The Poets in Vienna

Two

     Regulus Black was the type of person who secretly read classical literature in his free time. Of course, if you told anyone that, they wouldn't believe you. But it was nice, Regulus thought, to have a secret no one else would ever know.

     It was hard to tell at times, whether it was an insult or a compliment to say Regulus Black didn't look a poet. Was to be a poet a bad thing? Society's perception of the good and the bad was never negotiable. One person will say a thing is bad and then the world will say a thing is bad. One could never escape the judgment of their own people.

     So Regulus could say, to be a poet is a beautiful thing, but the people would tell you it is not. And Regulus did, that is, find being a poet a beautiful thing. And he took it as an insult that he would never be seen as one. It was odd almost, because it seemed a wealthy hobby to read.

     But perhaps it was because talk of a rich poet sounded like a children's tale. You didn't hear stories of famous poets in the paper, boasting their riches from books full of metaphors. It was unheard of.

     Regulus didn't intend to die a known poet. To muddle what God had already decided for himself. If the poets wished to be left in the shadows, why should Regulus be the one to defy them? He would die what he was born and that was the son of a wealthy man. It was a fate poor little boy's dreamed of at night, but it was a boring fate nonetheless.

     So it may be that no one would ever see Regulus Black as a poet, but he would never admit to it either. Nevertheless, he would continue to write as his heart desired. You are either born a poet or made a poet, and Regulus was born one. Poetry consumed him whole, as a man and as a soul. Every moment he spent not writing poetry, it wrote itself within his head. A constant stream of meaningless words begging to be put to paper.

     His thoughts were endless and busied, never seeming to quiet even in sleep. Regulus had been born a poet, but he was not one. For the poetry was him. The lines between man and thing were blurred with every poem he wrote, long fingers wrapped around expensive pens, paper illuminated only by the summer moonlight. Poetry was everything to Regulus. It was like an anchor, weighing him down from floating into an endless abyss of thoughts. Without it, he was lost.

     The last hours of daylight were fading, and shadows had begun to cast their darkness upon Regulus's bedroom. He reveled in this hour of the day, the minutes between light and dark, when the sun was laying to rest and the moon awoke. It was a beautiful thing, he thought, something he could watch forever.

     Regulus Black lived in a grand house. And of course, no grand house would have been complete without expensive furniture and fancy new technology, because his father would not have him 'living like a poor man.' The only exception to the house's over-the-top interior was Regulus's bedroom.

     He allowed himself to have that, atleast. It was a small bedroom compared to the other rooms in the house, but that had been the reason Regulus picked it. It had an average bed, dresser, and desk, all made out of cheap wood and purchased second-hand. It was only the necessities, and it was so overwhelmingly normal for someone like Regulus Black. There were no lamps or lighting fixtures in the room either, the only thing lighting the small room being the sun and moon, shining brightly through a skylight. It smelt overwhelmingly of summer, like fresh soil and warm concrete. It was everything he adored about Vienna in one place. The room could have easily been mistaken for any poor man's apartment. It wasn't a rich man's room, but it was Regulus Blacks room.

     Regulus sat at the second-hand desk, tapping his fingers idly against the hard work as a blank piece of paper teased him. He laid the side of his face on the desk, sighing at the way the cold paper contrasted the warm wood. A pen twirled aimlessly between his slim fingers, as if drawing invisible swirls in the air.