I know you prefer her

With blue eyes like sea water

Little freckles coloured copper

Everything you’re not, but desire.

Like the moon

She's course and pale

Cold and distant, but,

Somehow, she'll prevail.

In me is a pain

She'll never know

You see the world is promised

To skin like snow

I am the colour of earth

My eyes are black, the midnight sky

I am more than grime and dirt

I know my spirit will never die

Never again will I beg for scraps of love

I was raised to burn bright

I know I was made to rise above

And only a fool could deny my light.

Can you imagine a hand

Capable of so delicate a stroke

Even Renoir would tremble

Contemplating his relative courseness?

Can you imagine a mind

So ripe with creativity

Even Dali would weep

Haunted by the dullness of his thoughts?

Can you imagine a heart

So full of vibrant passion

Even Picasso would sigh

Exasperated by emptiness?

She paints in red

Lifeblood is her pigment

She draws circles that go on and on

Connecting generations and fulfilling prophecies

Written long ago in the hearts of hopeful ancestors.

She sculpts the future

With fingers nimble and patient

Creating crevasses and molding features

And the art will fast forget who made it

But she will remember every touch.

She tentatively sketches

An outline of humanity

And with ingenuity and will

She conjures a miracle of personhood

Creating life from nothing.

All the great virtuosos of history

Shake in existential trepidation

Cowering before the greatest artist of all time.

Her name is mother

And she made all of us.

One.

Allow yourself to forget

That there are few things

More dangerous

And ill-advised

Than deciding to want someone

Without any expectation

Or indication

Of reciprocated affection.

Two.

Dive head first

Into an ocean of your own imagining

Where the water is warm

And bluer than even his eyes

Where kaleidoscopic fish dance

In between coral of fantastic shapes

And all is well and beautiful

Because this is a world you made.

Three.

Take every word and savour it

Like an overgrown child

Sucking on a fast vanishing sweet.

Mistake politeness for curiosity,

Ascribe meaning to coincidence,

And memorize every interaction

As if it is the beginning of forever.

Four.

Tell people you love

About this growing obsession

And then look desperately at their faces

And gush so profusely

And bleed so openly

They cannot help but hold you up and say

‘You can have anything you want.’

Five.

Make a god out of a man

And allow yourself to grow so devout

You fear to lose

Something you never had.

Rinse yourself of skepticism

And bask instead in the addictive delusion

Of hope and longing.

Wait for the invisible wall

That stands in the way of inevitable destiny

To crumble from the force of your will.

Tell yourself it is only a matter of time.

Six.

In the paradise you made

You have become too soft

And too blind

To see the floor beneath you give way.

You don’t notice you are falling

Until you are too close to the ground.

And you realise

Upon your thunderous crash

That the one you wanted

Was never looking at you

But right past you.

Seven.

You recognise, far too slowly,

That perhaps the ocean of your making,

The vast sea of possibility

Was smaller than your dreams.

What was a sea is now a lake,

What was a lake is now a puddle.

What was a puddle is now a drop,

And a drop was never there at all.

Eight.

Swallow your pride

And choke on your ego.

Hold your chest as it collapses

And don’t ever cry

Because your mother told you

Frivolous things are unworthy

Of a clever girl’s tears.

Nine.

You feel a snake

Scaly and writhing

Wrapped around your neck

Tightening like a noose.

But there is no snake.

Only your own hand,

Mimicking a serpent.

Ten.

You hate yourself

Because your imagination

Has always been

Far too unruly

For your own good.

You hate yourself

Because you always covet

What you cannot have

And don’t deserve.

All you want

Is to never want anything again.

____________________________________________________________________

How to Fix Your Own Heart in 1 Difficult Step

One.

Write melodramatic poetry

And try to trap uncomfortable feelings

In cages made of words.

Look back at the ruins

Of that half-formed world,

The one you built on false assumptions

And chemical urges,

And try not to feel ashamed.

You were wrong, but you were brave.

And all those incapacitated dreams,

And crippled desires,

Were not wasted.

For your eyes were cloudy

But now they are clear,

Like a freshwater stream

Trickling slowly but surely

From mountains of experience.

And maybe the next world you make

Will be built on foundations strong enough

To carry more than just you.

‘Come with me’, I told you once

what feels like a million years ago.

You’d follow me, smile on your face

We saw the city lights aglow.

When the clouds would start to weep

We raced home like rabid dogs.

