Bosworth, Before Dawn
He was not born roaring.
He was born smaller than expectation,
his spine curving slightly
as though the body itself hesitated
to enter the world.
They would later call it omen.
But in the beginning
it was only a child
learning how quickly affection tilts
toward symmetry.
His brothers moved easily through rooms.
Doors opened wider for them.
Light seemed to settle on their shoulders
without effort.
He understood early
that the world prefers what does not disturb it.
And he disturbed it.
Not by choice —
but by presence.
There is a particular solitude
in being watched
before being known.
It hardens slowly.
Not into hatred at first —
into precision.
He became observant.
Measured.
Careful with language.
Careful with silence.
If love would not be given freely,
power could be taken.
The crown did not glitter to him;
it answered something.
To stand above
what had always stood above him —
to force history
to pronounce his name without pity.
But power does not untwist the spine.
It does not quiet the memory
of laughter stopped mid-breath.
By the time the princes vanished
into the stone mouth of the Tower,
he had convinced himself
that necessity and cruelty
were the same word.
That is how ambition survives.
On the eve of Bosworth
sleep would not hold him.
The dead have a way of returning
without sound.
Not accusing.
Not raging.
Simply existing.
Proof
that what is done
does not dissolve.
When he fell,
it was not theatrical.
No thunder split the sky.
Just a body —
human, breakable —
meeting the ground.
History would name him monster.
But history never records
the first moment
a boy understands
he is less wanted
than the others.
And sometimes
that is where it begins.
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