Before the Revolution

            I remember my sister, the only clear thing in a shroud of other memories. She reminds me now of the rushes by the lake, slim and beautiful, saying the most important things in a whisper. There was a wisdom she carried like a sheer, flowing veil. It would twist and flutter and glitter and she would listen. My other sisters thought her more than a little strange, but the life they lived was of diamonds and expensive lights where there were no mysteries, only secrets. That existence never suited my sister; as a child I was convinced she was a fay, come to tell me of the palace behind the moon, spun from gossamer threads of shadow and hung with stars. When she died, it was not brilliant gates set among dawn pink clouds I imagined before her. Instead, there was a curtain of deep blue silk, and beyond, lords and ladies in a gleaming hall of lapis and moonstone, welcoming her home.