We huddled around the muffled heat

On the stove, burnt garlic cloves.

I told you about Far Eastern dictators

You told me how you rioted for Catalonia.

We’d travelled far and wide accross the town

For beer and good conversation.

I don’t remember the bars or the music

Just us laughing over something stupid.

So was it you or was it me

That first gave in to apathy?

When was the exact moment

We lost all hope in good fun?

The only thing worse than blaming you

Is admitting my own part.

In souring what was once so

Wholesome, fresh and pure.

When milk spoils

There’s no turning back the clock.

The curds, the stench, the sickly hue

Rancid, till the end.

Yes. That's right. Me. I am the scourge of all mankind. I am the storm to end all storms, I am chaos and bloodshed and misery all in one.

You don't believe me?

I'm a writer. And I will tear humanity apart. Word by word.

I will ask you for one thing only. No matter what you hear about me, no matter how much they try to drag my name through the dirt, you must never, not for a moment, ever think poorly of my mother. She is sweet, stewed sugar plums and gentle wrinkles from gentle smiles, hair as white as the Siberian snow in the Russian village where she grew up. Port Baikal, she said. It makes me happy to imagine her as a little girl standing by the docks, waiting in wonder as boats emerged through the mist. Lake Baikal was the deepest lake in the world, she would tell me, her voice full of pride. It was as if, because she was from there, Lake Baikal’s depth and beauty was a part of her too, and as if its freshwater, clean and pristine, ran through her very veins. Maybe it did. I never saw my mother bleed. Only cry - and how was I to know if there was salt in those tears?

The point is, Maria Baskakova was a good woman. She tried to raise me right, to be a proper gentleman, fit to run a home of his own, to find a good wife, to raise spritely little children, to own a jolly old dog, to go to work with a sense of cheer and to have a quick after-hour drink with my dear pals before coming back in time for a wholesome, hearty, warm and delicious dinner of potatoes and meat and fish and bread and cake and cream. The problem was not in my poor mother’s words or actions, it was not in her bedtime stories. Please, I must beg you not to think that way, however tempting it may be. The problem was always, will always be in me, in the way I listened. I saw things in a sick way. A terrible way. I couldn’t explain it you. But let me try in any case.

It was summer and I was 7 years old. We were splashing about in a small pool nearby our flat - it was no Lake Baikal, but my mother liked it enough. For one thing, it wasn’t as cold. So she could dive beneath the surface like a gleeful seal, spinning about, dragging me under, bobbing me up and down and in between the world of light blue and chlorine and the blurry reality of above water. For some reason, one day, as I sat by the pool edge and adjusted my goggles, I paid particular attention to her pale, exposed legs while she did breastroke laps accross the pool. I became fixated with the way her pink, knobbly knees would bend, how her calves would swerve in and out, how her thighs would carve a path through the pool. I noticed the stripes, the lines, that ran accross her sturdy hips, light markings that told the subtle story of how a small shrimp of girl became a grown woman. I didn’t know that at the time, so the stripes perplexed me.

I thought about it all day, but I didn’t dare ask her about it, mainly because my hypothesis was an unpleasant one. It was only at nighttime, as my dear mother tucked me in for bed and kissed me on my forehead, that I felt safe enough to ask the question that had been tormenting me for hours on end.

“Mama. Are you a tiger?” I ask, my voice quiet and uncertain.

She laughs like thunder, my mother - her otherwise soft and delicate tone because deep and rich. It always catches you offguard, when she laughs. No matter how many times you hear it, it surprises you. “No. I am not. Why do you ask my sweet?”

“I saw your stripes. The ones on your legs. And you have orange fur.”

Before her hair was Siberian snow it was yellowish orange, like spring flowers.

“Stripes and orange hair do not a tiger make, my darling,” she told me, “You see the way tigers get their stripes is very different to people. Entirely distinct.”

“How so?” I asked, relieved that my mother was not a ferocious carnivore but now newly curious about the true nature of the tiger. Like all charming people, Maria Baskakova knew how to say very much with relatively little. She was telling me she had a story, a wonderful tale that would draw delight from even the dullest and most sullen of children.

