Collapsed Stars

I have loved stars that collapsed into themselves. People who once burned with the kind of brilliance that made you believe in something bigger—something divine. They carried light in their hands, in their words, in the way they saw the world with wild, unfiltered wonder. But like Icarus, like Lucifer, like every fallen thing that ever thought itself untouchable, they flew too high, reached too far, believed themselves invincible.

It is a cruel thing to witness—the slow, inevitable unraveling of someone who was once luminous. At first, it's just a flicker, a shadow at the edges. A little more arrogance here, a little less self-awareness there. They begin to believe their own mythology, that the light is theirs to command, not something they must tend with care. They mistake admiration for worship. They begin to speak as though the universe owes them something.

And then, the fall.

It never happens all at once, though from the outside it might seem like it. There is a moment where they realize the fire they once wielded has turned to ash in their hands. That the people who once stood in their glow have stepped back, weary of the heat. That what once made them special was never power, never ego, never dominion over others, but something much softer—something human. But by the time they see it, it is often too late. The sun has melted their wings. Heaven has shut its gates. And what is left but the long, lonely descent?

I used to think hell was a place, something external and eternal. Now, I think hell is a state of being. It is what happens when someone cannot look their own downfall in the face. When instead of reckoning, they rage. When instead of humility, they cling to pride, blaming the world, the gods, the ones who loved them most.

And what of us—the ones left watching from below, powerless to stop the fall? Do we reach out, try to break it? Or do we let them crash, knowing that some must be shattered before they can begin again?

I do not have the answer. I only know this: I have loved people who have fallen. Some have never found their way back. Others have clawed their way out of the wreckage, different but wiser, stripped of illusion. And some, still, are falling.

I am still watching the sky.