my best friend sports a head of gold, brown eyes warm like the sun — responsive when I ask him for help,

and people are quick to say that it’s romantic—

you would be better off as a—  but 

the sun rises over the mountain, not with.

he’ll shimmer and shine for everyone else, 

grin on his face —

smile on his lips.

I’ll stay and watch, stability lacking in mine but found in his,

and when he tires of the sky, he’ll just set back down behind me, eyes closed as he rests

I cannot be best friends with him since the people around me talk so much,

but he can be friends with me, because love is easy to accept when no one scorns you for it.

It is strange, carving a piece of yourself for someone.

a late night, a bloodied hand:

when you crack yourself open for someone, will they betray you right there?

Take what you hold dear and use it to crumble you?

he tells me that now I have blackmail when he carves a part of himself for me,

but I laugh when he does, head tilted and heart full — there is nothing to ask of the sun.

I wonder if he’ll burn me with his rays, 

heat scathing and making me wonder if this friendship was ever worth it, 

but I am reminded that it is natural — to cycle through it all with those I love. 

Life will grow again after the fire goes out — there is no growth without loss.

I wonder what that ray of light was thinking, presenting himself at the bottom of the mountain, chest pried open for me to see as the witches sang at the hour.

drop of gold left forever to take care of me even—

when he drifts off to greater things in the sky.

But it matters not because there is stability in knowing you are there—

reminders to breathe when I forget,  

reminders to rest when I cry.

and he’ll find me, browns gentle as he finds mine, and 

reminds me 

there is enough warmth for two in his heart.

He’ll find me while resting, 

exhaustion in his bones untended to him, but time passes slower at the base of the mountain.

Rest, for there is enough time for two. 

because he does not love me, no—

I’ll bask in the light that both burns and regenerates, 

while the sun rests his heart for a moment,

eyes closed at the foot of the hill.

Edited by Riley Schnittger

Artist Statement: sunshine boy, golden flare is about the cycles of friendship — the turbulence causing decay and a slow withering, but ultimately life comes after the hardship much like how the ecosystem slowly grows once more after a fire. In the same sense, when the sun gets too close, it burns the life from the mountain, but the sun is also from where the plants draw life from, so the plants will bloom again. There is dependency to be found — the warmth in the sun stops the mountain from getting cold and the life to bloom, just as the shade from the mountain provides the sun with a place to hide when it tires and withers.