Let It Flow

"Let It Flow"

 Hermione eyed the torn piece of parchment lackadaisically as she approached the bench it laid upon. The cool autumn wind sent her hair flying as she bent down to pick it up. She had taken her nightly walk for the past couple of months -- with strict intent of not running into anyone -- to clear her mind of every burden it had seemed to take on in the past seven years. And so far, she had been lucky, she had not met a soul, living or dead, on her nightly stroll. Head Boy, Draco Malfoy, helped make these private times possible by taking care of duties for both of them at night when he knew the stress of the day would hit her.

 Defeating Voldemort did nothing for Hermione's level of stress and lack of sleep. It seemed once, a seventeen-year-old, Harry Potter defeated his long-time foe the tension in the air heightened. Which, in turn, led to her own personal truce with the, not evil yet not redeemed, Draco Malfoy. Her own relationship with her famous best friends seemed to taper off into a comfortable business relationship, which, even in Draco's eyes, was a strange sight to see.

Hermione quickly shook her head to relive it of those burdensome thoughts. Her know-it-all, enthusiastic, attitude had matured into an intelligent silence, one many people had yet to accept. They thought it was a phase, a result of the things she saw in battle, but it was who she had become when she was forced, at barely sixteen, to see the world for what it was. No longer could she sit for hours giggling with Ginny over her new found crush, no longer could she waste hours upon hours reading the same book over and over, now she had to live life for the future, for her own livelihood.

 Her eyes swept over the parchment, reading, yet not understanding the words scrawled across the page.

 Quel wasn't esso. Ho dormito, ad esempio: un serpente

mascherato fra nero oscilla come roccia

nera nel hiatus bianco dell'inverno --

come i miei vicinoi, non prendente piacere

nelle milione guancie perfetto-cesellate

alighting ogni momento fondere

la mia guancica del basalto. Si sono girate verso le rotture,

angeli piangenti sopra le nature con acute, ma didn't lo convincono.

Quelle rotture congelate. Ogni testa guasto ha avuta una visiera di ghiaccio.

 The words were foreign yet beautiful, she recognized the script as Italian, a language she new few at Hogwarts knew. Italian, her thoughts flew to the only Italian she had ever wished to have known. Blaise Zabini, tall, dark, and handsome straight from the heart of Sicily. She had acquired a slight attraction for him during her Sixth Year and had never gotten over it. They had spoken barely ten sentences to each other during their years at school but Hermione knew his voice out a crowd of many.

 And maybe, just maybe, this small discovery would give her reason to approach the handsome, godlike, Italian.

~*~

 "Face it, Zabini," Draco Malfoy laughed, heartily, as he conversed with his childhood friend, "you've yet to master the skill of polyphonic prose, a skill I'd leave to those who seem to live forever in an angsty haze."

 Blaise Zabini, glared at his long-time friend, he had always been in love with the written word, especially words written in his first language, Italian. "Angsty haze? Do you ever think before you speak because I’m quite sure this isn’t a word?"

 "Never," Draco shrugged, "thinking before you speak is like censoring yourself."

 "Our Head Girl had censored herself so that she hardly speaks," Blaise remarked as he spotted a silent Hermione walking alongside a babbling Ginny Weasely.

 Draco became solemn at the sight of the young woman he shared a common room with. Her plight against her own demons made his look like scuffle between a dead man and a dog; it seemed where his had allowed him joy hers had murdered a piece of soul, it was long gone and Draco knew it wouldn't be back. "It is much more than censorship."

 Draco whispered the words just as Hermione left Ginny and approached them with a small, docile, smile. "Excuse me, Draco, may I speak with Blaise a moment?"

 "Sure, I need to run to Snape's office anyway, I'll get back with you later, mate," Draco called as he politely tapped Hermione's arm and ran off toward the castle.

 "So," Blaise began, looking down into Hermione's brown eyes, "what can I help you with?"

 "This," she whispered, pulling the folded piece of parchment out of her pocket, "I found it last night and I was just wondering what it said?"

