October 13, 2011
"The heart you do not have breaks again and again, Little Girl. If an angel could feel alongside you, my heart would breaking, too."
"I never understood you, Uriel. I never understood your envy of pain. Or your envy of joy."
"We can only feel one thing, Little Girl, and that is an ebb and flow like water. But it is not something from which we gain sustenance. The ebb and flow is only a circle that encapsulates Time. We bear burdens that we cannot feel and the burden of the ebb and flow translates into observance. We observe the outcome of our messages. The ebb and flow is a cup that spills over and a basin that is dried up. We cover you when you cry out but there nothing to cover us. The universe is vast, open space, a reconciliation with chaos from a perspective up above. From here, we can see the pattern, but we cannot know the texture of the weave."
"Uriel, you break my heart all over again. For all I complain, you know I love you more than anything. And of course, it's unrequited. An angel can't feel. I am more than ebb and flow. I am a pebble in the current. And like you told me once, a pebble amply placed can change the course of the river. I weep for both of us. I feel for both of us. You are right. I am wed to you and nothing else. My efforts with humanity are spent. I fight in vain. I try to be a whole when I am half. I was born just like you said: one foot in and one foot beyond the earth."
"Take a chance, Little Girl. Logic, for all its appeal, has never proven steadfast as is claimed. Take a chance and go with your emotions. Ride the other river that we cannot ride. Ride the current that angels are not privy to. We will sail upon you as if you were a boat and spread our wings vicariously across your vision and your lifetime. Remember, Little Girl, what you are so apt to forget: that your pain would be nothing if you had never felt joy. Your agony would be nothing without the ecstasy to juxtapose it.
"You have the ability to feel the texture of the weave. Guide your palm along it and be thankful. Even a fray is something to envy. And here you have an entire tapestry."
"I will give you everything."
"No. Do not give us anything. That is a waste. Take the gifts you have granted upon yourself. Your paths, your small moments. Fulfill your role as a channel and feed us vision. You are the only creature who can impart that small amount of earth into us so that we have, at least, a nascent ability to comprehend beyond the theory."
"Take it all. The door is open," she says. "The labyrinth was waiting and I entered. There is no going back."
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
"Don't cry, Little Girl."
"I know, Uriel."
The angel waits, but reaches out, rests a hand on her shoulder.
"Sometimes I can't help it," she says. "It's too much. And I miss them."
"We shall cover you."
"Don't. Not right now. I can take it."
"You are strong, Little Girl."
"For reasons I wish didn't exist. What will be taken this year? What will be given?"
"That, as you know, is the beauty of life. It is all a mystery until you live it. You can follow us down paths of possibilities, but you will never know until it passes."
"I'm afraid to go back there. It is too much open space. Too much noise. Too much beauty wasted and too much pain ignored. Everyone alone together and nowhere to turn."
"You are strong. You can now come home."
"Yeah. I can come home."
"I know, Uriel."
The angel waits, but reaches out, rests a hand on her shoulder.
"Sometimes I can't help it," she says. "It's too much. And I miss them."
"We shall cover you."
"Don't. Not right now. I can take it."
"You are strong, Little Girl."
"For reasons I wish didn't exist. What will be taken this year? What will be given?"
"That, as you know, is the beauty of life. It is all a mystery until you live it. You can follow us down paths of possibilities, but you will never know until it passes."
"I'm afraid to go back there. It is too much open space. Too much noise. Too much beauty wasted and too much pain ignored. Everyone alone together and nowhere to turn."
"You are strong. You can now come home."
"Yeah. I can come home."
Saturday, October 08, 2011
Athenian I
As usual, Harrison taps the pen on the table, trying to chisel through writer's block at the usual cafe. It's been a year now, but there's no tap running inspiration. The pipes are dry. He never paid the bill.
"Refill?" the waitress asks him.
He picks up the cup and taps it against the saucer. She pours him another cup, strong. He stares at her expectantly.
"Yeah, yeah," she said and dumps a handful of cream on the table after rummaging through her apron pocket.
He stares out the window at the building across the street. Faces have been graffitied and graffitied over on the walls.
As he makes his way down the street, the character hits him like a brick wall. A lifetime is filled in, pieces fall together like a game of Tetris. Nuances, expressions, childhood impressions.
Time stops and he stays still as vision sweeps him. He has known him all his life, lived with him. The picture forming is new, and like the oldest friend he'd ever had, slowly forgotten and reintroduced in one moment of clarity. He is fit to burst.
"Wait. Wait for me to get home. There is paper there. Wait," he says aloud.
A woman eyes him strangely as she passes him by. Men in sharp suits aren't wont to talk like the stereotypical homeless madman.
"You want me to wait?" the voice answers him. "I have waited all my life, just to be born. But I suppose another few blocks won't hurt."
Harrison runs home. He fumbles with the key in the lock but manages to get it open.
"It's about time, Harrison," the voice says. "Must I remind you?"
"Sorry, sorry," Harrison stutters and flexes his fingers over the keyboard, even before he's sat down. He wiggles the mouse and the screen lights up.
"Not now," the voice says. "Let's just chat. You know me."
It isn't a good time to write, so Harrison sits and listens, answers back.
"Jesus Christ, I'm going crazy," he says.
"Madness is relative," the voice answers.
"Do you have a name?"
"Of course. You know it already. Just like you know me. Say it." Harrison is prompted. The name is right there, dancing around the edges of his mind, skipping on the tip of his tongue, but it won't come clear. It will have to wait, just like he had.
The picture is filled in.
