A Convenient Lie

He rose from the water, the water dripping off his rippling back, the scales writhing as he torqued his waist.  Calloused hands stretched into the air, and droplets fell across his face.  He shook his massive head, his matted mop of hair tossing from side to side.  He crawled closer to land, his long, thick legs completely hairless, colored a deep bronze.  And when his toes curled around the soft, dark dirt beneath his feet, his greedy lips stretched into a smile.  He wanted to rip something apart, tear the strands of the universe, and then piece them back together.

He had many names; the Maker, the Destroyer, the Noosphere…

To himself, he was the Star.  He did not know what the stars above truly were: luminous balls of plasma, no magical fantasies involved in their making.  To him, the Stars represented omniscience, and this is what he saw himself as.  He was all-knowing.  But of course, he really wasn’t.  He was the Maker.  But everything he Made was better before he intervened.

After emerging from the crystal lake, the Maker traversed many lands.  He swept across cities, destroying everything in his path.  People screamed and animals hid in terror.  He was of normal height, about six feet, but he walked completely naked, and the scales on his back shone through the outer epidermal disguise.  He wielded evil in his left hand, fire in his right, and goodness in his chest, deep down beneath the hatred.

It gave him joy to rip apart skyscrapers, watch it all burn.  It gave him power.

But later, later after all the cities were gone and the people were dead, he grew lonely.  He burnt forests, now, desecrating the homes of wildlife.  He sunk islands, sunk the whole world in a tidal wave.  He erupted volcanoes, watching lava mix with the water.  And then he jumped in, letting the heat surround him, and he wished he could tear something once more.

He rose from the lava years later, transformed.  The scales had been torn off, and he was young; four, maybe five.  He stared up at the sun above, and tears streamed down his angelic face.  He sank to his knees on top of the water, floating up in the air.  And when he reached the clouds, he looked down and decided to start once more.

Lava coagulated, hardened, form land.  Hundreds of years passed, and then it was all there again, that mass of land, that pangea.  The Maker saw his work and was pleased.  He realized that he really was a god, a hero.  He was saving everything by doing what he did.

Perhaps he was right.  Perhaps he really was saving humanity by destroying it, forcing it to start over.  For we all need checks and balances.  We all must be stopped at a certain point, because otherwise, we start eating ourselves.  But maybe he was wrong.  Maybe all we was doing was crippling it.  Maybe he was no Maker.

She said what was gone could never come back.  That it was floating in the never now, that far-off thing that resides within each of us.  She said good-bye to the things she loved, as if she could never see them again.  Because for her, reality was what she thought she saw.  Not what she knew in her mind.

She said catching hope in a jar is easy.  The hard part is letting hope go.  Because pretty soon you’ll have no more room for hope, and it will become just a word, no longer something transcending language.  Just hope, a definition in our brains, not our hearts.

She said she tried to run but her shoes won’t tied.  And when she stopped to tie them, she hfell behind, and now she was floating in space, cold and alone.  She said she wanted to cling to materialism, but it slipped away.  She said she wanted to find you, but you disappeared.  And so all these things she said, she said to herself quietly in the dark.  That is where greatness is made.  The dark.  And she said it softly, so it wouldn’t bother the souls of those around her.  She could feel them at times, the ones she never said good-bye to.  They were called Regret, and they were one being separated into many entities.  They flitted into her heart every so often, and she would beat the invisible spirits away with one hand, the other holding her dead daughter’s scarf.

Her daughter had died years ago.  At birth, actually.  The scarf was a light, faded yellow, and she could still remember buying it.  Her bulging stomach, the anxious joy of the day.  And then a month later, her daughter dead in her arms, covered in blood and sadness.

She said we can stop running now, that there’s no use.  She said there was no chance of redemption.  She said we would burn.

She said many things.  When they found her alone in her house, starved to death, they never heard these things.  No one knows what she said because she’s gone now.  And when something is gone, it never comes back.

Previous posts concerning this topic:

Forever Just Isn’t Forever Anymore
Broken Knights
The Choice
These links are just for your own convenience (i.e. if you want to know more about Holden Lightfoot).

