fly too close to the sun

Daedalus was the cleverest maker of his age, and his cleverness had earned him a prison. He and his young son Icarus were shut away on the island of Crete, watched on every road and every shore by a king who would not let so useful a man go free.

So Daedalus studied the one road no guard could close: the sky. He gathered feathers, the largest at one end and the smallest at the other, and bound them in rows with thread and soft wax until two great wings took shape under his hands, and then a second pair for the boy.

Before they leapt from the cliff he took Icarus by the shoulders and gave him a single rule. Fly the middle way. Too low, and the sea spray would soak the feathers and drag him down; too high, and the sun would melt the wax that held them together. Keep between, he said, and follow me.

For a while the boy obeyed, and it was glorious. But the sky was open and the wings were his, and joy climbed in him until caution slipped away. Higher and higher he rose toward the burning face of the sun, until the wax began to soften and then to run. The feathers loosened and drifted, and there was nothing left to beat against the air. He fell, calling his father's name, into the sea that still bears it.

To fly too close to the sun is to be that boy: gifted, exhilarated, and undone by reaching for more height than any wax was ever made to hold.