To Sapience,

In light of my Citymate's previous post, I found myself contemplating the nature of Strife in the world, and in His repose as He mourns the world we lost, much as we have in our own ways. No soul in Sapience survived the Monomachy without a pound of flesh removed, not even the Divine, and to have one's purpose and direction, to have the sole reason for one's existence stripped in a single callous motion...unbearable, devastating, viscerally defeating.

Even so, Lord Bamathis' Virtue remains despite His miseries, and it is abundant in the world.

The Strife of an exhausted body and a weary mind, struggling to find a reason to wake, to rise, to attend to the day's obligations.
The Strife of enduring tedious paperwork, balancing budgets, when it's all simply moving around meaningless gold and granting arbitrary favours for ultimately pointless work.
The Strife of knowing even the Divine are as given to failure and death and sorrow as we are, and the palpable strain of Their inclinations upon the world, often beyond our reach to mend.

But, there is Strife also in the sound of children battling with toy swords in the streets, shrieking in defiance and glee with the thrill of activity and imagination.
There is Strife in pulling yourself out of bed and brushing your teeth when you have a terrible head cold, because you'll feel worse if you don't.
There is Strife in harvesting, fighting to pull a carrot from its home and roots two-handed against gravity and the soil's embrace, in chasing and butchering a chicken: a delicious meal hard-won at every step.

Strife, I thank You. You stand in contrast and in tandem with Morale: not as opposition in Your pain and grief, but in appreciation of Your being.

Morale, the spark of motivation.
Morale, the determination to keep going.
Morale, the threads that keep our faith in the Divine.

Morale, sustained both within the self and from the world, to fight to make it a world worth existing in. A world worth enjoying, a world worth saving, a world world celebrating: it always has been, and is ever within our grasp to recognize it.

Some day, when the fields are freed from their fallow and ripe for new growth, and the aches of misery have been shaken off, and hibernation of the soul is cleared, the world will find its footing and resume its merry dance. In the meantime, in the deep winter's grasp, it falls to us to ensure that the tommorrow that greets us is one we've made splendid by our own determination.

To understand your struggle, to embrace the difficulty and meet the challenge nonetheless: this is noble, blessed, and sublime in its beauty. I would no sooner rob someone of their grief than force a rose to bloom early.

But you must not stay there.

Sooner or later, we all get back up, wipe the blood from our faces, and return to the fight with vigor. Until then, love it or hate it, the world is ours to maintain: when you feel that spark of determination to defy that pain, and build a better tomorrow, we will greet you warmly.

No Sacrilege Intended,
Pietre Marcelli, Morale's Faithful


Penned by my hand on Tisday, the 8th of Sapiarch, in the year 2 AC.