“Well, all tigers, from the noble Siberian ones who live in snow and ice and thrive in the unforgiving chill, to the rowdy Southern cats who creep amongst green mazes of jungle, jumping over branches and rolling about in warm pools of mud, all of them are born without stripes. They look like funny little fools, bright orange sillies leaping about with little dignity, with little chance of camouflage against the dark mangroves or the nothern pines. Absolutely hopeless. It is only when a tiger hunts its first meal, catches its first prey, be it a slow hare or a child strayed too far from home, that it gains its first stripe. Everytime a tiger catches its next meal a new stripe will appear, again and again until the furry fellows are all covered in them and finally become decent.”

She was smiling brightly, my mother, taking great joy in the whimsical falsehood she had spun for her child, certain that she had filled my head with enough fantastical nonsense to last a night full of dreams. After she finished her tale she kissed me goodnight once more and left me to sleep. Sleep I did not.

Instead I lay awake, pondering the significance of my mother’s tale. The tiger is dignified because of its stripes, without them it is nothing but an overgrown, overrated cat. And yet, these markers of worth, these indicators of value, could only come about through death. Through the act of killing. Only in murder was that bright, neon idiot of a tiger able to gain the stripes necessary to hide, to survive, in the wild wilderness of the world.

A week later I saw a small, helpless kitten, who had, through some misfortune, fallen into the pool my mother and I so loved. I was annoyed that this dirty stray was contaminating our waters. Using the poolside cleaning net I tried to scoop up the kitten. It was a great effort for a 7 year old with weak, wobbly arms. But I was determined to get the bugger out. When I finally caught it in my net, I noticed it was still breathing. Suddenly I remembered the tiger. I remembered what was necessary. So without a moment’s hesitation, I lowered the net back into the water, kitten still inside, and waited a few more moments.

I can’t tell you why I did that. All I know is I felt very accomplished. Afterwards, I went upstairs and searched all around the house for my mother’s razor. I had seen her use it in the living room once before she had to leave in a rush. She was a working woman and I was often left to my own devices. She regretted the fact, but I never held it against her. She did what she did for me, after all. It’s my fault I used my time alone in such nefarious ways. Finally I found it tucked in the back of her bathroom cabinet. Slowly, delicately, but with full intent, I made a tiny line, a little scratch next to my ankle, where my mother wouldn’t notice so long as I wore socks. My very first stripe.

I felt so proud. The same kind of pride my mother had when she talked about Lake Baikal. Just as her childhood memories were a part of her the story of the tigers were a part of me. It was interwoven in my soul.

I think you can anticipate where this goes. Slowly but surely I began to accumulate my stripes, and soon I wanted bigger ones. I knew I would only deserve them if the prey was of an appropriate size, and unfortunately the largest animals that I could hunt in my proximity were, well, you know.

I know you are horrified. But you must understand, I did not grow up in the beautiful wilds of Lake Baikal, with seals and deer, I did not get to hunt fat juicy monkeys and lemurs. I grew up in a city, and the most populous and satisfying prey was, unfortunately, and I say this with real, genuine regret, people.

My mother found out the same time as the press. She was horrified. Digusted. She wrote me a letter stained in tears, which I did not lick to test for salt out of absolute respect, telling me she never realised how greatly and severely she had failed as my parent.

That broke my heart. I don’t want you making this worse by telling the world I am this way because of her story. Like I said, it was me. Any other child would’ve laughed, fell asleep and forgot about it. I don’t know why I couldn’t do that. I don’t know why I became obsessed with self-mutilation, the accumulation of these scars, these precious stripes. All I know is that they mean the world to me and they make me who I am. All I know is I am nothing without them.

New Draft

Dear Liyana,

I've never asked for much, you know. My whole life, I've lived by the principle that if you work hard and never give up, you can control your own destiny. You can't fault me for believing that - every movie and book made for children says that same thing, one way or another. And in many ways I've proven it true. Through sheer effort, I've made myself a law student at a very good university, a beloved daughter and a person who doesn't despise the way she looks. I'd happily pass on the adage, albeit with two, crucial exceptions.

You can control anything in life with enough time, effort and money, anything except biology and emotion. For example, if someone you love is dying of a certain incurable cancer, there's very little your will can do to fix the situation. I learned that when my aunt passed away. Beyond technological innovations there is very little we can do to overcome genetic conditions, hormonal imbalances or debilitating physical injury. Sad, yes. But it is not biology I have qualms with today.

It is that fickle beast, emotion. I cannot tell you how much of my life I've wasted trying to... to extract certain emotions from a particular person. I know how it sounds. But if I could just explain how I felt during all those years and how I feel now, I think you could understand. I'm not a piece of shit. You know that. I know you know that.

