I Am Icarus

I have always laughed loudly enough
to shatter the ice three tables away
and I have always grinned with a thousand
watts of electricity,
with brightness that could blind the sun.

A girl once told me that I should
temper myself before my skin caught fire
before I burned myself to a smoking husk
with my own light,
right before my mother told me I was born
to deafen the sun, and burst the stars,
like fireworks.

I would rather be a single firework
than a church full of dim candles
a gutteral lantern holding on
for a hundred guttering years,
and I have heard it said -
Icarus was the only hero to die happy.