 A small, smirk laid upon his full lips. "There it is! You've greatly aided my cause, Granger."

 "Your cause?" she questioned.

 "I often write out poems by other authors to help inspire my own poems and this just happens to be a piece I'd torn off and lost. It's a stanza from Sylvia Plath's, "Love Letter," he said, staring at the piece parchment, rereading the lines to himself.

 "She was a genius," Hermione smiled, surprised to have found a mutual admirer of poetry, "I know few purebloods who enjoy a Muggle's work so."

 "I, Hermione," he began, stressing the use of her first name, "am not the usual Slytherin, I appreciate anyone, Wizard or not, who can pick up a quill and write such marvelous things."

 She had to smile at his enthusiasm, it had been months since she had felt that way about anything. She spoke softly and carefully, "Could you read it to me?"

 Blaise looked at her, with something akin to compassion in his dark eyes. The small voice she had used had stirred a fire within him that he had not felt since his last relationship with the very beautiful, very charming, Tracey Davis. "I would be honored to but how about I recite the entire thing?"

 She nodded in agreement and his soft, baritone, voice met her ears pleasantly as he began to recite one of her favorite poets best poems.

 "Not easy to state the change you made.

If I'm alive now, then I was dead,

Though, like a stone, unbothered by it,

Staying put according to habit.

You didn't just toe me an inch, no--

Nor leave me to set my small bald eye

Skyward again, without hope, of course,

Of apprehending blueness, or stars.

That wasn't it. I slept, say: a snake

Masked among black rocks as a black rock

In the white hiatus of winter--

Like my neighbors, taking no pleasure

In the million perfectly-chiseled

Cheeks alighting each moment to melt

My cheek of basalt. They turned to tears,

Angels weeping over dull natures,

But didn't convince me. Those tears froze.

Each dead head had a visor of ice.

And I slept on like a bent finger.

The first thing I saw was sheer air

And the locked drops rising in a dew

Limpid as spirits. Many stones lay

Dense and expressionless round about.

I didn't know what to make of it.

I shone, mica-scaled, and unfolded

To pour myself out like a fluid

Among bird feet and the stems of plants.

I wasn't fooled. I knew you at once.

Tree and stone glittered, without shadows.

My finger-length grew lucent as glass.

I started to bud like a March twig:

An arm and a leg, an arm, a leg.

From stone to cloud, so I ascended.

Now I resemble a sort of god

Floating through the air in my soul-shift

Pure as a pane of ice. It's a gift."

"Sylvia Plath was a master at an art that I struggle to create," he sighed after he finished the poem.

 "So what was written on that piece of parchment?" Hermione asked as a sudden burst of cool air whirled around them, sending her curls into sudden disarray, leading Blaise to push a curl behind her ear, a gesture that sent shivers down her spine.

 "The second stanza, I had written it in Ancient Runes to inspire myself," he said looking down at the parchment in his hand.

 "Did it help?" she asked as a group of students leaving for Hogsmeade passed them noisily.

 Blaise flashed a dazzling smile. "Not at all but as my father always says, 'Vigilanza Costante' ."

 "What?" she retorted, quickly, mesmerized like never before by the beauty of a genuine smile.

 "Constant vigilance, it's an old family motto from the days Roman occupation but father believes in it faithfully. He always says my moment of inspiration will come if I watch for it patiently," Blaise replied, softly, nostalgia glowing in his dark eyes.

 "Your father speaks great words of wisdom," Hermione began, shivering from the sudden drop in temperature, "I'm sure you will finally be blessed with a bout of inspiration and a flourish of beautiful words and it'll just flow. Well, I have an essay to be finishing, I'll see you later."

 "PiÙ successivamente non È abbastanza presto," he whispered as she turned and walked back toward the castle with her hands in her pockets and her hair flowing softly behind her.

 ~*~

Blaise ran his fingers through his thick black hair as he wrote quickly across the parchment on his desk. He had tried to sleep but it would not come, he kept thinking about Hermione and Sylvia Plath. It had led to him pick up a random book that his grandmother had sent him for Christmas, it happened to be a collection of Sylvia Plath's earliest poems written in Italian.