I'll cut the crap. Zul is the particular person I am talking about. Your twin brother. The brother whose wedding you have just invited me, your best friend, to attend. I know your parents will be disappointed, but I can't go. Hopefully, this email will thorougly explain why.

When did this all begin, you ask? Was I ever really your friend or was it all a ruse to get your brother to like me? Fret not, Liyana. I knew we would be sisters long before I fell for Zul. You see, you have always proved my principle correct. After another physical education class spent lazily whacking a shuttlecock across a droopy net, I saw you in the changing room, trying and failing to pin your headscarf neatly around your head. So I made an effort, I decided to be kind. While you held the cloth in place, I carefully inserted the pin between the folds, tucking away strands of stray hair behind your cheek. We must've looked like the perfect National Day TV advert, you and I. A clumsy, adorable Malay schoolgirl and her witty, Indian classmate. A living portrait of our country. Beautiful, multicultural Malaysia.

Ha.

Anyway, the takeaway is I put in work and I made a friend for life - principle affirmed. If only if it were as easy with your brother. The first time he and I really spoke I was twelve years old. I still thought all boys in real life were repulsive and as you know, my heart only had room for Danny Phantom, the half-boy half-ghost from Nickelodeon. I hated his stupid cartoon goth girlfriend so much.

You and I were in the park, on the swingset, talking about something I can no longer remember. He was playing football with his friends. Without a shirt on. A creepy observation for 20 year old me to make, but fair game for 12 year old me, I suppose. He walked towards us because he was thirsty, and he wanted to use your water bottle. You wouldn't give it to him, so I gave him mine. You may find this either sweet or disturbing, but that smile he gave me, that gleaming, gracious toothy smile, it burnt itself into my brain, and sometimes I still feel it.

All this cannot come accross as too surprising to you considering the fact you and your family so thoroughly endorsed the narrative of me and Zul being together. How many times did you tell me to marry him just so we could be aunts to each other's children? How many times did your mother pinch my cheeks and call me daughter in law? How many times did your father laugh or smile at something I did, and then say, 'What a clever girl. That's the kind of girl you need, Zul.' Zul and I both would cringe, grimace, roll our eyes, but deep inside I was thrilled, esctatic.

My parents were less excited. They didn't fancy their daughter becoming a Muslim convert. But I didn't care, I was prepared. I stole your Koran a couple times. Practiced wrapping your scarves around my head. I got better at it than you. I saw it as a sacrifice I was destined to make for your brother.

When Zul and I got closer in secondary school, I thought my destiny was following its natural path. My concerned parents always asked what I got in return from all those evenings I came over to help him with Chemistry. I could never tell them how your brother's laugh at my array of rehearsed jokes meant more to me that all the pocket money in the world. After we went over the Chemistry, because we still had time to kill before you got home from dance class, we'd watch Glee. Why? I liked some of the songs and I thought Cory Monteith was pretty cute. Zul never complained.

I know being a fan of Kurt Hummel does not automatically make one an LGBT rights activist, but I felt like one at the time. "I can't believe people can be so cruel," I'd say. Looking back, it was laughable how I was condemning American bullies while living in a country where sodomy was punishable by imprisonment. Zul was always hesistant to hop onto my pro-rainbow bandwagon, and I always thought it was because he came from a conservative Muslim family and these things were just harder for him to swallow.

I realised the truth a year later. It was season 5 of Glee and we were sixteen. He turned to me mid-episode, and paused the TV. "You know how Brittany likes both boys and girls?" he asked me. I nodded. "Do you... ever feel that way?" he continued, cautiously. I grinned. I had just read about the Kinsey scale online and was feeling like an expert on the topic. "Sexuality is a spectrum, Zul," I say, like a smartass, "it's scientifically proven." "Please don't tell anyone," he said to me, "Not even Liyana, okay?" I nod again, more eagerly than before.

I'm sorry for keeping this from you so long, Liyana. And I guess I'm also sorry to Zul for finally breaking this very old promise.

"Well... then I feel like, I fit somewhere on the spectrum... Somewhere in the middle." I stared at him with glazy eyes, touched by his vulnerability, by his honesty. I grab his shoulders. "I won't tell a soul," I tell him, and yes I'm breaking that promise right now, but I also tell him, "I'll always have your back, Zul. I'll always protect you.' That's a promise I have never broken, and will never break.

Maybe, as his twin, you always knew, but never said it aloud. I don't know how you feel about this. But I can tell you how I felt at the time.

