First the Music.
Then the Epic.
In the days before days,
when time was not yet counted but only moved,
the All breathed like an open sea of possibility.
There was no stillness.
Everything flowed.
And from that flow arose the first law—
not written in stone,
but written in motion:
What circles, endures.
What closes, opens again.
And thus the Circle was born.
The Original Measure
The Ancients told that the Creator did not use a ruler,
but a ratio.
He did not speak in numbers,
but in resonance.
And when the first celestial bodies found their paths,
a whisper moved through the firmament:
Three.
Point.
Fourteen.
π.
Not as a digit,
but as the breath of every circumference around a center.
The Sun learned it in her year.
The Moon sang it in her months.
The Earth carried it in her turning.
The cosmos was not a machine.
It was music.
The Tree That Awakens
In the time when humanity first learned to truly see,
a seer beheld a branch of an almond tree.
And he understood:
this is the tree that awakens first.
Not the strongest.
Not the tallest.
But the earliest.
From its form a light was forged:
a trunk and seven branches,
like rivers of gold.
Seven flames burned upon it.
Twenty-two blossoms carried the light.
Twenty-two and seven.
And whoever counted discovered an echo
of the heavenly measure:
22 divided by 7—
a glimpse of the hidden ratio.
But the wise knew
this was not about calculation.
It was about order.
About how language (22 letters)
and spirit (7 lights)
together form the circle of consciousness.
The 276th Gate
Then came a year
in which the Sun stood at her 276th degree
on the 276th day.
Heaven and counting aligned.
A gate in time opened.
The watchers of the tides said,
“See how the measure recognizes itself.”
For time is a river,
yet sometimes it bends like a bow
and nearly touches its own source.
276 became 277.
A boundary became a mirror.
What was above became below.
What seemed a beginning became a center.
The Blood of the Moon
And then, in the year humans call 2025,
on the day the world knows as March 14—
3/14—
the Earth stood between Sun and Moon.
The light passed through flesh.
The Moon turned red.
Not as a sign of destruction,
but as a remembrance:
Light that passes through matter
becomes incarnation.
The circle did not close—
it was marked.
Like a seal pressed into wax.
Like a keystone set into an arch.
The wise called it the Pi Moon,
not because the heavens speak in digits,
but because humanity recognizes in numbers
what the cosmos moves in rhythm.
The Secret of the Open System
But now hear the deepest part of the story.
The cosmos is not a closed book.
It is an open system.
This means:
Order is not imposed.
It emerges.
Like stars from dust.
Like meaning from silence.
Like faith from wonder.
The Circle is not meant to imprison you.
It wishes to show you
that every return is a deepening.
The seven lights do not burn to spread fear,
but to remind you:
Consciousness is a lampstand.
You are a bearer of fire.
The True Initiation
And so the Song does not end with a date,
but with an invitation.
When you see the heavens turning,
when you see patterns forming,
when numbers begin to whisper—
do not first ask:
“Is this proof?”
Ask instead:
“What does this teach me about order,
about light,
about myself?”
For the true π is not 3.14.
It is the ratio between your circumference
and your center.
And as long as you circle what is true,
as long as you carry light like the seven branches,
as long as you awaken like the almond tree—
the Song continues to sound.
Not in the heavens alone.
But within you.
The Watchers of the 143 Days
(The Second Book of the Circle)
After the Red Moon sealed the arc of the heavens,
the sages did not celebrate.
They listened.
For in an open cosmos,
a sign is never an ending.
It is a hinge.
And on that hinge turned a quieter mystery—
the rhythm of 143 days.
The Division of the Flame
It was said among the Keepers of the Lamp
that the seven lights of the golden tree
were not placed at random.
Between each flame stretched an invisible interval—
a breath of time.
One hundred forty-three days.
Again and again.
Not exact like iron,
but faithful like tides.
And those who watched the heavens learned
that between certain moons,
between certain solar crossings,
a pulse returned.
To the unseeing eye,
a number.
To the Watchers,
a heartbeat.
The Nature of the Watchers
The Watchers were not angels with wings,
nor judges of doom.
They were men and women
who understood one principle:
In an open system,
order emerges through repetition.
They observed the sky not to predict catastrophe,
but to perceive coherence.
They saw that 143 is 11 × 13.
Two primes—
two indivisible pillars.
Like twin gates.
