The Hunter of Stars

I have chased the stars across the veil,

their silver calling through the dust.

Each shimmer promised what would pale,

each gleam a vow the dark would trust.

I followed where the silence led,

through corridors of wind and flame.

The night unstitched the paths I tread,

and whispered softly, Say my name.

I said it once, and lost my breath—

the sky replied in broken glass.

Each shard became a truth, a death,

a mirror I could never pass.

For what I sought was never far,

but folded deep beneath my skin.

Each step became another scar,

each scar a door I entered in.

I found no beast, no crown, no bride,

no trophy for the hands to hold—

but something vast that would not hide,

a pulse that burned through blood and cold.

It was myself, before the fall,

the flame I lost, the truth I knew.

I caught its shadow, caught it all—

and found the hunter hunted too.

Now every light I see ascends,

and every loss returns in kind.

The hunt, it seems, has no clear end—

just constellations re-aligned.