I felt that as his secretkeeper, I was the holder of his heart and soul, the only one who really knew him, the only one he could ever be with. After all, I had his life, his reputation in my hands. Why would he give me so much unless... unless there was something between us?

Of course, if I was right about any of this, Zul would not now be marrying someone else, and Jason Tan wouldn't have been such a goddamned thorn in my seventeen year old side.

Oh the questions you must have. Don't you love Jason? Isn't he like your best friend, aside from moi, of course? And what does Jason have to do with Zul and the reason you can't come to the wedding?

Yes, yes and everything.

You'll remember high-school Jason had nicely gelled hair, nice smelling deoderant and generally looked like a toned down version of a K-pop star. It is little wonder the uncouth brutes at our school were so unkind to him when he first moved to our town. During one particular lunch break in our penultimate year of highschool, I went back into our classroom to get a bag of chips I had left behind. Expecting the class to be empty, I was surprised to find Jason there, cornered by a pack of bullies from the senior year. They were screaming 'fag' at his face and roughing him up. Maybe its because I have some repressed aggressive tendencies or maybe its because I love your brother and hence am really touchy about this stuff, but I grabbed a classroom chair, sneaked up behind one of the guys and whacked him really, really hard. Blood splattered everywhere. He fell to his knees. "Do you think any teacher here will believe the top student just did that?" I say to them, a demonic look on my face. I pause, appreciating their stunned silence. "I thought so. Now fuck off."

They scram, Jason gathers his breath. We hug, and I know, just like I knew with you, that Jason would be a friend for life. I never told you this story because I thought it would freak you out. Liyana, I wish I was lying when I say the freakiest part of this confession has yet to come.

Months pass, Jason proves to be a football god, and he doesn't get bullied anymore. The four of us, you, me, Jason and Zul, we feel unbreakable, invincible. I see a future where Zul and I are in our thirties with precious children and we throw dinner parties in our penthouse and you and Jason show up with flowers and good side dishes to compliment my menu.

You and I are partnered for a History project. Your parents are out of town so you invite me to come over so we can play loud music, eat junk and finish our project at the eleventh hour. At this point my parents know your house is my second home and vice versa, so I get the greenlight from them. I go to your house straight after school, and as usual, your stupid dance class lasts till 6pm so I'm meant to loiter about till you get home. Bored, I wonder if Zul is home, and I stroll upstairs. His bedroom door is left a little open, so I step in - "Hey Zul-"

Your brother is tangled up with Jason on the bed. They see me. I see them. "It's o-okay guys," I stutter, "You're fine. No one knows. You're fine, you're safe, you're fine." I shut the door tightly behind me and go back downstairs. I feel really numb. I always knew Jason was gay, heck everyone knew, but my delusion had prevented me from seeing the obvious. Zul had picked Jason over me. Me, his confidante, his TV pal, his tutor, his provider of water when he needed it most.

I had fucked up dreams that night, Liyana. I dreamt of Jason and Zul and me, wrapped up and doing fucked up things to each other. Things I may have enjoyed. I don't know why I'm so fucked in the head, why the literal manifestation of Zul's disinterest in me romantically and sexually still manages to turn me on.

I got over all of that, Liyana. Without telling you, without telling a soul. I maintained my friendships with both those boys, and in a week it was like nothing ever happened. But something about this goddamned wedding doesn't sit right with me. Something about it rips at those old wounds. Maybe a part of me got over the Jason thing because he was a boy, and at the end of the day, he had boy parts that could satisfy Zul in ways I could not. That was okay. I could live with that. But Zul is going to marry a fucking girl, and if he was going to fish on this fucking side of the sea anyway, why the fuck didn't I get a chance?

I'm not unattractive. I go through guys all the time, trying to fill the Zul-shaped hole in heart and failing. I kept his secret for years. I cradled Zul in my arms whenever he had his crisis of faith. When your zealous uncle began to get on Zul's case, I anonymously blackmailed him to shut up. Why do you think he doesn't show up to family gatherings anymore? I've done everything to protect your brother, only to be replaced by some girl he's only known for a year.

I'm not a saint, but I've tried to be a good person, Liyana. But God, do you know what's the worst thing? I can't tell if I'd prefer if Zul really loved her, or if he is just marrying her to appease your parents and to silence any doubts as to the kind of man he is. Maybe I do deserve to rot in hell. I don't know, Liyana.