 He opened it to a random page, to a poem called, "Cinderella," and somehow it reminded him of Hermione. Though the girl in question had green eyes instead of brown she gave him a sense of Hermione as she clings, at the end, to the prince. Like Hermione currently clung to her sense of self as the clock ticks relentlessly.

 He wrote:

I could not keep this from you yet I refuse to translate it, I knew only you could appreciate this in my beautiful language.

 "Il principe si appoggia a alla ragazza in talloni di scarlet,

 i suoi occhi verdi fa pendere,

capelli che si svasano in un ventilatore di argento mentre il rondo ritarda; ora le bobine cominciano sui violini inclinati alla portata

. . .

Come in mezzo del colloquio hectic del cocktail e di musica

sente il traliccio caustico dell'orologio."

 Beautiful isn't it? You know Albert Einstein, as you know was not as Muggle as most believe him to be, once said, "There are only two ways to live your life: One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as if everything is." Hermione, I think your approaching me is a miracle, I've never been so inspired in my life.

 Ispirato e riconoscente,

 Blaise Zabini

 He then proceeded to give the letter off to his Owl and began writing his very own piece of poetry. The words just seemed arrive at him without any forethought, he'd never been able to write so effortlessly, so personally. As he wrote of thought of her; he thought of her silence, her hidden desires, and her kind words.

La luna ha lasciato il cielo, amore,

le stelle ora stanno nascondendosi e frowning sul mondo, l'amore,

notte scopre la sua fronte del sable.

La neve È sulla terra, amore e freddo ed acuto l'aria È.

I'm che canta qui voi, amore;

You're che sogna lÀ a Parigi.

. . .

Guardo l'alba ottimistica, amo,

rubare venuto sull'est,

mentre tutte le cose rotonde rejoice, amo,

che notte il suo reign È cessato.

Il lark presto sarÀ sentito, amore e sul suo senso sta traversando;

Quando poets di Nature's si sveglia, ama,

perchÈ dovrebbe un uomo cantare?

 When he finished he placed his quill on his parchment not even rereading what he just written he knew that his emotions had just flown together with immense perfection.

 The next morning Hermione sought him out, her patience wearing thin, she didn't really want him to translate the beautiful words that he'd sent her the night before but rather share the words that he'd written the night before. She hurried through breakfast with more enthusiasm than she'd felt in months, anticipation nipped at her as she struggled to be attentive to Harry and Ron. The moment she couldn't take it any more she bid good-bye to them and raced out of the Great Hall, leaving them confused.

 She bit her lip anxiously as she thought of how childish she must look hurrying after him. The poem didn't mean anything, she had just, quote unquote, aided his cause. The moment she spotted him sauntering down the stairs she had to keep herself from running to him, thankfully he spotted her.

 "Good morn, Hermione," he greeted, with a smile, in a slight accent that made her smile.

 "Morning," she replied, softly, "did you have any luck last night?"

 Blaise gently wrapped his arms around her waist and whispered softly in her ear, his lips slightly grazing her ear as he spoke.

"THE moon has left the sky, love,

The stars are hiding now,

And frowning on the world, love,

Night bares her sable brow.

The snow is on the ground, love,

And cold and keen the air is.

I'm singing here to you, love;

You're dreaming there in Paris.

. . .

I watch the rosy dawn, love,

Come stealing up the east,

While all things round rejoice, love,

That Night her reign has ceased.

The lark will soon be heard, love,

And on his way be winging;

When Nature's poets wake, love,

Why should a man be singing?"

 "Blaise," she whispered, as she held on to him, "it's beautiful."

 "Not as beautiful as you, il mio amore," he replied, deliberately kissing her neck.

 She smiled, joy embracing her heart, and whispered a verse that she had often written in her journal as sixth year, when she had become infatuated with man embracing her: He came with footsteps beautifully slow, and spoke in voice meticulously low. He came and Romance followed in his track.