Clearing space

Quest. To succeed, I have to live.
No life, no Fairy God Mother.
I am making space for her/for you.
I am creating my body into an empty stage, a space for you.
Sinew and bone. No messy gender. No sex. Nothing but a shadow of an elf.
Everything's overdetermined, has too many causes.
A touch of the ana takes the edge off the emotions.
If I feel too much, I won't make it. I'll do what I want to do, day after day. I'll go to bed and never wake up. That's what I want to do.
But I also want to live, and live for you.
Here's what I've done. I'm clearing the space.
Clearing the feelings that dull the focus.
Removing every practical obstacle.
No pity. No pity for the s/elf who failed you. She will go on with the whip at her back, living living, against her will, as long as I can drive her.

Be yourself, you said. But what am I?
I am the point of intersection between a set of abilities and a set of responsibilities.
Nothing, then. A point has no mass, no extension.
But I can refine my abilities, hone them to a razor's edge.

Sifting through my life, throwing out lies, trash, fear.
An empty stage —

The space between the skeletal ribs, woven with ribbon, bone-chest expanded to dance or song —
Chasm between the skull-bones —

A field of sky and the moisture heavy-visible, curls of wool of invisible sheep drawn by Gyo Fujikawa, and vines curling down from the broken masonry, and between here and there, between this hill and the folds of those hills, warm air on an evening updraft, deep shadows and a tree trunk returning the day's light to the dusk, emptiness that is yet still full of air, motion, unshed dew —

Joy, a slash of joy, cleaving the firmament.