a lot of coin. A lithe silver dragonborn, she was attractive and mysterious, and would have surely had her pick of friends and lovers, despite her slightly criminal job description. But she seemed to keep mostly to herself. Other than a few words exchanged here and there with the shopkeeps whose stalls she frequented, she was usually alone. Until one day she appeared to buy bread in the market with a fragile-looking human child, who hid in her shadow and stared at the world with wary brown eyes.

The child was odd, everyone said. She had scars on her face. She growled when touched, flinched whenever someone smiled at her, and met people’s eyes with such intensity and ferocity that it made them nervous. She rarely spoke, and when she did it was haltingly, with an odd accent no one recognised. People who had overheard Jheri speak to her whispered that it wasn’t in the city’s tongue, and that the child had responded in snarls and hisses. Rumors swirled around her arrival in the city. She came from a village, somebody had heard, one of the many raided by demons. Jheri had gone to stop the raid. Some said she’d found the child alone, curled in the ashes of the burned huts, eyes glowing.

She was a witch, they speculated. Blood full of dark magic so she couldn’t be killed. Some swore otherwise, that Jheri was harboring the very demon who had razed the village. When these stories came too close to Jheri’s ears, she was quick to defend and dissuade. Nobody quite believed her. Mercenaries were sketchy types, easy liars. But nevertheless, they tried to keep their opinions closer to their chests, out of fear of Jheri’s sword.

The child didn’t seem to notice the way people looked at her, and if she did, she didn't care. She followed Jheri about her business like a breathing shadow, tense and quiet. Nobody ever saw her smile.

boys will be boys

performing perverted acts

and girls will be girls

forever living in fear.

boys will be boys,

stigmatized for the acts of others.

girls will be girls

jumping on the opportunity

to criticize.

boys are in the wrong.

girls are in the wrong.

everyone suffers.

girls living in fear for what they wear

and boys being disbelieved

when they report their share

of sexual harrassment.

is it any wonder

that i don't want any part

of this binary clusterfuck?

better to slide in between

the pink and blue

a purple middle ground

so that i don't have to deal

with perverted boys

and judging girls.

everyone has their flaws

indeed i do too

and it's not fair to generalize

based on the acts of a few.

i don't want to be a boy

and i don't want to be a girl

because no matter which gender i

choose to identify with,

you can't win.

boys will be boys,

girls will be girls,

and i will be me,

far away from

all of it.

stiring the dirt under me

would you call me filthy

or am I grounded in this land?

When I go searching

do I have a spirit that can ride the winds,

or is it a seed from a forgotten wish?

I clothe myself in a lost time that wouldn't reflect anything to you

I wash in the waters of reincarnation.

I birth myself a thousand times and in the sands, you will be a grain.

Look down on my humility from your exhaulted place.

There will be no virtue in my actions otherwise.

The walls of my heart close in a tiny home.

I looked to you to maybe one day fill it with more than I can spare.

and knowing that what I have is not wanted.

I still offer it to the sky and the many suns that dot it in eternal day.

shown to me the light of each and collected the stories of plenty.

Don't die by the axe of your actions. I won't have it any more.

You are of the only mind to carve your blame into my bones.

A soiled lamb sacrificed to the emptiness of your eyes.

My tears don't feed your lost fire, yet you still cut into me.

Toss me aside in the name of something better.

You seek a light that waned a long time ago.

And the light that still burns in me.

F.R.I.E.N.D.S. Reunion is a package of nostalgia, comedy, and memories. The episode began with all the cast members meeting together and reminiscing the set. I felt that the sets reminded them of more than show. Friendship, old memories, small sweet bitter times. The same goes for the audience. I had flashbacks of when I watched F.R.I.E.N.D.S. with my sister having dinner on summer nights. Sharing common jokes, references for one more golden time. For them, it’s a memory they ought to carry on for their life and the same goes for us. It’s a power punch for the audience to listen to the theme song one more time, to bless their eyes with the sight of 6 members setting the stage on fire. It’s surely the missing part of the puzzle we all have been longing for.

The entire episode made me reflect on the strength of change. Change is indeed inevitable but some friendships remain unrusted forever. I understand the gravity of the friendship between David Schwimmer and Jennifer Aniston that lasted forever despite their fleeting crushes. They recreated some scenes, which send Ross- Rachel fans to the seventh sky.

It was wonderful to have segments with creators so that we could change perspective and put ourselves in their shoes to understand how this show was created. David Crane and Marta Kauffman developed how the show was put together and gave an insight into our favorite scenes. The very idea of the show is quite interesting and relatable. It did set the standards high for any future shows.

The quiz gave me chills. It’s one of the most entertaining recreations from our favorite episode. Astonishingly, we will never know what Chandler did for a living. (transpondster?). The whole episode is unconditionally spiced up by hilarious remarks from Matt LeBlanc and Matthew Perry. And Michael Tyler, aka Gunther, looked unrecognizable in the reunion. We will cherish and remember the soul of Central Perk.

Janice’s laugh was something my ears and eyes have been thirsty for. All these years we have been patiently waiting for Maggie Wheeler’s presence on the Reunion. And Oh My God, for the last time we got to reminisce the most peculiar yet entertaining laugh. We got to witness many more cameos which added life into the episode.

Lisa Kudrow performed Phoebe’s most popular song Smelly Cat along with Lady Gaga and followed by support from a six-person gospel choir. Indeed phoebe’s version is the best one yet and will be. Nothing could match Phoebe’s standard’s and like she says Smelly Cat song is an emotion and no one can get it right. The last time we could hear these lyrics purify our ears like holy water.

Few parts which stood out to me were firstly when Courtney Cox mentioned how this is the last time they will be seen together as a team. This thought shook me to my core. When I first started watching F.R.I.E.N.D.S. it was just because some of my Friends pursued me. Now in some years, we might have separated ways but the connection must stay alive. Throughout the show, they have delicately portrayed the time when Friends are your Family. Sooner or later you grow out of your cocoon and part ways. But this Reunion was a celebration of change. We will definitely miss the show, but finally, it’s time for it to set in our hearts.

I love to write because it takes my mind to a place of stories, miracles, mystery, enchantment, misery, joy, hatred, fascination, question, education, and intrigue.

My mind contols the output, and no one else.

Your story is built on what you see and what you believe. While you write, you're releasing an anger or an emotion that has trembled inside your mind with every waking moment. To surface it to a pen, puts you in control of it's appearance. The way you write your emotions on paper give you the option of keeping it personal or drawing in another mind to capture the output as you saw it. You reading this far symbolizes the effort I used to intrigue the output. I love to write.

Writing is purely an art of instruction.

I think the secret to life is that we exist ... until we choose to live. We 'are' until we 'are not' and we 'won't' until we 'do'. Life is not meant to be easy or there is no meaning to the words accomplishment, vacation or relaxing. Life is not the same for everyone. Life is not a pay check or a car or a family photo with more than 2 faces in it. believe it or not, love is not LIFE. Happy IS however, and when you can see the difference between those two things you are a better and stronger person. Too many times we jumble up existing and living, I am guilty of that myself. I think existing is what we do to live. Today... I think I will try and live as much as I can and hope that tomorrow I can do the same.