Two lives
maybe three
if we are lucky, we get to see

There is a meadow, and a sunset
a crackling fireplace, freshly chopped wood
family to grow and love
time and space, to read and speak and write and feel

Or a different pace, another climb
one where rest can be hard to find
but there we get to be, more than most will ever see

I sit here and think
what is the syllable
what is the path beyond these crossroads
a simple coin toss will not reveal

To seek and seek
can we ever be free
of egos want, a prisoner bound to folly

Or is there a higher calling
a chance to be

At some waypoint down this misty road
we will find our end
and those that see it clearer
than you or I
they will find us waiting
contemplating
and say

There is the angst of indecision, the regret of a path not followed, and the mythos of a door closing that cannot be reopened.
How then do we decide?

Is it possible that the decision itself matters very little?
Our subconscious has already made it.
The internal circuitry that we have set in motion that led us to these crossroads will continue to paint the road ahead.

In other words, the paths ahead differ less than we realize.
It is our habits and our nature that have brought us here, and while we do get to choose who it is we want to be.

Two Lives was originally published in My Fair Lighthouse on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Costly victory

Pier 21 Prompts

Queen’s Gambit Accepted was originally published in My Fair Lighthouse on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

And yet, at the same time as the Emperor rested in Petrópolis under the shade of his lush garden, in Minas Gerais and São Paulo, enslaved men toiled under the sun in sprawling coffee plantations. In the capital, Pedro the Magnanimous’ government contrived exclusive ways to define voters and wrote broadly powerless anti-slavery laws, meant to enact change on very little besides the disfavorable temper of the British government — this being the origin of a current expression referring to token gestures, lei para inglês ver. Only in 1888, after decades of pressure by abolitionists, was slavery finally abolished, when Princess Isabel signed the Lei Áurea. Thus, in an ironic twist of fate, one of the most celebrated figures in the history of the abolition of slavery in Brazil was the royal heiress of a slave state. The very famous golden pen with which she signed the law is in the Imperial Museum. You can buy a replica at the gift shop.

I cannot help but wonder how these people imagine the monarchy, and the time when Brazil had its own Emperor. Maybe they reckon that the word empire sounds nice and would have given them chauvinistic pride, regardless of what awful things it rightfully suggests to others. Maybe they are impressed by Westminster glamor, or by the nostalgic, old world elegance of the Imperial Museum. I’m sure that they bought monarchist flags at the gift shop to go with their golden pens.

Time is ever kinder to the privileged than it is to those who labored under their boots. The Emperor’s palace is sturdy, but the enslaved’s shack is brittle. Though the casa grande stands, the senzala has long collapsed. After a century, it is easy to see the first and forget the second.

One of the most memorable sights in the Imperial Museum to me lies outside the confines of the palace proper. Left from the main gate, close to the backdoor to the gift shop and with no ticket required, there’s a pavillion housing a well known painting — Pedro Américo’s A Batalha de Campo Grande.

Remembering the Brazilian Empire in the Imperial City was originally published in My Fair Lighthouse on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.