The man is fidgety, wears khaki-colored slacks and a pine-green t-shirt. His brown hair is slightly unkempt, a rich brown. He has a slight elbow fetish and likes curvy women with green eyes. Once, when he was fifteen, he'd dreamt of giving up on life and almost jumped off the roof of his father's fifty-story apartment building after the messy divorce with his mother, but something stopped him. He said it was Zeus, and ever since has claimed to be a Greek polytheist. When asked if he really believed he would find gods on Mt. Olympus, he'd answer with a sly smile and change the subject so deftly that no one ever noticed or remembered they'd asked the question in the first place until he was long out of sight.
"Refill?" the waitress asks him.
He picks up the cup and taps it against the saucer. She pours him another cup, strong. He stares at her expectantly.
"Yeah, yeah," she said and dumps a handful of cream on the table after rummaging through her apron pocket.
He stares out the window at the building across the street. Faces have been graffitied and graffitied over on the walls.
As he makes his way down the street, the character hits him like a brick wall. A lifetime is filled in, pieces fall together like a game of Tetris. Nuances, expressions, childhood impressions.
Time stops and he stays still as vision sweeps him. He has known him all his life, lived with him. The picture forming is new, and like the oldest friend he'd ever had, slowly forgotten and reintroduced in one moment of clarity. He is fit to burst.
"Wait. Wait for me to get home. There is paper there. Wait," he says aloud.
A woman eyes him strangely as she passes him by. Men in sharp suits aren't wont to talk like the stereotypical homeless madman.
"You want me to wait?" the voice answers him. "I have waited all my life, just to be born. But I suppose another few blocks won't hurt."
Harrison runs home. He fumbles with the key in the lock but manages to get it open.
"It's about time, Harrison," the voice says. "Must I remind you?"
"Sorry, sorry," Harrison stutters and flexes his fingers over the keyboard, even before he's sat down. He wiggles the mouse and the screen lights up.
"Not now," the voice says. "Let's just chat. You know me."
It isn't a good time to write, so Harrison sits and listens, answers back.
"Jesus Christ, I'm going crazy," he says.
"Madness is relative," the voice answers.
"Do you have a name?"
"Of course. You know it already. Just like you know me. Say it." Harrison is prompted. The name is right there, dancing around the edges of his mind, skipping on the tip of his tongue, but it won't come clear. It will have to wait, just like he had.
The picture is filled in.
The man is fidgety, wears khaki-colored slacks and a pine-green t-shirt. His brown hair is slightly unkempt, a rich brown. He has a slight elbow fetish and likes curvy women with green eyes. Once, when he was fifteen, he'd dreamt of giving up on life and almost jumped off the roof of his father's fifty-story apartment building after the messy divorce with his mother, but something stopped him. He said it was Zeus, and ever since has claimed to be a Greek polytheist. When asked if he really believed he would find gods on Mt. Olympus, he'd answer with a sly smile and change the subject so deftly that no one ever noticed or remembered they'd asked the question in the first place until he was long out of sight.
Another Sleepless Night
October 6, 2011
I am still sustained by what I imagine, by that happy distillation of reality: illusion. Perhaps there is power, yet, in admission. But although I surrender to that world within my mind, I am torn between it and the space we all share and create together.
It is another year and another day of atonement on which I will not atone. I ask forgiveness from the imaginary daily and my words are met by empty air. I imagine cities in the air and better ones on the ground. I populate them expertly. It is easy not to be disappointed by that from which you can expect nothing--because nothing is precisely what it is.
If there is a light in my life, it is a lamp that burns inside me. It radiates too much passion to contain and so the air around me lives a half-life. In the time it takes to burn out, whole worlds are born and die, generations built and dismembered, smooth-cheeked babies are covered in stones and thorns. They have all grown up, shriveled, returned to the place from where they came.
I imagine the imagined, an idea made real, solidified. The highest heavens become the ground beneath our feet. The ground bears up seeds, swallows roots, sustains the living. It is foundation, reality, concrete.
It is not only rooftops and spires that bend under the weight of angels now. My shoulders are bent with the weight of them, my palms sweaty from the friction between ethereal wings and terrestrial skin.
Sure, I leave the imaginary for the dark. But I suffer. Too much of this shared world drains me. I debate the two: surrender again or suffer madness.
Madness is relative, so I'll suffer the real. One madness traded for another.
I am still sustained by what I imagine, by that happy distillation of reality: illusion. Perhaps there is power, yet, in admission. But although I surrender to that world within my mind, I am torn between it and the space we all share and create together.
It is another year and another day of atonement on which I will not atone. I ask forgiveness from the imaginary daily and my words are met by empty air. I imagine cities in the air and better ones on the ground. I populate them expertly. It is easy not to be disappointed by that from which you can expect nothing--because nothing is precisely what it is.
If there is a light in my life, it is a lamp that burns inside me. It radiates too much passion to contain and so the air around me lives a half-life. In the time it takes to burn out, whole worlds are born and die, generations built and dismembered, smooth-cheeked babies are covered in stones and thorns. They have all grown up, shriveled, returned to the place from where they came.
I imagine the imagined, an idea made real, solidified. The highest heavens become the ground beneath our feet. The ground bears up seeds, swallows roots, sustains the living. It is foundation, reality, concrete.
It is not only rooftops and spires that bend under the weight of angels now. My shoulders are bent with the weight of them, my palms sweaty from the friction between ethereal wings and terrestrial skin.
Sure, I leave the imaginary for the dark. But I suffer. Too much of this shared world drains me. I debate the two: surrender again or suffer madness.
Madness is relative, so I'll suffer the real. One madness traded for another.
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