strange fate

A Basket Case.

As a child, in love with maps and books, one that included a fairy tale that pictured a man in the tub inscribed with the quote: "There was no soap ... So he died," hilariously matter-of-factly to our childish minds. Then the world and the universe that contained it were more than enough to encompass a naive vast appetite. How big the world seemed to one sequestered in dark corners, how invitingly it beckons to house-bound youth. But now looking back through the eye of memory, how small it  has become; as though memory were a telescope we peer into ass backwards.

One night we go to bed weary, yet look forward to the morning with hope, assuming the day will carry the same possibilities the previous one had, only to awake and find the world submerged, the Future removed from our grasp and now imprisoned behind a wall of flame, like Brünhild asleep, who lies unconscious of our desire to reach her; likewise ignorant of all those scorched by the effort to release her, the now-unreachable Future lies untouched by the fire burning in our hearts to attain it, despite the fact we can see Her right there, just beyond the pale. Which knowledge, magnifying the intransigence of destiny, inflames otherwise lazy brains with ire; hearts swollen with desire are soon enough filled with bitter resentment as the realization dawns that the only means of extinguishing such intense flames is a deluge that will carry off the very reason we wish to part the blazing wall.  Desperately we concoct ideas that flow, but like a river in spate, they rush past us toward the object of desire, only to see a denouement more akin to The Mill on the River Floss: the closer we get to the future that invites us, the closer the engine of our doom looms in the glowing dawn. We arrive just in time for one final embrace, only to find that what we have a clasped to our breast is a corpse .

But where to go, how to proceed but to follow that rhythm of the waves; rock gently in their hypnotic rolling, recuperating in the embrace of its infinity our finitude afloat on the endless seas: some of us are happy to flee from a dishonored country; others the horror of the plague follows close at their heels, and a few, relying on the astrology of strangers, immerse themselves in the vague promises of seers. Their proferred futures wrapping around them like seven veils, enveloped in an exotic perfume; they follow its scent, though its mists only serve to confuse the senses, they immerse them in seductive illusions that hold promise; the smell of death, for however short a time, is dispersed.

So as not to be changed into Neanderthals, we drink deeply of space and light under flaming skies; biting ice and burning suns slowly erase the love marks of kisses. We have become reclusive, going nowhere; only leaving for leaving's sake; hearts as light as balloons can't help us diverge from the path of our fate and, without knowing why, we're always ready with an enthused, "Let's go." But though desires lie in the shape of clouds, and though we dream of limitless pleasures, with the same dread longing of a recruit imagining cannon fire, ever imagining unknowns, which the human mind has never been able to name, the human heart never able to decipher, the dreams have begun to frighten us.

We imitate horror, a top, a rogue cop, a roller coaster in a park whose theme is danger sugar-coated with assurances of safety; they represent  dazzling balls with their waltzing and bouncing, all to distract us from the knowledge that even in our sleep curiosity torments us and spins us about, like a cruel angel whipping us unconscious only to drop us into this strange fate whose objective we cannot fathom as it is constantly moving, and since we are no longer able to convince ourselves that it is we who control it, spins us off to nowhere, or at least to an anywhere not of our choosing. We're just humanity, whose hope never tires, but seeks repose by running forever like a madman, and think it's normalcy that is what we wish to return to, forgetting how fervently we had wanted to leave it behind. We wanted to leave the entire planet behind. It's only now that we crave it, when it suddenly seems determined to leave us behind.

Astonishing what noble tales we tell ourselves, deep as the ocean; jewel-cases full of rich memories, those wonderful gems sparkling like stars and as amorphous as ether, they allow us to travel without steam or sail, relieving our boredom without imprisoning our minds with dread of gases choking us for our hubris, without remorse stretched across our conscience as tight as a canvas, so that we can't ever see a pink horizon without remembering it's a result of particulate matter of our own generation.

Carbon units unearthed carboniferous pools whose ignition spawned carbon units propelled by flights of fancy; engines launched into the night in the hope of dreams reaching their fulfillment by changing space-time, bending light to weave dreams despite the dangers looming, warping what's weft of Eden. Yet even were the journey in fact the destination, can we say, or even guess at, what it is we saw on it? We saw stars and waves; we saw sands and forests, but in spite of the shocks and the unexpected, we were mostly as bored, despite the unconscionable cost to get there, as here. It' s never long before the glory of the sun on the dancing sea, the splendor of cities in the setting sun, the rustling of rain whose sound is like a string of pearls rubbing against a chiffon dress, leaves us cold, our minds plunging from the skies to indulge in our own alluring reflections, since glorious as they are, neither the richest cities, the broadest landscapes, nor the sweetest twittering of birds, the busiest of hives, ever hold the mysterious attraction of those images which chance makes out of bilious cumulus clouds. Amorphous desire makes fools of us all, makes everyone uneasy.

So then, and then ... what then? Oh feverish brains.

We forget the most important things; we see everything, and notice nothing until, without having to look for it, from the bottom to the top of existence, the tedious spectacle of an overarching pestilence visits itself upon us. Once again we're a slave, contemptible; proud and stupid, adoring ourselves in solitude without laughing or loving, without disgust or delight, a greedy tyrant, lecherous, hard and covetous, slave to a slave, a gutter leading to a sewer. Thus can one see why perhaps the Angel of Death relishes his task as the sobbing martyr bends his neck for the swipe of the scythe. Our most frolicsome Holidays are now seasoned and perfumed with blood; the poisonous miasma unmanning the despot as the people fall in love with the stultifying whip. While religion stands mute, asleep with dreams of the after life, like a Madame wallowing in a feather bed, seeks its pleasure in its treasure; a writhing  voluptuary, aroused by tithing sects.

Chattering humanity, intoxicated with its won genius and made mad more now than ever, shouts at each other in its furious death agony, "I curse you!", while the less stupid, the bold lovers of nature, are sent fleeing from the great herd penned in by Destiny, and take refuge in their survival bunkers or Oxycontin. That is the burning news from the entire globe. It is a bitter knowledge that comes from pestilence. The world, monotonous and small, today, yesterday, tomorrow, always, has never shown us so starkly our own image: an oasis of horror in a desert of tedium. Should we stay in ? Should we go Out? If you can stay, stay; leave though, if you feel you must. One man runs, another cowers to avoid the vigilant, deadly enemy, whose ally is Time.

Whether the wandering few or the stay-at-home many, nothing, no SUV, no airship, will serve to flee this dreadful net, which has spread to encompass even those who it will manage to kill without them ever leaving their cradles. When it finally puts its knee down on our necks, we will be able to hope we can still cry "Farewell" to someone who might care; to utter "I love you" to an unmasked stare, and dream we have left China with eyes fixed on the open sea, and the wind in our hair. But the Sea of Darkness on which we've set sail with the joyful heart of a young wayfarer lures us with songs both charming and deadly, sighing in a breathless whisper, "This way leads back to the placid Normal Sea." But scents of camellias, speak to your heart's desires; come and lose yourself in the strange sweetness of an afternoon in the afterlife. Where you can recognize the ghosts of dear friends, holding out their arms to you, now that they're gone; they invite you to swim to their banks, to their open shops or an empty pew, tables are set, readied for after you've had a few, to repair to, to repair you and your broken heart.

But Death, old nemesis, insists it is time. And Time is endless, and dark as night, while our hearts  are hopeful, full of rays of light, when they're not as black as ink and full of poison that lights the fire that burns our brains, but we yet plunge into the depths of the abyss, while both Hell and Heaven, which both are remiss, so I doubt that it matters, when at the end of the known, Our Reality Show shatters.