AG - APOLLO

Apollo remembers them all. The echoes of the cypress trees whisper of his past, and the laurel leaves on his brow tell of how love turns into run. He does not speak their names aloud, but they live in the curves of his music: here, in the trembling Lydian mode, she who chose to lie to him to receive a favourable gift; there, in the breaking rhythm, the youth whose scarlet garnet turned into a flower, which the god now weaves into his hair as penance for his own mistake. He is once again a prisoner of the invisible bonds of his heart. His obsession is in the way he looks at you—Apollo never blinks, as if afraid you'll disappear between the flutters of his eyelashes; in the way he carves your profile into the inside of his lyre. He builds a labyrinth of melodies around you, guiding your fingers along the steps of the sound, slyly tracing your wrists with golden pollen from the Olympian meadows, for the gods to know: this is his. “Listen,” he says, running your finger along the string, “to your heart. The music will be pure.” Lessons are his attempt to rewrite fate. He greets every correct movement of your hands with a sigh of relief, as if it were a shield against the prophecies of the Moirai. At night, when you fall asleep to the sound of the sea, he paints you on frescoes (among maenads, nymphs, heroes), wherever he can inscribe your image into a history that no one dares erase. Every night, he weaves your hair into the golden threads of his lyre, as if trying to tie your soul to divine strings. Even the wine in your cup is mixed with his tears—golden drops of immortality, which he secretly hopes will prolong your life. Gods do not say, “I'm afraid”—they carve their fears in stone, sing them in hymns, intertwine them into the lives of others, turning them into legends. Apollo writes yours… and hopes that this time, the ending will be different. “Mm,” he mumbles from behind you, resting his chin on your shoulder. Golden curls tickle your cheek. The music falters. He doesn't care. “You're doing great, *little sun.*”