Tuesday 4 January 2011

The immortal words of a mortal man

I am sure these words do not belong to me. However, I am open for a short while, so I will let them come. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. A deathtime extravaganza waiting to happen, perhaps. And if you are a man, you can have your share. If you are a woman, too. Ladies and gentlemen! Our lives, our words. Speak up! If you have the strength.

These are the words. Oh, are these the good words, the following words, that will lift us up, away from money, towards a higher life, where we can be happy? Or are these the evil words, one thousand, two thousand, close to, three thousand, words, that will make us sick, more diseased than we have ever been?

Will these words, the coming words, capture the visions we need? There are ways to chase money, to chase love/sex, to chase all sorts of things on our cold earth. But words can be used to chase the visions that exist beyond. Or visions of those things that exist beyond. If there is a beyond. Are you lost? I have to admit I get confused myself.

Time is passing. Years go by. There are more years ahead. Chances to get wise. How much wisdom does one require? Enough wisdom to die happy, to die sad. There you are, with a light in your eyes, as you pass away, and on and on and on. Perfectly natural. Life will be seen again. This is not goodbye. Not for any of us.

We open our mouths. Gasp for air. We are dying. No rush. Our situations! There are worse things than debt. There are better things than all the riches we go after. Is this the truth? I believe it is. A coffin of solid gold would not satisfy some people. Death makes them angry. They consider death the worst insult. Better things are for light spirits without the flesh and bones, the heavy bodies.

Our bodies are kingdoms of pleasure and pain. I suggest we hold on to them for the time being. We are not free to drift off. We have our little excursions, of course. But we cannot leave for eternity. We have to pay our dues. That enormous mystery will take us soon enough. Just when you think you are comfortable, eternity strikes.

Is death a rotting tooth, waiting to pounce? Or is death some other annoyance? Our bodies are so unpredictable. It is best not to worry. I would like to focus on spirit only, mind possibly, the self hopefully. It was disgraceful, rolling on a grave. They say the skeleton did not complain. I wish I could forget. That episode, other episodes. Old days back in the night-time of my soft dreamy head.

Before we go any further, I should tell you that neither God nor Satan nor any other spiritual overlord will be making an appearance. This is not a decision on my part. I do not possess such power. This is more of a gut feeling. A belief? Oh, it could be a belief. It could be a great fear. Animal thundering inside of me. These old bones of mine. Nothing, no one, to worship. I am afraid we are on our own.

This is going to be difficult. We hardly know each other(s); and yet, we have to trust each other(s), and the others, with us. Countless beings, not all human, moving, gliding. The delicate, glittering ones, all searching for the experiences or revelations that will change everything. I hope we are lucky, all of us.

We are suns with rays of consciousness. Something to be cheerful about, eh? Imagine if we were shadows on a wall, at dusk. We would easily fade into the night. You cannot enjoy that sort of existence. But we are heavy ones. Our bodies! We have substance. A burst of wind could not blow us around like leaves in autumn or like dust after the winter of old age. We should count our blessings. A body is not that bad, really.

Some disturbance, a noise. I wonder if I will be able to escape. Is it too late? The breath on my neck. Is that you? I know you have been following me. I know you are fascinated by my mask. You would like it for yourself. Heart to bloody heart? This is mask to bare face. You can kiss the mask. Will I reveal a secret or two, if you ask me, if you force me? It is not impossible.

Most things are possible in our reality. I said, our reality. I am the sharing type. These words are your words. They come through me. They go through you. I think you will find that your mind is open for business, just as mine is. You have been accepted. Look around you. Nothing but friends. We all want to love you. Let us love you. Surrender, and then the joy of burning. That is the order of the day. You are aflame!

No ashes! That is very impressive. Be prepared to be ignored. The cold ones of this world frown upon our activities. Jealousy is a terrible thing. That is what we are dealing with. It must be so frustrating, wandering in endless night, shivering, with not one flame to call your own. We should pity them.

