What is fame? A false promise. A coin with two sides. The antithesis of Love. A painting with two scenes superimposed.
The one visible at first glance: the one who reached the summit of the world, the most admired, the most loved, the one who deserves everything. A path of sacrifice culminating on Olympus. The ultimate goal of a fleeting, insignificant life: to be someone amid nothingness. I did not come into this story to be a mere extra or part of the scenery on a stage where you would have to strain your eyes half-blind to make me out.
“Is that bush alive?” someone asks.
“What does it matter?” another replies.
His ascent is therefore clearly a necessity.
The scene in the background, barely glimpsed, only faintly discernible: the new king climbing the stairs, determined to be Real. He stands before the reigning king and slices off his head.
Then he throws the body down the stairs and lets a pack of hungry wolves devour it with their exquisite taste for hatred. He sits on his blood-soaked throne and displays his Machiavellian smile. A second later, his guts twist, for he needs the very blood he has spilled to survive.
A hungry king, full of lack, who becomes another ravenous wolf. He demands a procession of servants, whom he devours one by one, never satisfied. His hunger grows ever stronger, and he asks himself:
“Why do I never have enough?”
Sometimes he recognises the futility of his pursuit and sinks into despair; other times, he dies before asking himself that question. Around the corner lurks the next king, who has been watching the feast eagerly from the wings. Then the wheel of fortune turns again. Who will be next? Whose turn will it be this time?
Mirror, mirror, magic mirror, who is the fairest in the kingdom?
“If he is not real, neither are you. If he is worth nothing, neither are you, because Love is One,” the mirror replied.