honey-poet:

The first gods were the earth itself, and they had no reason to whisper. They are the grass, the wind. They wave and laugh and feel and love. They were pure emotion, making every move based on their hearts. They did not understand the purpose of fighting. They sought peace and love. They wrote the songs of the earth in the first languages. They spoke light and wind, weaving the redwoods and the waves and the mountains. They birthed the moon and the stars from a million unborn dreams, a million untold stories. When they were finished, they laid down to rest, but the world kept growing around them. They faded to dust and crumbled. The first gods are dead.

The song of the old gods still resonates throughout the earth, though to some it is nothing more than a feeble whisper. They are still here. They have faded into the background. They live among the redwoods, no, they are the redwoods. They float with the waves of the world’s oceans, and dance in time with the erosion of the mountains. They mumble and whisper to the moon and the stars, singing nursery rhymes in a language so long forgotten that it was before the day of man at all. The old gods are dying.

The young gods don’t know how to whisper. They are loud, and bold. They are bright and bubbling and threatening to spill over. They laugh with the redwoods, cry with the ocean, yell with the mountains. They pray with the moon, and sing with the stars, and smile with the sun. They run with each other, living and laughing. They protect mankind, for they are not so different. After all, young gods are born from stardust and hope and perseverance, and so is man. They look lovingly upon the earth that their predecessors built. The young gods are growing.

The grown gods whisper when appropriate. They are controlled, and yet just as soft and childlike as the young gods. They are maternal, nursing the redwoods, singing the oceans to sleep. They hold the mountains together, and smile fondly when the moon shows its pale face. They care for man the same way a mother cares for a child. The grown gods give comfort in times of pain, and reassurance in times of doubt. They embrace the earth. The grown gods have a constant hollow feeling in their chest. If they don’t resist, the risk becoming as empty and apathetic as the new gods. The grown gods do their best. The grown gods are not yet dying.

The new gods do not whisper. They are born from grown gods who no longer care, who no longer feel. They lack the gentle warmth of the old ones, instead making every move with a calculated coldness. They do not fade, they do not float, they do not dance. They shun the moon and the stars, and point their dark, empty eyes towards a future that holds only power. They would laugh at the suffering of mankind, giggle at their infighting, if they could feel anything at all. They stand, cold and unfeeling, and gaze upon an earth that they plan to demolish.  The new gods aren’t planning on dying any time soon.