Modern Mythology: Icarus

"The pieces all fit together. Yet everything was falling apart."

A Modern Icarus who drowns in the smoke that bellows from his lungs, and yet, somehow despite the flames that spill from his rib cage, he is bright enough to put the stars to shame, bright enough that children would make wishes on the embers that fall from his skin. Even his grin shows something of those flames, something never meant to live; his laughter is death-tinted, as if he knows he’s already breaking. He dances with galaxies, and just as they do, the brighter they burn, the closer they are to their end. No life has ever made its way into his bones, but the flames that transform his blood into ash, also shine in his eyes. He is a ghost to this world, sometimes people must glance at him twice, for they fear that his skin is translucent, but it is that light that continues to spread inside of his lungs that causes him to whisper in quiet tones, just for his ears, that this is only the beginning, there is starlight calling him, there is something beautiful waiting for him. Someday those phantom wings of his will reach the galaxies he has always known, and those flames will transform into the same fires that are given to falling stars.