********************

Despite his best efforts, Holden’s Society #1 failed.  And the societies after this, mere reflections of the potential power that was Society #1, they all fell too.  And they were just shadows of the past, a dream engraved into the cerebral pathway of Holden’s mind.  Always flitting past the conscious, never tangible, never reachable or attainable.

Sometimes, alone at night, Holden thought he could see the society.  Even now, knowing that it could never work, he would catch flashes of it and still see a glimmer of hope in his soul.  He saw pitchers of water being drawn from the well, the agricultural citizens working hard.  No improvement.  No development.  None of that Progress.  And it was nice.

But then he would think back to when he saw Jesus Christ dying on the cross, and all Jesus told him were pointless words.  All the Buddha told him was that regret was inevitable.

Perhaps he had to embrace the regret, but something was in the way, something blocked his soul.  Just as everyone else was, Holden was deep down an optimist.  Pessimism was simply a mechanism develop to block yourself to pain.  If you expected the worst, you were never disappointed badly.  You had nowhere to go but up.  Which is never true.

There’s always something else lower, or at least that’s what Holden thought.  A true enlightened person knew that the lowest point of dignity was when you thought you were happy.  When you’re chasing some broken hope, when you think you’re high, that’s when you come crashing down.  Enlightenment was true pessimism.  Enlightenment meant embracing regret, because an enlightened person knows there is no escape from suffering.

No one who wants to be happy should desire true enlightenment, but as always, we never know what we want.  Which is where Holden contradicts himself.  He wants a perfect society, but he doesn’t know what that is.  Not really.  It’s all speculation, just as the makers of Greece speculated about how to create a perfect society.

The Greeks, those arrogant geniuses, they had no dignity.  Because you don’t make your own dignity anymore.  Dignity is when you know your place.

You only know your place when you’re enlightened.

The id, the ego, and the super-ego.  This is the psychological Bermuda Triangle.  At least, that’s what Holden said.  Then again, Holden said many things that meant nothing.  Just as Jesus Christ did.  “Forever just isn’t forever anymore.”  Holden felt disgust when he thought of those words.

Which should bring tears to your eyes, because they are the most beautiful words spoken in history, spoken in the most beautiful moment.  The crucification of Jesus Christ sums up reality.  Determined people, trying to prove a moral point they know nothing about, they die in vain for something they think they believe in.  And then they say something equally wondrous.  “Forever just isn’t forever anymore.”

Or was it ever?

Here comes another heartbeat, twisting slowly around your thumb.  Here comes another fire, burning words upon your tongue.  Only when it is all stripped down to nothing can we see the truth, when we are exposed for what we really are.  Not the chemistry, not the skin, not our eyes or our hair or our bodies.  Only then are we speechless, groundless, floating somewhere in a tub of souls.

the G O D he’s in the sky, he’s in our minds, taking up our time
the pink police they’re all around, look down at the ground don’t make a sound
it’s G D P serving up our product, taking money from our wallet, go get em boys
the economy let’s hope it’s domestic, don’t want a disturbance

don’t want to disturb us, when we’re seriously disturbed
never know behind closed doors, the never now, the clever cow
wish I could take back the time before you crossed that yellow line
before cancer ate away your mind before it burned a solid hole in the sky
now it’s come down to a solid lie baby it’s my redemption can’t lose my chance again
this time it’s real like a movie reel watching it play twenty times in my head until your dead
your dead to me alive only in thoughts I’ll bring you back make you live just trust in me
but trust is hard when you’re staring back through a cage of bars see me glaring back
could’ve saved you then I had better things way back when I had golden wings