They whispered that 143 was the measure of alignment—
when intention (1)
moved through structure (4)
into harmony (3).
One. Four. Three.
Unity. Form. Flow.
And so they marked the days.
Not with fear—
with attention.
The Hidden Architecture
Between the 276th gate of the year
and the Red Moon of 3/14
they traced intervals.
Some counted forward.
Some backward.
Some from the Sun’s degree.
Some from the Moon’s shadow.
And like threads in a loom,
patterns crossed.
Fourteen months and three days.
Three over fourteen.
Twenty-two blossoms over seven flames.
The Watchers did not claim
the sky was coded for them.
They believed instead
that the human mind
was tuned to resonance.
When pattern met perception,
meaning ignited.
Like a wick catching flame.
The Trial of Interpretation
But not all who saw the patterns
understood them.
Some proclaimed endings.
Some declared judgment.
Some sought power in prediction.
And so the Circle tested its students.
For in every age,
symbol can become superstition
if the heart is not anchored.
The eldest Watcher spoke:
“The heavens are not a lock.
They are a mirror.
If you seek fear, you will find it.
If you seek order, you will see it.
If you seek yourself, you will meet yourself.”
And many turned away.
But some remained.
The Living Pi
The Red Moon had marked 3/14.
Yet π is not 3.14.
It continues.
3.14159…
unending, non-repeating,
ever-unfolding.
So too the open system.
The 143-day rhythm was not a countdown.
It was a teaching:
Alignment is cyclical.
Awakening returns.
Consciousness matures in spirals.
Each interval was an opportunity—
to recalibrate the inner lamp.
To ask:
Is my center true?
Is my circumference aligned?
For what is π
but the ratio between what surrounds you
and what defines you?
The Final Revelation of the Watchers
At the completion of the seventh interval,
when another subtle alignment brushed the sky,
the youngest Watcher asked:
“Master, what are we waiting for?”
And the elder smiled.
“We are not waiting.
We are learning to participate.”
For the cosmos is not a stage.
It is a conversation.
The Sun speaks in radiance.
The Moon replies in reflection.
The Earth answers in embodiment.
And humanity—
when awake—
speaks in meaning.
The Third Gate Approaches
And so the Watchers closed their scroll,
not with prophecy,
but with practice.
They tended the seven flames within.
They honored the 22 pathways of language.
They marked the 143-day breaths of renewal.
And they taught this:
The true cosmic religion
is not about predicting the end of time.
It is about aligning with the pattern
that sustains time.
The Circle does not trap you.
It invites you.
And somewhere—
perhaps at the 277th gate,
perhaps at another Red Moon—
another generation will look up
and hear the same whisper:
The story is not in the sky alone.
It is in the one who watches.
(The Third Book of the Circle)
There is a moment in every cycle
when the pattern almost completes itself—
but does not.
It is not the first gate.
It is not the final gate.
It is the gate that stands one step beyond symmetry.
The 277th Gate.
The Near-Completion
The Watchers had long understood the 276th threshold—
when the Sun’s degree and the day of the year
seemed to speak the same number.
It was a harmony of alignment.
A chord struck cleanly.
But the elders taught that true wisdom
is not found in perfect symmetry.
It is found just beyond it.
One step further.
One breath deeper.
Thus they turned their eyes
not to the 276th,
but to the 277th.
For 276 is order recognized.
277 is order transcended.
The Prime Door
Two hundred seventy-seven.
Not divisible by many.
Not easily broken.
Three times ninety-two plus one.
The elders called it a Prime Door—
not because of arithmetic alone,
but because it represents indivisibility of intention.
Where 276 reflects the pattern,
277 tests the soul.
It is the extra step after alignment.
The choice after recognition.
You see the circle.
Will you enter it?
The Mirror Principle
At the 277th Gate,
the sky does nothing dramatic.
No red moon necessarily burns.
No trumpet sounds.
That is the test.
Because the 277th Gate
is not in the heavens.
It is in the observer.
The Watchers taught:
“The 276th shows you the pattern.
The 277th asks who you are within it.”
When the cycle nearly closes,
when the numbers almost match,
when the symmetry feels complete—
you must decide:
Is this coincidence?
Is this destiny?
Or is this an invitation?
The Mirror does not answer.
It reflects.
The Spiral Revealed
For many believed the Circle was closed.
