((Will update with pictures in the morning.))

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I had an uneventful morning: I resolved to wait until I better understood Peyton's and I's situation: there may be hope left, hiding under winter snow like (forgive the pun) the seeds that sprout the following spring. Or perhaps the hope, like flowers in winter, is dead. I will wait, and find the truth. I had an uneventful morning, as I said: I rose, and was helped a bit by another deer, to regain my pelt, and I went on my way. I spotted a deer sleeping with my pictogram: these seem to happen more and more often. The fellow looked nothing like me, but for a moment I wondered if he, perhaps, was a life I didn't live, a path I didn't choose. I think about that sort of thing a lot these days. I wanted very much for him to wake up, nuzzle me, and tell me that I made the right choices with my life, after all: that his life is no happier than mine. I left him and that idle fantasy, and took a nap.

I awoke, and decided that there were some bridges I wanted to repair. I ran across the forest, trying to find a flower patch that reminded me of one that... was once precious to me. I knew I wouldn't find the exact one: what stag, wanting home again having wandered far away, can ever find it? It was in some much more distant part of the forest, much less explored by deer, and it was so long ago that even if I could find it, I'd probably not recognize it. But I found one like it, out of reach of trees, bare of ferns, just the purple flowers and the butterflies, and I sat in it for a while. After a time, I went and saw some saplings, clustered around a flowerpatch not so far off. I went up to them and rubbed my sides against them, and I went and walked alone among the trees.

((I don't know what to call this, and possibly the ones that come after it. Got any ideas?))

Now, this may need some explanation. So go read the comments from Tales of the Oak, and you'll know what you're looking for when you find it.

If you still need explination, refer back to Seed's backstory Here and some further information here (though what would have been that story may or may not get written, or may or may not get absorbed by this.)
... My goodness, this sucky little comic has a lot of background! Well, anyway, enjoy!

[center] #1: You have to admit, he's pretty cute...

(the Great Oak looks not much like the Great Oak. Also, I'm annoyed to see I accidentally cut off Seed's widdle green booties in the last panel. *sigh*)

#2: Go with option 4! go with option 4!

(Yay for little off-model chibis of Seed's pals... Can you guess who these adorable but inaccurate little guys are?... You can't?... I'm an awful person!)

#3: It's guy love... Guy love, between 2 guys.

I need to stop doing comics in which Seed becomes distressed. It's just too easy. Anyway... I love messing around with Seed and Scape's Bromance. Here, however, Seed breaks a basic rule set across by the Guy Love song: "There's no need to clarify...Just let it grow more and more each day." Silly, silly Seed. Oh, and it's worth noticing that I decided on a rule about language that I already broke in the previous strip...

((Seed's feeling particularly sad. I'm feeling kinda inspired. The result? Angsty poetry!
For less angsty poetry of Seed's, check out The Collection))

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A rainy day today, with the rain sizzling off my ever-lit candles, candles made for flames that burn everlasting, in spite of it all, lighting up the night as they await the person they were lit for: given that humans likely placed them as they did, that person will probably never come again...

The rain pitters softly onto the forest floor, glancing off the darkened branches, flashing droplets passing before our eyes like ghosts. The moment I awoke, I spied the Hat Lady sitting under the protection of the old oak, and went forth to join her. She seemed to dislike the rain, and preffered to stay there and snuggle with those companions gathered. While there were times when we cast pelt spells on a peltless neighbor or danced, mostly we just sat together. There was a somewhat depressing time when she, unexpectedly, vanished: I went and took a quick run in the rain, an ordinary loop, and then patiently returned to wait. Some time after her return, she stepped, shivering, out of the oak, flinching against the dream-thin droplets. From there she dashed, here and there stopping beneath a spire-like tree, to the slanted rock, and the dry space beneath. And it was there she said her farewells, and I returned to my home beneath the bridge, to reflect for a while. There was a pair atop the bridge, and for a moment I thought they would fight. Instead, they settled and sat, and I watched them sitting: perhaps they recalled I was there, and then again, perhaps not. Either way, they left not long after, leaving me to my peace.

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I awoke to a world written in rose and jet. I awoke to a world of fireflies.

Oh, fireflies. Oh, fireflies. Shimmering stars, brought down by the smell of purple flowers. As they glow, trying to find their perfect match, they bring out some strange things in me. First, there is the wild, giddy joy of them: they are like the sun. To see them is like standing in bright sunlight on a cold day. To see them is to be in love. And then they bring up memories, and I find myself full of old memories, aching with them. There was Payton, in the ruddy light, dancing with me cheek-to-cheek. There was a briefly-known friend who I met surrounded by fireflies. I am never quite as happy as when I am happy in the fireflies. I am never quite as lonely as I am alone in the fireflies.