I can't imagine Jason would want to go either, but I can't speak for him. Personally I don't think I can stomach it. It is not Zul's fault, or yours. But I just thought you needed to know the whole truth. I couldn't think of any other way to justify not being there for such an important moment in both of your lives. I love you, Liyana, and as much as I hate myself for it, I still love Zul. That's why I can't come.

Warm wishes,

Ash

Delete Draft

New Draft

Dear Liyana,

OMG WHAT AMAZING NEWS! Of course I'll come. I'm so, so happy for Zul. Tell your parents I'm excited to see them again too! I hope Jason can come. It'll be a proper reunion. Love you, can't wait to see you all!

Warm wishes,

Ash

Send

I flipped through the pages and squirmed. The faces of a hundred pale corpses stared back at me. I looked into their empty eyes and unsmiling faces and my stomach turned. I slammed the book shut. A trickle of blood ran down my finger as I moaned in regret. A paper cut. History books are the worst.

History is basically just like those celeb biographies on E-News but for old dead people. Without the drunk driving. Or offensive tweets.

Ms Cooper was raving about this wooden structure on her desk. An accurate model of a Mongol crossbow, she claimed. I was on my phone, living vicariously through some vegan model’s instagram when Ms C said something that caught my attention. “In his youth Genghis Khan murdered his half-brother Behter.” That’s cold. It reminded me of when my favourite boy band broke up. So sad.

Suddenly, I felt this warmth, like furry pelts and fire-pits. “A chicken has more honour than Behter,” said a thundering voice. I turned around and saw the moon-shaped face of Genghis Khan. “You’re... a ghost?”

He grunted in affirmation. I realised the entire class was packed with historic ghouls only I could see. Aristotle was taking notes, Cleopatra was fixing her hair and some Aztec dude was trying to eat the class pet.

Khan leaned towards me and pointed at Ms C. “I don’t like her,” he growled. She was a harsh grader. “Me neither.” Khan grinned.

He raised his hand and the crossbow moved by itself, just ever so slightly. Then he pulled his arm back and jerked it forward really fast.

That day I learned an important lesson. Only very special dead people make it to the history books. The rest of us can only hope for a catchy hashtag. #ripmscooper #youweresupercooper #MsCiswiththeBigG

The stone, rough and heavy, sits atop the worker's back. The weight of it contorts his spine into weird and unnatural shapes. His sinewy thighs tremble. His veins rise up, pressing against his skin, forming hundreds of blue rivers around his limbs. The cuts are fresh and they refuse to clot. A solution of blood and sweat seethes out from those thin flesh crevasses, a wash of red that tastes like salt and iron on his tongue. 

After some hours, he reaches the top. The burning sun singes his hair, and he can finally look out into the endless sky. He breathes in the air, allowing its purity to wash his tainted lungs, and closes his eyes. He dreams briefly for a celestial being, an apsara, like the ones that tried to tempt the Buddha away from enlightenment. She descends behind his closed lids, her robes flowing in the wind and forming long wispy clouds behind her. He opens his eyes and she is gone. 

The stone leaves his shoulders but his work is not done. He brings forth his tools, some long and slender, others round and blunt. They fit nicely in his calloused hands. His fingers transform from brutish devices used for simple tasks of strength and survival into something more. They become artists, delicate and precise, fore-bringers of beauty, channels through which divinity enters the mortal world. He carves serene smiles, closed and kindly eyes, robes that fall elegantly across the humble breast. Through his hand the stone becomes the Buddha. Before his touch the wanderer would step upon it, sit his behind upon its surface, dismiss it for just another part of the world. But now men and women will walk across cities and through forests to bow before its majesty. 

And for what? 

If there were no stone temples, no labour, no penance, would the Buddha show discontent? The Buddha embodies contentment. He is forever compassionate, asking for nothing for himself and everything for others. His lips speak the wisdoms of his Hindu forefathers, but not once did he utter a demand for immortality, through stone or thought or story. Yet we have made countless monuments and poems and songs to his name, forgetting that Siddhartha gave up worldly pleasures long, long ago. 

So why do we build all these things for a man with no desire? Perhaps it is the only way we know to show love. Love and suffering have always been intertwined in the human mind, like tangled serpents. The temples are glorious, and they are testament to the unyielding nature of our hearts and minds. But alas, they are not for the Buddha, but for ourselves. And until we find quieter ways to show our love, they will be all we have to offer.