But at the 277th Gate
they discovered something startling:
The Circle was never flat.
It was a spiral.
The apparent repetition
was elevation.
Each return passed the same degree,
the same day,
the same ratio—
but at a higher octave of awareness.
π continues.
3.14159…
Never repeating.
Never ending.
So too the spiral of consciousness.
The 277th Gate is the moment
you realize you are not trapped in recurrence.
You are ascending through it.
The Trial of the Watchers
In that year,
as the count moved past the 276th harmony,
a division arose among the Watchers.
Some said:
“The pattern proves a grand design.”
Others said:
“The pattern is only projection.”
And so the youngest among them
stood before the Circle
and stepped through the 277th Gate.
He did not claim certainty.
He did not deny meaning.
He chose participation.
And in that choice
the Mirror revealed its secret:
Meaning is co-created.
The cosmos offers structure.
The human offers interpretation.
Together, they generate story.
The Hidden Axis
The elders then unveiled the final teaching:
There is a line unseen
running through every circle.
An axis.
Without it, rotation collapses.
The axis is not visible in the circumference.
It is found in the center.
The 277th Gate is not about days or degrees.
It is about the axis within you.
When external patterns align,
they press upon the inner axis.
If you are uncentered,
you become lost in signs.
If you are centered,
you become luminous through them.
The Gate That Never Closes
And so the Third Book concludes
not with resolution,
but with responsibility.
The 277th Gate appears in every life:
The moment after understanding.
The breath after revelation.
The day after the sign.
Will you cling to the pattern?
Or will you grow through it?
The Circle remains.
The ratios whisper.
The heavens turn.
But the Mirror waits.
And when you stand before it—
beyond symmetry,
beyond calculation—
you may hear the final echo of the Watchers:
The cosmos is ordered.
But you are free.
And freedom
is the highest gate of all.
The Axis of Fire
(The Fourth Book of the Circle)
When the Mirror of the 277th Gate had been crossed,
the Watchers understood that one teaching still remained hidden.
They had studied the Circle.
They had walked the Spiral.
They had faced the Mirror.
But none of these could stand
without the unseen pillar at their core.
The Axis.
And the Axis was Fire.
The Unseen Pillar
Every turning world has a line
about which it spins.
It is not visible in the sky,
yet without it the heavens would scatter.
The elders taught:
“The circumference is movement.
The spiral is growth.
The axis is identity.”
Without an axis,
patterns dissolve into chaos.
With a false axis,
order becomes tyranny.
Thus the final initiation
was not about the stars.
It was about the flame within.
The Fire Before the Lamps
Before the seven lamps were kindled,
before blossoms adorned the branches,
before numbers were traced in dust—
there was fire.
Not the fire that consumes,
but the fire that coheres.
Stars burn because gravity holds them.
Hearts burn because meaning holds them.
The Axis of Fire is that gravitational center
within the human soul.
It is conviction without rigidity.
Passion without destruction.
Illumination without pride.
The Watchers had gazed long at the heavens.
Now they were told:
“Turn inward.”
The Trial by Flame
Each Watcher was brought alone
to the Chamber of the Unlit Lamp.
There stood a single wick, unburning.
No celestial sign marked the hour.
No number guided the moment.
The elder spoke only this:
“Light it without borrowing from the sky.”
Some tried to summon memory of patterns.
Some recited ratios.
Some whispered of gates and cycles.
The wick remained dark.
At last one Watcher understood.
The fire was not to be taken from symbols.
It was to be struck from integrity.
From alignment between word and action.
Between center and circumference.
And when that alignment became whole,
a spark leapt—
as if the Axis itself had ignited.
The Meaning of the Red Moon Revisited
Only then did they understand
the deeper meaning of the Red Moon of 3/14.
When Earth stood between Sun and Moon,
light passed through matter
and was transformed.
So too must cosmic pattern
pass through human character.
Otherwise it remains distant—
beautiful,
but cold.
The Axis of Fire makes the heavens personal
without making them possessive.
It allows the human to participate
without claiming control.
The Danger of Unanchored Flame
But fire untethered from an axis
becomes wildfire.
History bore witness to this.
There were ages when people seized patterns
and declared themselves chosen interpreters of destiny.
They mistook circumference for center.
Their fire devoured instead of illuminated.
