HP's not mine. Duh.
Dancer in the red sky
Dealing death, never die
Love and joy will pass you by
All alone with no reason why
None of love, the same of hate
Spurned by Death, held by Fate,
Doomed to victory too late
Fighting Hell at Heaven's Gate
He dances. The phosphorescent glow of hexes are his footlights, the roar and clash of battle his music, the pulses of hate radiating from his opponents are his inspiration. His tools are simple: a long silver blade in his left hand that glints and flickers with spellflame, green as the Avada Kedavra that gives it life, and the diamond-tipped wand in his right which spits curses like an angry dragon. Overhead, a full harvest moon lends red light to the scene, illuminating the shadowy figures of Death Eaters flinging spells. His dance partners do not know him in this world; he comes from another, still darker, universe, where the war is over because there is nothing left to fight over. Alone in the broken remains of the last act, he waited for Death to consume him like it had everyone else, but Death is a contrary creature, and rarely comes when it is welcome. Instead, green Death left the dancer for the coreagraphy of Fate. Fate took him from the lifeless world he had fought so long for and put him on a new one, the same and still so different. But some things never change, and his wand deals rude emerald Death into the familiar masks of the Death Eaters, the easy swing of the spell singing hatefully in his magic. He knows well the price of the final curse, knows because he has paid it a thousand times over. He knows it; he does not care: he has nothing left to pay.
Singer by the green sea
Forged by ugly Fortune's weave
Stone-hearted soldier be
Fight for light you cannot see
Once knew love, once knew hate
Touched by Death, guarded by Fate,
Doomed to know but be too late
Fighting Hell at Heaven's Gate
He sings. The broken cadence of well-remembered spellbooks are his music, harsh cries of curses his voice. He knows the tune well; it took little prompting from the silver-and-black-masked vocalists to get him to sing it. It is a ballad he will sing anywhere--has sung anywhere--though even now he does not know where he sings. All he knows and needs to know is that these are Death Eaters, his enemies. He cannot spare a glance to discover his location; if he could he would find his stage an unfamiliar part of the Forbidden Forest, which was utterly destroyed in the universe he came from. The fizzing colored notes of hexes scale the night around him and he is consumed in the song. Because, to him, this is a song, his song, the song, the song of the broken-hearted Phoenix. Fawkes sung it for him first, but not last, never last, because he sings the song still, he sings it always. The song changes, but is always essentially the same haunting tune. It is all he hears on his sleepless, dreamless nights, it is the rhythm guiding his stumbling steps in the daylight, and the swirling rise of song carries him as he dances with Death, time and time again. The song is his life and the song is his death. The song is all that holds him together and what is tearing him apart.
Wanderer in grey dawn
Daylight comes but in how long
Soul shattered; body strong
Fighting still; all others gone
Shaped by love, formed by hate
Taught by Death, led by Fate,
Doomed to realize too late
Fighting Hell at Heaven's Gate
He does not know. Why does he still fight? Still sing the song? What is left to fight for, to sing for? Why him? His voiceless question found no answer in the silent world he left; there are none to answer here but his enemies. Soon not even they will be able to answer--he knows the dance well and his song is true--and he will seek others to ask. He sings the final notes of his fatal song and the other dancers fall, not to rise. For the first time, he studies his stage: a red-lit part of woods, presumably part of the Forbidden Forest. He does not recognize it, so it must be to the far north of Hogwarts, where he never explored on his own world. The maps he barely remembers said that there was a Muggle village on the far border of the Forest. It would be a place to get food and rest--he wants neither but needs both--so he heads north. Minutes later, the clearing is silent again, the only sign of his passing the scattered bodies of his dance partners and a few scorched trees.
A/N: Huzzah for over-extended metaphors! This is, right now, a oneshot. It is up for adoption, or, if enough people say they want it to continue, I'll keep writing. There's more to the story if you want it. I'll post the rest ofthe poem Call of the Phoenix so you can get a hint of what the rest of the story would be like, if it was finished. If you review, you get a cookie. If you want to adopt the story, send me a PM and I'll give you a more complete outline for the plot I had in mind. You can do your own thing too, if you want to.
The entirety of the poem in this oneshot is posted under the name Song of Dancer: Call of the Phoenix, if you'd care to read it. This poem's mine, not Silence Loud's.