The smell of death lingers,
a memory that refuses to fade,
a guest that never leaves,
sorrow draped over the soul’s threshold
like a tattered shroud.

Ziya grows up with war as his cradle—
watches coffins, small as his own shadow,
lowered into the earth.
Three paths stretch before him,
each a different kind of hunger.

A ghost chained to old screams,
gnawing on the bones of the past.
A grayhound sprinting in hell’s loop,
Every night, the same bombs fall.
Every morning, the same blood stains his hands.
Same hands clutching at shadows.

Eyes fixed on a horizon
that retreats with every step.
He runs toward tomorrow,
but tomorrow is a feast never served.
He builds castles in the air,
stacks dreams like stones,
but the horizon always steps back.
One day, he will turn,
and find his pockets full of dust.

He learns to live in the crackle of now,
to survive today,
not in sunlight, but in ember-glow,
digging for joy like a miracle in the ashes,
buried just beneath the skin.
It is not happiness,
it is the quiet before the siren,
the breath between gunshots.
A hard choice.
A different kind of burning.

Ziya is made of war.
An accent, an immigrant,
a muted tongue,
a face that forgot how to smile.
Grew up poor,
a body bruised by hands and words,
an undiagnosed mind
wired for a world that did not speak his language.
This infinite fire is not his doing,
but it is his to carry.

Still,
his mind runs wild,
a stallion kicking free of fences,
galloping through fields
of boundless imagination.
Reality sits in the audience,
watching the theater of his thoughts, untamed.

Free will? Yes,
but every road is lined with walls.
His certainty is destined to become
food for the flames.
What the fire burns,
that, at least, is his.
He alone decides:
light or ruin.

Stars burn.
Their fire is light.
Some shine.
Some swallow whole.
Destruction is a recognized familiar face,
trusted by the world.
Light is always questioned and must always prove itself.

How does the beauty inside
ever bloom outward
when even his own breath
feels like a risk?
when the fear of being seen
echoes,
in solitude,
in crowds,
like a whisper no one claims?

Where is the host?
Who stood at the door
and said, Welcome?
Who opened their arms
and did not flinch
at the scent of smoke?
Who let him in
without counting the burns?