I tried for a while to enjoy the fireflies on my own, but I just kept thinking about how quiet it seemed, how nice it would be if someone dear to me could enjoy this with me. I wished for Payton. I wished for Lemon, or Walter, or Scape, or Zerg, or anyone who could keep me company, glow with me like two matched fireflies. I went wandering to find someone: and here and there I thought there was hope, but they never lingered. I began to despair of finding someone to dance in the fireflies with me, and turn them from lonely wanderers into bright jewels. And then something -- fate or chance, destiny or dice or the Twin Gods -- smiled at me and said "done." I saw a doe, skipping among the purple flowers and fireflies. I rushed to join her.

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Early in the morning, I woke up and browsed around for a little while: I met a shy fawn that I didn't recognize. I followed the fawn around for a while, trying to draw nearer, to close that distance. Eventually, the fawn came close enough to sniff me, but even before I departed, the distance had widened.


When I arose, I smelled Lemon asleep on the hill outside the lake. She awoke after not too long. She's changed her look -- she's changed. Summer has come to her, inside and out, and she flushes to it. Trouble's coming, and coming, and come, but she seems much more mature than last I saw her, long ago... Everyone around me seems to be moving forward, putting forth new growth where last season had harshly pruned. I'm happy for them, come what may.

We were joined in our play by Queze and by another deer, I assume a doe, who seemed very nice -- I'd like to meet her again.

Queze ran us over to Vala, sitting in the mushroom circle by Payton's sleeping spot. I tried my best not to look, because the moment I looked, I would hope that if I stared just a second longer, her body would rise up out of the aether to fill it. We ended up settling and stopping right in front of it, where her scent had drained -- from rains and snows and fogs -- somewhere deep into the soil, growing up with the fresh generations of grass. I gladly got up, along with Queze and the doe, when a pair of stags on the hill started fighting for some reason. It was a moment's respite, as we sat back down to await Lemon's getting up (she vanished, however, leaving me feeling oddly cheated for a moment.)

((Yeah, this one will be edited, perhaps even with pictures...But Seed just gave me a pretty strong bit of monologue here, so I had to include it.))


I awoke to find Lemon, who I had awoken specifically to find, asleep. I sat down beside her, and tried very hard, very hard, not to think. I don't like where idle thoughts take me these days. Perhaps I am just feeling lonely, and when reliable, repeated company is restored, these thoughts will vanish like mist in the hot sun.

I really do hope so. I would do anything for certainty. So I thought about fog that inflates like a mood, blows like a thought, colorless -- save for the pale, bright color of rain or wind -- without regard for time or gravity. It is like a cloak, clapsed by clouds that block out the sun. It is the breath of a herd of deer, frozen in the cold air, and moving in waves as they breathe.

After a time, it occured to me that things are not right: nothing was moving right save the fog and myself. Once or twice, I leave Lemon to go look at deer that are running in place, or standing perfectly still. I knew I am trapped in the place between dreaming and waking, though I felt well awake. I began to panic a little. I wonder -- wondered -- if this is the way of the twin gods to make me face my thoughts, my fears, my doubts (and they are all one in the same now.) Even the trees, who chatter faintly as a raindrop backdrop to my own thoughts, were silent as the dead.

I am cold; that is what I told myself as I shivered. I am just cold.

I couldn't stand it much longer, after that, and left.

More later, assuming things return to normal later today.

Art inspires art; that is simply in its nature. I do not know Iaurdagnire well, but any loss is a tragedy, and any winter is cruel. So I choose(chose, eventually) to sit by him and, while doing so, composed this in his honor.



((This has been a response to Crackéd Smile Part II as well as another visit to Seed's Poetry Corner))

and I'm back from yet another small vacation!
This time it was to Florida with a friend of mine.
Did I miss anything?

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I awoke to find Bastillion recovering from defending some fawns against an older stag. The more I see of forest violence, the more it puzzles -- the more it saddens me. They forget, all of them, how pointless it is, the attackers and the counter-attackers alike, as they blend together like reflections, like puddles and rainwater... We cannot be wounded; not truly -- the forest isn't made for it. We are only as wounded as we feel ourselves to be, I believe. So every day, my heart (fragile thing, isn't it?) breaks when I hear of, when I see, the blood and the bruises.


I awoke and sat with him -- this is my place, I think, in times of violence. I sit with the combatents, after their trials are over, and try to help things heal. I cannot decide if I am being wise or cowardly.