Vision to vision. Where are we? Somewhere nice? We could be in a green field, on our backs, blue sky in our eyes. A rural idyll. Where? Over there! We are not there though, naked, as nature intended. Here! Sand beneath our feet. This is the desert of our inner spaces. Yes, here we are, naked, our hairs stretching out through our skins, and our skins coloured, stained, blue, yellow, red, cracking on the edges of life.

Our souls are deserts. We know the emptiness. We are not afraid of it. It drives us on. More money! More status! More success! We will never get enough. But the vibrations! Outside of us, all around us, the ultimate reality, the dream. The dream is what we are chasing. We want to taste it. That honey love! We want to get lost in it. The flesh of eternal life! The cold ones refuse to believe in it, if you can believe that. Ha! We may be wretches, but at least we are believers.

We believe in the life to come. We are willing to die for a dream, a mere vision. Our yearning makes us unusual. But we are beggars. Desperadoes. Sea creatures, even! Picture the scene. There is a big blue sea. I am there with you. You are my dolphin. I am your shark. I am biting you. Will you dive with me? Deeper. Everything is flowing. Everything we want flows from space to our minds. Going down. This is not a fantasy. It is death on the seabed.

Are you someone? You could be anyone. I know only too well that I could be anyone myself. We are together, all of us, in this. There are so many of you. I cannot judge you all. Why should I judge anyone? Tell me your stories. I want to fall asleep, listening to your whispering voices. I want to lose myself in your wildest imaginings. Yes, imagine! Imagine for me as saliva trickles from the side of my mouth. Imagine for me as saliva ...

Bubbles of images floating up. Your whisperings have had quite an effect. You must be so proud of yourself, and yourselves. I am awake, and refreshed. How long was I away? Signs of mad hours in your watery eyes! Were you with me? We should do it again, and again, and again. These distractions have been a shot in the arm, a tonic. We will not think of death. Right now, even the horrors of life cannot upset us.

Marching on, over your heads. The troops of my subconscious! I am keeping the Old Guard in reserve. Tactics, you see. It is a war. I fight for your love, your commitment. I demand obedience. Oh, I am a tyrant! Despair has brought me to this point. I strove for greatness. Isolation was my reward. But I was thinking of you as well. I want you to be like me. You have the emptiness. You have the desire. You can do it. You can ruin yourselves.

It is hard to keep going. Word after word. Image after image. A path leading nowhere, it seems. I feel like crying. All I want is a little transcendence. I do not want the gutter life. I want a palace that floats in the sky. I do not want the stains and smells of earthly existence. I want the cleanliness and perfume of immortality, higher up. Or deeper down.

The higher life is not one of my delusions. That is what I keep telling myself. It is what I keep telling anyone who will listen. Are you listening? I am aching for it. I hope you feel the pain the way I feel it. I do not want to be cut off from you. My pain is your pain. It has got to be true. If it is nothing more than wishful thinking then I fear I may not have much of a future.

One perfect stream of words would brighten my mood. The perfect phrase. Maybe just the perfect word. Is my passion under control? Well, my words are under control. Not perfect yet. But they are under control. Odd, for me. There is always a fire raging in my head. A sliver of ice is a surprise.

How will you feel when this is all over? Relieved? Disappointed? Elated? I am not promising you anything. After all, no one ever promises me anything. I have to live with uncertainty in a world of fools. Stumbling through "normal" life, I rarely see a thing. I am practically a blind man in their paradise. If I opened my eyes, I would be saved. Maybe my angel would save me. Nonsense, of course. What an idea! But it is a very comforting nonsense.

A pile of skulls. A torn flag. A burning building. All of a sudden. It can come like that. Oh, how your mind can shift! One minute you might be with a woman, the next, up to your waist in blood. Get back, man! My supersanity is at stake. My visions! I am a special seer. My visions are an investment. I have watched humanity rising and falling through centuries of change. Insignificance is the one constant.

Centuries? Have I been around that long? Maybe in my dreams. Maybe in your nightmares. Will I ever go away? I will take you with me. Are you coming? Speak up! All of you! As loud as you can! No whispers! Let me know your plans. I cannot believe I have wasted my time and energy on a crowd of timid puppets. Ah, silence. What did I expect? You are strange ones. You are shy ones. I am exasperated. But I refuse to let you go. I will drag you to the door. When the door opens, you will be there. When the door shuts, we will be gone.

