✓ | frozen

16. the playwright and the poet

Michelangelo's father killed his spirit piece by piece, his heart attached to each and later dissected. He hated him with every inch of turbulence staining the fringes of his tongue—his words complimenting the abyssal of life while his sanity matured impatiently.

A lonely boy, now transformed into a frantic man, roamed in a town full of darkness—only led by the agony that ripped a hole in his rotting flesh. He didn't know whether to cry or yank his tears from his drooping eyes and smear them on the wall; temptation wallowed at dusk and followed throughout the bleeding night.

'Maybe the pain will eventually go away.'

Maybe succumbing to control reopened wounds meant to store away from the sun's demolishing rays—or perhaps, Michelangelo spread his candle wax wings too far and melted the expectations built on hopeless dreams and aspirations. He desired to fly high angelically and saintly embrace the wonders of possibilities—immersing himself into a world requiring no ticket to heaven.

A bubbled fantasy and a troublesome infatuation ruined his perception of romance. He swore the thought of love and plays would encourage a newer outlook on companionship—little did he know that love was a complicated piece of shit.

'You can't bleed if the knife doesn't cut.'

Michelangelo pushed and pounced on consequential ideals of sexual encounters. One after another, his soul bled involuntarily—various women took a blade and ran their teeth along the edges, sinking into the bite until he wrenched lifeless—a troubled entity hidden in plain sight. He hadn't understood the purpose of intimacy—watching as his parents' marriage washed down the ignorant drain and shoveled together in the presence of their children. Katherine attempted to hold onto what was left; she didn't want her babies to grow up without a fatherly figure.

She never understood the art of letting go.

Katherine often gathered conclusions about what true love resembled on the outside and forgot to judge the inside. But to Michelangelo, she was distantly caring—journeying from place to place to make him happy—and for once, he learned to love her (every bit). The closet she got when he departed from the Airòi family was the agreement of his father, Joseph. He was a mean man—inflicting painful threats and emotional scars onto the one child that embodied the resemblance of a definite failure.

Thus—perfection found its saving grace through hard work: trial and error.

'Won't you consider what your father is saying, Michel?'

Michelangelo died a billion times.

Maybe not that many—

And Joseph constricted his movements, tying his feet to a rigid stone and crafting a thorny crown around his head—persecuting the crucifixion of his begotten son. Every hero bore a tragic tale, losing the battle with oneself and internally carving a gap within their bruised temples.

(I had fun writing this when I was testing out prompts.)