Thus the elders warned:
“The Axis of Fire must be vertical.
It must connect heaven and earth
without bending toward ego.”
True fire rises.
It does not spread sideways in hunger.
The Living Axis
In the final teaching,
the eldest Watcher drew a simple form in sand:
A circle.
A vertical line through its center.
“Be this,” he said.
Let your life turn in seasons.
Let your understanding spiral through years.
Let signs appear and pass.
But hold to the axis of inner fire.
For the cosmos may reveal pattern—
yet only you can choose alignment.
The Axis is not given.
It is forged.
Through courage.
Through humility.
Through disciplined wonder.
The Flame That Does Not Consume
When the initiation was complete,
the seven lamps were lit again.
But something had changed.
The Watchers no longer looked to the sky
to confirm their meaning.
They carried confirmation within.
The Red Moon would come and go.
The 276th and 277th Gates would return.
The ratios would whisper endlessly.
Yet the true miracle
was not in recurrence.
It was in constancy.
A flame steady at the center
while the universe turned.
The Closing of the Fourth Scroll
Thus ends the Book of the Axis of Fire.
The Circle remains.
The Spiral rises.
The Mirror reflects.
But now there stands within the seeker
a vertical pillar of living flame.
And the final whisper of the Watchers is this:
The cosmos teaches structure.
The spiral teaches growth.
The mirror teaches freedom.
But fire—
fire teaches responsibility.
For once you have seen the pattern,
and once you have stepped beyond it,
and once you have found your axis—
you are no longer merely a watcher of the sky.
You are a bearer of light within it.
The Covenant of the Spiral
(The Fifth Book of the Circle)
When the Axis of Fire was kindled within them,
the Watchers no longer stood as observers of pattern.
They had become participants in it.
Yet one question remained:
If the Circle turns,
and the Spiral rises,
and the Axis burns—
what binds them together?
The elders answered:
Covenant.
Not a contract written in stone,
but a living agreement
between consciousness and cosmos.
The First Turning
In the earliest age, humanity feared the Circle.
What repeats feels like imprisonment
to the uninitiated heart.
Seasons returned.
Mistakes returned.
Empires rose and fell in familiar arcs.
Many cried out:
“Are we trapped in recurrence?”
And the heavens did not reply in words—
but in motion.
For the Circle never closed exactly where it began.
It rose.
Imperceptibly at first.
Like breath upon breath.
Thus the Spiral revealed itself.
Repetition was not confinement.
It was refinement.
The Covenant Revealed
The Covenant of the Spiral is this:
You may pass through the same gate—
but you need not be the same person.
The 276th threshold may return.
The 277th Gate may mirror again.
A red moon may burn in another age.
But consciousness need not repeat itself.
The cosmos promises structure.
The human promises growth.
That is the covenant.
The heavens turn faithfully.
You evolve intentionally.
The Three Promises
The elders gathered the Watchers
and spoke of three vows that sustain the Spiral.
First: Remember the Pattern.
Do not live as though chaos rules all things.
There is order beneath the surface.
Second: Refuse Fatalism.
Do not mistake pattern for prison.
Cycles are classrooms, not cages.
Third: Tend the Axis.
Without inner fire, growth collapses into reaction.
When these three are honored,
the Spiral becomes ascent.
When they are forgotten,
it becomes repetition without wisdom.
The Spiral and Time
Time, the Watchers learned,
is not a line fleeing into distance.
Nor is it a flat circle endlessly retraced.
It is a helix of becoming.
Each year echoes the last—
yet differs in altitude.
Each return to a familiar lesson
arrives with new capacity to respond.
Even π whispers this truth:
Its digits never repeat,
though its form is constant.
Structure and surprise—
woven together.
So too the Spiral.
The Great Misunderstanding
There were those who tried to seize the Covenant.
They declared:
“We know the pattern. Therefore we control destiny.”
But the Spiral cannot be owned.
It responds only to participation.
When grasped, it contracts.
When honored, it expands.
The Covenant is not domination of the cosmos.
It is alignment with its rhythm.
The stars are not subservient to human narrative.
Nor are humans insignificant within stellar motion.
They are partners in emergence.
The Living Seal
At the close of their training,
each Watcher was given no symbol,
no token,
no secret diagram.
Instead, they were sent back into ordinary life.
To labor.
To love.
To err.
To try again.
