You have come to burn. Not for glory. Or light.

But because there is no other way forward.

All who seek transformation walk the spiral— descending, ascending, breaking, mending, again and again.

There is no straight path. No single ascent. No final triumph.

ONLY THE WORK.

The Great Work. The alchemy of undoing and becoming. You will shatter. You will sift through the ash for fragments you thought lost. And each time you gather them— each time you bind them together— you will find they are not the same. Neither are you.

The fall. The fracture. The descent into the truth you fear. The breaking of illusions and the embrace of shadow. This is the death before the rebirth.

I wear darkness
as armour.
As statement.
As bright colors
to the snake—
an invitation
to ruin.

Yet,
like all,
I yearn
for more:
connection,
understanding,
meaning
in the blazing light
of the real—
a salve
for the bloodied heart.

I've lost myself
in the Black,
meandering
through reaches
where memory fractures
like funhouse glass,
reflecting
a past
I'd burn
to forget.

An uncertain future—
pitfalls hidden,
sharpened
with each
earnest step.

Regret
clouds the rungs
of the ladder out.

Still,
I climb.
Still—
I fall.
Still—
I wait.

Doubt—compelled.
Pain—worn as sovereignty,
a throne
for weakness.

Here,
in the safety of the Deep,
the Cold,
Quiet Black
A satin wrapping—
armoured,
but forgotten.

This twin-edged Black,
to rend the soul.

Connection.
—
Solitude.

The scales always balance—
always
against me.

The purification. Where agony becomes offering.
Where suffering strips the self bare, and only the truth remains—blinding, merciless, pure.

Show Me the Light.
I've spent too long
staring into oblivion.

The siren's call
The Abyss
Pulls at my soul,
The wraith laments—
Tearing like nails
through the marrow.

My psyche—
splintered,
crucified,
Raked across jagged stones
Of suffering.

Every breath:
Pleading,
Penance,
Regret,
Flagellation—
Torn from my throat,
as pages scattered.

This labyrinthine hell
tightens its grip;
walls close as iron
around a bloodied heart
long stopped.

Entombed
in this cathedral of ruin,
I don suffering as fetters—
each link a memory
Perpetually resurrected,
As death from the clay.

Time seeps like pitch,
Riven from the wrists of clocks
that no longer tick,
A constant reminder
Of stagnation,
Of this prison,
Of the Black.

My barren Throne of despair
bleeds all from me:
color,
voice,
shape,
want—
until I am little more
than shadow drawn thin
over a sepulcher too shallow
to ever be found.

The distant light,
a fragmented flicker,
Through iron bars,
raging with life's conflagration,
reaching—
Sullied hands
Across scorched veils.

Beyond my reach.

Show me the light.
I've spent too long
staring into oblivion.

Show me blazing light—
as
proof
that I am not only ash,
Entombed in the Black.

For I've spent too long
staring into oblivion.

Crushing is the weight,
Though I bear it.

The Scales chime
In the Deep.

The beating,
Wings in the Black.

False.

I breathe.
I
—FINALLY—
See.

The ignition. A faint, unyielding ember—too small to save you, yet too fierce to die. From ruin, the first spark of sovereignty.

In the cold Throne of the self
I languish.
Solitude—
consuming,
My will—
shattered.

The Black—
All consuming,
A welcome grave
For a rest
That will not come.

Beautiful,
in its devouring hush.

Terrible,
in its tender erosion.

But,
Beyond it,
A twinkle,

For in the gloom,
The Black of self ruin—
Gleaming,
Unspent,
The gem:

Of oneness,
Of permanence,
Of life—

Buried in the deep,
Beaten,
Lost,
Assailed within,
Battered without.

Even so,
It smolders,
Flaring,
Gnashing,
Waiting.

Rise—
Not yet in glory,
In defiance.

Throne of dust left to the churn,
Fathoms of Black stretch ahead,
To find the bloodied heart,
Warm in trembling hands.

Fear?
Yes.
Pain?
Always.

ENDURE.

It must be unearthed—
To mend the soul,
To soothe the mind,
To build—
Anew.

Uncover the self—
Emboldened by truth—
Not wrought by temerity.

The forging. Where ruin gives way to will. Where the shadow and flame merge to form the Sovereign Self. The work never ends, it only deepens.

I draw bitter breath,
Chilled with earned truth,
Treading the hush
of violence
held close.

I rise, not as Phoenix,
False in flame,
But naked,
Intent
draped in grace.

Wreathed in defiance.

Loosed from ash,
And crowned in ruin.

Sovereign to the broken,
A Throne of self-loathing,
Turned inward.

Fractured memory,
now mirror.
Rebuke
the gaze of destruction.

Hard fought,
Bloodied trenches of the self,
Contain the forge—
My tongue wrought by wounds endured,
My hands hammered by trials weathered,
My soul forged by pain given.

Steel,
In answer to oblivion,

Voice—
My vengeance.

Word—
My weapon.

Trench swept clean,
Earned in blood.

My sullied hands
Fervently
Cradle the bloodied heart
Before the Scales,
Shattered.

I seek no throne for dominion—
Only to bear the crown,
In mercy—
that others, too,
may climb,
And mercy weigh their final measure.
For mercy, too, is a blade,
Only to be wielded by those
Who bled for it.

From the smoke of ruin,
Rise.
Feel
blazing reality
Burn flesh,

And know
Life.

The Magnum Opus is not a map. It is the fire itself. You will pass through them, and they will pass through you. Not once. Not cleanly. But in spirals—deepening, refining, until the self you carry is no longer a burden, but a blade.

THIS IS THE WORK.

The endless beginning.