i am going 

to give you music

to write and paint

and tell,

with awe-inspiring colors,

of the surrogate world

(having renounced

the original)

i built for you

inhabited by people

you could choose to save, or

if beyond salvation, soothe, and

if beyond soothing, grieve with

- which is the best

we can manage,

us humans,

in this frightened breath

we're allowed.

there'll be mountains

and sailing, and a vastness

peppered with secret and terrible

wonders, but

therein, most importantly,

dreamed-up people,

with their 

more-real-than-them

stories.

back here, in this wilderness 

of horrors, 

may their stories be

a balm.