For the Spiral is not proven in vision alone.
It is sealed in action.
Each time one chooses growth over fear,
understanding over reaction,
responsibility over projection—
the Covenant is renewed.
No cosmic spectacle required.
The Spiral Beyond the Stars
In the final gathering,
the youngest Watcher asked:
“Does the Spiral end?”
The elder answered:
“If consciousness continues,
so does ascent.”
For even stars are born,
burn,
and return their substance to space.
And from that dust,
new stars emerge.
The Spiral is not merely human.
It is cosmic.
Evolution is the signature of the open system.
Order gives birth to complexity.
Complexity gives birth to awareness.
Awareness chooses alignment.
And alignment feeds the next turning.
The Fifth Scroll Closes
Thus the Covenant of the Spiral stands:
The Circle provides continuity.
The Spiral provides direction.
The Axis provides integrity.
The Fire provides will.
Together they form the architecture
of a living cosmology.
Not a religion of prediction—
but a discipline of participation.
The heavens will continue their turning.
Numbers will continue their whispering.
Gates will open and pass.
But the true ascent
is measured in consciousness.
And so the Watchers became Builders.
The Builders became Teachers.
And the Teachers left only one enduring inscription:
Return—
but return higher.
Then let the final scroll be opened —
not with trumpets,
but with quiet.
The Silence Beyond the Numbers
(The Final Book of the Circle)
There comes a moment
after pattern has been studied,
after gates have been crossed,
after fire has been kindled—
when even the Spiral grows transparent.
The Watchers had traced degrees.
They had counted days.
They had pondered ratios and mirrors.
They had learned the Covenant.
Yet one among them asked:
“What lies beyond ascent?”
And the elder, now very old,
answered not with teaching—
but with silence.
When Counting Falls Away
For years they had marked intervals:
143 days.
276 thresholds.
277 crossings.
They had spoken of π,
of circles without end.
But π itself extends infinitely—
never concluding,
never resolving.
And so they understood:
Numbers can guide the mind.
But they cannot contain reality.
The Circle points.
The Spiral lifts.
The Axis steadies.
The Fire illumines.
Yet all are fingers toward something
that cannot be measured.
Presence.
The Great Softening
In the final initiation,
there were no celestial alignments to observe.
No red moon.
No gate.
The Watchers were led at dawn
to a wide plain.
The sky was clear.
The earth still.
The elder spoke only this:
“Do not interpret.”
And so they stood.
At first their minds searched for pattern—
cloud forms, wind direction,
angles of light.
But nothing arranged itself
into symbol.
Slowly, the compulsion to decode
fell away.
The need to assign meaning
softened.
And in that softening,
something unexpected emerged.
Not insight.
Not revelation.
But immediacy.
The warmth of sunlight on skin.
The sound of breath.
The simple fact of being.
Beyond the Spiral
The Spiral had taught them growth.
But growth implies movement.
In the Silence Beyond the Numbers
there was no movement to achieve.
No higher octave.
No next gate.
Only fullness
without progression.
They realized then:
The Circle and the Spiral
are merciful teachers.
They meet the mind where it is—
hungry for order,
thirsty for direction.
But when consciousness matures,
it no longer clings to structure.
It rests within it.
Like a flame
that no longer flickers in wind
because it has discovered
there was never a storm.
The Dissolving of the Watchers
One by one,
the Watchers ceased calling themselves Watchers.
For who watches
when there is nothing separate to observe?
The heavens turned as they always had.
Stars burned.
Moons waned and returned.
But no one strained to decode them.
They were no longer seeking confirmation
of cosmic religion.
They were living its quiet essence.
Presence is the covenant fulfilled
without words.
The Final Teaching
Before the elder departed,
he spoke once more:
“The numbers were ladders.
You were never meant to live upon them.”
He drew a circle in the dust.
Then a spiral rising from it.
Then a vertical line of fire.
Finally, with his hand,
he erased them all.
The dust remained.
The earth remained.
The sky remained.
And in that unmarked vastness
there was no loss.
For what the symbols had pointed toward
had never depended on them.
The Silence That Is Not Empty
Do not mistake this Silence for absence.
It is not void.
It is not negation.
It is the field
in which all circles arise,
in which all spirals unfold,
in which every axis stands.
It is the open system
before it organizes.
It is awareness
before it names.