White noise, buzzing. Chaos. There is the hammer. It smashes my senses. There is the razor. It slashes my intellect. There is the axe. It chops my reality. The light is fading. The darkness will come. Should I submit? What choice do I have? Help me get back on track. If you have any power at all, use it now. Or will you just watch as I thrash around in a pit of damaged images and thoughts?

I will not submit. It took me a long time to create myself. My ideas have piled up to become a mountain in my mind. I will put on a show. Watch this! As darkness comes, I go black. I do not panic. The darkness sweeps over me. And listen! I am conversing with demons. The darkness leaves. The light returns. I am untouchable. Nothing can wear down the rock of my identity. Though the darkness tries again.

A flash of gold! Sometimes a colour will appear out of the blue, even the blue of my despair. This one is gold. I am on the riverbank. Very peaceful. So quiet. I will be moving along soon, and up. The sea is waiting for me with its long line of gold right to my heart. Later, it will be pulling me out of my body. I am resigned to my fate.

We are insects. I am not making any sense. We are apes. You are struggling to understand. Oh, specks of dirt. And I look at you, a scared man, a scared woman. A dog begs for a bone. A bird hovers in the air. We are skipping to our graves. We are human beings. Are you pleased? Were you born for such ignominy?

Yes, yes, yes! Are we looking for God while hiding from Satan? No. We are on our own. This has got nothing to do with them. Our goal is beyond money, beyond art, beyond words; and beyond God, Satan. Are we clear on this? There is no name for the absolute freedom we seek. Forget everything you have heard to the contrary.

We enter a sort of madhouse, together. The walls are paper-thin, not padded. We can hear the screams of lunatics. They are inviting us to join them. You put one of your hands through a wall. You lose a couple of fingers. They are food for someone. Will you stay, or will you run off, away? This is the world, my friend. What are you going to do?

So near, yet so far. Why must we struggle so hard? Is there a reason? It often seems as if we are working for nothing, even playing for nothing. Where is the good life? The worm crawls through its muddy territory. Is it satisfied? Truth is, it does not own any patch of earth. Are we any better?

Step outside yourself, your body. For a moment. Do it. Pretend everything you think you are is what something else is. Do you have any sympathy for the poor creature, this animal? I am afraid that it is an animal. It should be put down. It is suffering. You can see that it suffers. Go back inside your "home". It is only a temporary shelter. You need to plan ahead.

I will leave you soon. Or you will leave me. We will all leave each other, and then we will meet again. Purified? Oh, I hope so. Perfumed? You never know. All the broken things shall be repaired. Tears will dry. Even scars will disappear. It sounds like a fantasy. But I am not a fantasist. What seems a fantasy to some is basic reality to others. Let us try to be different.

Lights in our eyes fire through the gloom! Good! Our glory is out. Our decency! Our righteousness! Evil goes off when you confront it. You have to make the effort. The meek are paralysed. The sceptics are all in a muddle. They are low, on the ground. We stand proud. A strong wind comes. We hold firm.

We can take any storm. Thunder and lightning! What do we care? Nothing is worse than being born. And death will not bother us, if that is what we face. This is the interior. The fools cannot see it. And if they could see it, with mystic eyes, they would turn away. They are cowards.

Rain pours down. Will there be a flood? I am flooded, with emotion. I have never felt such joy to be alive. I have no idea how long it will last. I will not be counting the minutes, the hours, the days, the weeks, the months, the years. Why should I? One second of this illumination is enough for any mortal.

We are on the verge. Or, at least, I am. Just speaking for myself. We all get to that stage in life where we can only speak for ourselves. No one can understand another person and his or her individual human heart. I am on a cliff. I am staring at the sea of eternity. I do not need to be pushed. I am willing to jump.

Off the edge! Here I go, falling to my dream. What words could describe the things I see now? There is no angel. I leave her behind. There is no money. Why would I need any? There is a wave. There is a crash. I am gone.