In the silence of the lonely and the lost, breathless from the magnanimous gift of the universe, the boy with no heart kneels at the lip of the pool, new life bursting in his palms, and is unable to speak. The hush hush swallows the temple – it swallows the dawning sun. Birds do not dare to sing. The stars above give their last shuddering efforts before winking out, the presence of the dawn overwhelming in its glory as it crests the horizon.

The light rebounds off the glistening, crystalline pool, and turns the room otherworldly. The heartless boy, sunlight framing him in radiance, tips his face skyward, towards the unseen stars, brilliant beyond the thousands. His hair is spun to gold. His eyes are brighter than stars. He holds his newborn world in his trembling hands.

He once dreamt he had a gift for holding up the sky, until he held the universe in his blistered, aching hands, and took in a breath of the frosted galaxies that spun pinwheels in the space where his heart should be.