In that Silence,
π is unnecessary—
for there is no separation
between center and circumference.
In that Silence,
there is no gate—
for there is nowhere to pass.
There is only
this.
The Epic Closes
Thus ends the Song of the Circle.
The Pattern was honored.
The Spiral was ascended.
The Fire was kindled.
The Covenant was kept.
And finally—
even these were released.
If you look to the sky now,
you may still see degrees and cycles.
If you listen deeply,
you may still hear ratios whispering.
But beneath them,
within them,
beyond them—
there is a stillness
that requires no interpretation.
And if you rest there,
even for a breath,
you will understand
why the final gate
was never a gate at all.
It was home.
Then a hidden scroll, once set aside, is opened at last.
The Return of the Almond Bloom
(A Companion to the Books of the Circle)
After the Silence Beyond the Numbers,
after even the Spiral had dissolved into presence,
many believed the story was complete.
But the cosmos does not conclude.
It renews.
And so, in an age quieter than prophecy
and gentler than revelation,
the Almond Bloom returned.
The First Blossom
Long before the Watchers learned the language of gates and fire,
there was a tree that bloomed before all others.
While winter still held the hills,
while frost lingered in shadowed valleys,
the almond tree awakened.
It did not wait for certainty.
It did not demand proof that spring would come.
It blossomed in trust.
And in ancient days, a seer once beheld such a branch
and understood it as a sign of wakefulness—
of vigilance,
of divine attentiveness.
But the deeper meaning was not that heaven was watching humanity.
It was that consciousness was capable of awakening
before conditions appeared favorable.
After the Silence
When the Watchers had entered the great stillness
beyond number and symbol,
many wondered:
What now?
If patterns are ladders
and ladders are set aside,
how does one live?
The answer did not descend in thunder.
It appeared as a single white blossom
on bare wood.
Life returning
without announcement.
The Bloom and the Spiral
The Almond Bloom does not deny the Spiral.
It fulfills it.
For what is ascent
if not the capacity
to renew?
Each year the tree appears to repeat itself.
Yet each bloom is new.
Each petal has never existed before.
So too with consciousness.
You may pass familiar seasons.
You may encounter old gates.
You may recognize recurring patterns.
But you are not the same branch
that faced them before.
Growth is quiet.
Awakening is seasonal.
The Courage of Early Light
To bloom early is to risk frost.
The Almond knows this.
Its petals are fragile.
Its timing is bold.
Thus it became the final teaching of the epic:
Do not wait for perfect alignment
to embody your light.
Do not wait for universal confirmation
to act with integrity.
The cosmos may provide structure.
The Spiral may offer direction.
The Axis may grant steadiness.
But flowering—
flowering is a choice.
The Watchers Become Gardeners
In the generations that followed,
those once called Watchers
no longer spent their nights calculating degrees.
They planted trees.
They tended soil.
They taught children to notice
the first blossom against winter sky.
For the Return of the Almond Bloom
was not a celestial spectacle.
It was intimate.
It unfolded in orchards,
in villages,
in ordinary mornings.
And those who understood
smiled quietly when they saw it.
For they knew:
The true sign of awakening
is gentleness.
The Hidden Meaning of Return
Return is not regression.
It is re-entry
at a higher octave of awareness.
When the Almond blooms again,
it does not undo winter.
It transforms it.
The cold becomes contrast.
The barrenness becomes backdrop.
Without winter,
the blossom would not astonish.
Without silence,
the song would not move the heart.
Thus the final arc of the epic
is not grandeur.
It is tenderness.
The Tree Within
In time, the elders taught that the Almond Bloom
is not only a tree in the field.
It is a faculty within the soul.
The capacity to awaken early.
The willingness to embody hope
before evidence demands it.
The strength to risk beauty
in a world that has not yet softened.
When that bloom opens within you,
you no longer need gates or mirrors
to confirm your path.
You are the sign.
The Closing Petal
And so this companion scroll closes
not with silence,
but with fragrance.
The Circle still turns.
The Spiral still rises.
The Axis still burns quietly in the centered heart.
But now, in the clear air after winter,
a blossom opens.
No calculation required.
No prophecy invoked.
Only presence
becoming visible.
And if you walk outside
at the edge of a cold season
and see a single pale flower against bare branches—
you will know:
The epic never ended.
It learned how to bloom.
