New Heaven, New Earth
Title: New Heaven, New Earth
Play: Antony and Cleopatra
Author: speak_me_fair
Recipient: lareinenoire
Rating: M
Summary: Antony is a god for more reasons than Rome and Octavian can ever imagine.
Warnings: Sexual imagery, mention of death, Egyptian Gods, Roman Gods, euphemisms, self-delusion.
New Heaven, New Earth
He sometimes wonders what he did to merit this. Not the godhood, he takes that as lightly as it is bestowed, takes it as easily as he does the fine linen and the importance of water, wears it as easily as he knows Caesar did
(and with more respect, he knows the price now of mocking any god alive)
and knows he bears comparison, here if nowhere else, here if anywhere else, he bears that comparison to his own glory and no detriment.
The old gods are best. Nile and Tiber, Nut and Bona Dea, the mysteries and profundities that have nothing to do with Dionysius or revelry. Caesar was Osiris in Cleopatra's bed, come to a resurrection to bring Egypt false fruition.
Antony, though he is a lesser god than Caesar still, does that better, for he is more bound to the earth, he has wielded in his time and still wields
(though now it is Love's whips he employs and not their leather counterparts, he wears the white diadem and does not offer it)
the lashes of Lupercalia and their promise without shame, and dismisses the cold marble of Octavian's distant claims to adopted godhood not from pique, but from something deeper.
He is not Roman, not in the way it now means. He has married Egypt, ploughs the lands of fertile soil with a seed that drives back even the Cubits of Death, holds back the dark with song and light and adoration of the flesh.
He does not need perfection. He does not want it.
He wants his earthly joys, wants all that the god-in-man can have and hold and caress, the taste of wine on his lips and the perfume of her body's hidden places rich in his nostrils, curling the air to incense with their desire
(touch and taste and the filling of the mouth and mind and hand with all that is good, gluttony raised to the divine, to art, to an essential in one glorious move of his body into hers, their nerves thrilling to what they are and what they bring each and every time, as much as they do to their own bodies' power).
Antony understands the mystery of death, more, perhaps, than a good Roman should. He does not see it as part of his dignitas, but as the greatest thing he will ever be asked to perform upon this stage that is his godhood's world. He will one day embrace it.
But he knows, too, that to live it out as though it were all that life could ever offer; to only pass through what is given as a truly bequeathed blessing; to hold the body apart from the gifts the gods have given the world; to keep the soul as an untouched seal of purity - to do this is no honour of any divinity, but rather a sin that will never be forgiven. He knows that Octavian has forsaken all that is good and real and true in his quest for excellence. Whatever it brings him, he will find no more trophies after his death than those he purloins in life.
Octavian was adopted into the heart of a living mausoleum, already a memory and a legend before he had relished his time.
But Antony has brought the promise of Lupercal's fertility to the land which desires it most, and to the bed of a queen who welcomes it with an understanding to match his.
In this realm, he is god and king, he is Dionysius and Mars and Antony all one. Here he surpasses Caesar and Octavian both.
(I have my crown and my corona, all else is shadow to their light).
He does not need Rome's blessing for these rites.
**
Play: Antony and Cleopatra
Author: speak_me_fair
Recipient: lareinenoire
Rating: M
Summary: Antony is a god for more reasons than Rome and Octavian can ever imagine.
Warnings: Sexual imagery, mention of death, Egyptian Gods, Roman Gods, euphemisms, self-delusion.
New Heaven, New Earth
He sometimes wonders what he did to merit this. Not the godhood, he takes that as lightly as it is bestowed, takes it as easily as he does the fine linen and the importance of water, wears it as easily as he knows Caesar did
(and with more respect, he knows the price now of mocking any god alive)
and knows he bears comparison, here if nowhere else, here if anywhere else, he bears that comparison to his own glory and no detriment.
The old gods are best. Nile and Tiber, Nut and Bona Dea, the mysteries and profundities that have nothing to do with Dionysius or revelry. Caesar was Osiris in Cleopatra's bed, come to a resurrection to bring Egypt false fruition.
Antony, though he is a lesser god than Caesar still, does that better, for he is more bound to the earth, he has wielded in his time and still wields
(though now it is Love's whips he employs and not their leather counterparts, he wears the white diadem and does not offer it)
the lashes of Lupercalia and their promise without shame, and dismisses the cold marble of Octavian's distant claims to adopted godhood not from pique, but from something deeper.
He is not Roman, not in the way it now means. He has married Egypt, ploughs the lands of fertile soil with a seed that drives back even the Cubits of Death, holds back the dark with song and light and adoration of the flesh.
He does not need perfection. He does not want it.
He wants his earthly joys, wants all that the god-in-man can have and hold and caress, the taste of wine on his lips and the perfume of her body's hidden places rich in his nostrils, curling the air to incense with their desire
(touch and taste and the filling of the mouth and mind and hand with all that is good, gluttony raised to the divine, to art, to an essential in one glorious move of his body into hers, their nerves thrilling to what they are and what they bring each and every time, as much as they do to their own bodies' power).
Antony understands the mystery of death, more, perhaps, than a good Roman should. He does not see it as part of his dignitas, but as the greatest thing he will ever be asked to perform upon this stage that is his godhood's world. He will one day embrace it.
But he knows, too, that to live it out as though it were all that life could ever offer; to only pass through what is given as a truly bequeathed blessing; to hold the body apart from the gifts the gods have given the world; to keep the soul as an untouched seal of purity - to do this is no honour of any divinity, but rather a sin that will never be forgiven. He knows that Octavian has forsaken all that is good and real and true in his quest for excellence. Whatever it brings him, he will find no more trophies after his death than those he purloins in life.
Octavian was adopted into the heart of a living mausoleum, already a memory and a legend before he had relished his time.
But Antony has brought the promise of Lupercal's fertility to the land which desires it most, and to the bed of a queen who welcomes it with an understanding to match his.
In this realm, he is god and king, he is Dionysius and Mars and Antony all one. Here he surpasses Caesar and Octavian both.
(I have my crown and my corona, all else is shadow to their light).
He does not need Rome's blessing for these rites.
**