Sunstroke
#12 of poetry
"Ishamentaru, God of Noon, was in some accounts of the myth held to be the son of Barolan, God of Sunrise. In other accounts they were held to be bitter enemies: it is perhaps to be noted that these latter accounts are very likely to be those in which Barolan himself plays an antagonistic role.
Notably, the folk hero Coren occupies a similar role in those tales in which he appears: often, but not always, purported to be the Son of Barolan, and antagonistic toward him in direct correlation to the attitude toward Barolan of the tale as a whole. It often argued, from this, that Coren and Ishamentura are different versions of the same figure, perhaps a folk hero deified by a later culture, perhaps a foreign deity demoted to a mortal when his tales were imported.
Some scholars have argued that Ishamentaru and Barolan were in fact the same deity, for whom different names were used depending on whether they were referred to in a benevolent or malevolent aspect. As disproof of this, I think, I would present the above piece, which if nothing else demonstrates that even in those cases when Ishamentaru was presented as good, he was also presented as nonetheless dangerous."
We heard of him in fairy tales,
Unfinished epics, songs in braille.
From all ends of the ending earth
We tracked him to this place.
We each believed the others fools.
But all believe: those are the rules.
At last his trail,
Like doubts, did fail.
We saw him. We gave chase.
Ishamen means the sun, my son,
And Taru is the day.
And he will flee and he will run.
Don't let him get away.
Through mountain passes high we chased.
Where far below sprawled cloudy wastes.
On a cold crag above the sky
He could no longer hide.
And some of us had lust for gold,
For life unending, power untold.
I wanted what
I knew not, but
I would be satisfied.
And Coren is the man, my son-
None was of greater worth-
He wears as cloak, he once was one,
To walk upon the earth.
_"I'm done with holding back the joy
So touch me not. As fires destroy
The paper doll set down too near,
My light, my heat, will slay.
Go back. Or you will live too much
To live. You catch what you can't touch.
Go seek your wives.
Go live your lives._ And let me go my way."
Ishamentaru is, my son,
The sun of day himself.
All man's desire is just begun
To hunger for his wealth.
I was the hindmost. Slow, I saw
They laid their hands. They broke the law.
He simply smiled as all around
The world became too bright.
Now I alone can tell their fate.
Their caution came too small, too late.
That peak is gone
And I alone
That live have seen his light.
So still I hunt forevermore
To find again what I adore.
All that had stirred my heart before
Overshadowed has been.
What then I sipped, I soon will drink.
That's all that I desire, I think:
To cross that brink,
In that joy sink,
The light to touch again.
To find him is to die, my son,
To seek him is to live.
So hunt him ever. Ever run
After what more than anyone
Can dream or hope. To touch The Sun
Is more than life can give.