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Ponder a solar system. Planets orbit around the sun, taking advantage of its light, stealing from it without ever giving back in return. But the sun is free to give. It has nothing it needs; nothing can ever grow from it like a planet. Planets will produce crystals, fine dancing structures that will only widen the sun's light, or plants which will fixate it, and refine it into something new and amazing. The sun lives through these lives, its gentle touch responsible for a kaleidoscope of growth and beauty. Alive but never living, the sun shines like this for eons.
The sun lives longer than that which it nurtures. The plants will die, the crystals deform and the planets rot away. Even the sun will one day fade, but only so it can be born again in an explosion of light. The sun recycles itself like this for eons, the last explosion propelling itself away from its sister solar system, leaving both distant and dark.
The sun has changed recently, however. Another star was tugged into its system, you see. Dim now, but the sun nourishes it. The sun gives it more than just shallow light, but real bits and pieces of itself, hydrogen and matter to use on its own. The little star orbits the sun, stuck fast and not wanting to let go, but never truly merging. The star grows and grows, gaining bits and pieces of its own from the solar system, and it swallows up a dainty comet, a heavy orange gas giant, a swift swarm of meteoroids. Here it grabs a drifting swath of nebula, and there a spark of light that gives off more energy than it takes in. At last it pulls back from its little green moon, and grows even bigger. After enough years, the star breaks off from the sun, leaving it drifting in the cold of space.
The sun tastes void again. Space is emptier for having been full once. But, to its surprise the new star returns, shining brighter than ever before. It should be impossible. But the star has taken in what the little spark has to offer, and it too can do the impossible now. Together the two fuse, both giants in their own right, and the new gravity combined creates a magnificent solar system. The sister solar system, the little green moon, new hydrogen bubbles all radiate towards and orbit around the massive, proud star. They drift like that, forming and reforming, building and destroying as they can. And then, when at last even their light fails, they collapse into one another, and the world falls silent around them. And at last the binary star's light fades, and the worlds are no more.