CHORUS
what’s your name, are you sane, (tell me)
who are you, who are you
the never now, the present tense
who are you, who are you really

searching behind what I once tried to lock I would burst on in but I’m afraid to knock
living ever watchful in a cloud of doubt, always pondering what life’s about
I wish I had done it when the haze set in but now it’s gone now it’s broken
it’s shattered like the mirror I saw a long long time ago I held it in my hand but it slipped on through
the grains of sand cutting through the flesh of dying aquatic the maze of blood it’s all chaotic
automatic dogma man equals god if he eats the apple but I’m allergic to fructose so I dive on in
the benzene rings a noose to my tender neck just wanna lie down my head and begin my rest
the truth is this we’re already dead so stop debating and cut off my head
I want to save you once again but like before I waited too long and now my chance is gone
and I’m just regretting everything I ever did

CHORUS
what’s your name, are you sane, (tell me)
who are you, who are you
the never now, the present tense
who are you, who are you really

wandering through the darkness, I think I’ve found my love

We should live our lives for the stories we can tell afterwards.  Because when it comes down to it, the truth is that our grades, our jobs, the money we make, it’s all worthless.  It’s just shit collecting dust in a jar on our desk, and every day when we look at it, it just reminds us of the other things we could’ve been doing that night.

Maybe you’ll say that the stories are worthless too, that there is no afterwards.  But that’s what we’re doing anyway, right?  I mean, why do we have this urge to make money, to be successful?  All it does is make us want more.  We think things make us happy but when we finally get them they just make us feel sick.  And the afterwards is the great nothing that swallows us up when we lose consciousness for the last time.

I want something to remember as I lay dying.  Memories aren’t worth money.  And even though emotions and stuff are just kind of evolutionary adaptations, they don’t mean anything, we still follow them.  That’s why I hate philosophers like Nietzsche who view life so pessimistically that they decide to not follow their emotions or even their logic.  It’s stupid.

Because everything is basically the same, it’s just how we see it.  It’s all perspective.

I’ve never been to Colorado.  I don’t know if it’s a good place.  I just want to live more simply.  I’m tired of shit collecting on my desk.

She better stop fronting on me.  I want no more.  I don’t want a piece of that.  Stephen Hawking has a better voice than her.   And I know that sounds terrible, but it’s also funny.  And funny is what is shock value, what is unexpected.  So that’s how to make people laugh.

I really don’t feel like trying to be humorous though, I just want money.  So here is why I love love love love Britney:

1. She sets a great model for little girls.  They need to know and understand that their body is a toy and should be treated that way.
2. She is one of those people who is able to sell her body in a way that requires little to no intelligence.
3. I can’t see myself loving nobody but her.

In reality, though, no.  I cannot stand her.  Rihanna is ok.  Missy Elliot=god.

Improve.  Develop.  Progress.

Running through his mind, running through his body, running through his soul like a mantra, like the prayers he said when he was young.  It’s all a prayer, every memorization, every recitation.  All a testament to some higher power, all a struggle for control.  A struggle that no one ever wins.

Improve.  Develop. Progress.

This is what they said as he grew in his mother, even his time in the womb’s haven filled with brainwashing and evil.  His name was Holden Lightfoot.  And if you’ve read more about him, you’d know he was what we call now a Broken Knight.  The Broken Knights are the results of a small, utopian commune created in an attempt to break away from capitalism and progression.  It was isolation, happiness.  Content.  Consistency.  Routine.  Simplicity.

Diseases ravaged through, but death was natural.  Or at least that’ what they were told.  Holden was the Jesus Christ of the commune, sacrificing his old life and his old values to try and build something better.  He alone remembered the past, and perhaps this was the society’s undoing.  He went crazy in the end, you know.

Improve.  Develop.  Progress.

It’s a cycle, a snare, a trap that catches us all in the end.  When we try to run from it, we find that it’s only waiting at the next corner, a tantalizing image tempting us to improve.  Develop. Progress.

Holden knew this, for he had seen both the past and the future.  He saw Siddhartha Gautama attempt to break away from the cycle of suffering.  And even though he achieved enlightenment, Holden spoke to him as he died, and the Buddha uttered one last, crippled speech:

“I couldn’t stop it.  I don’t know why I thought I could.  It’s impossible, young one, and if you try to follow my path, you’ll end up here wishing you had lived your life better.  Because regret is intrinsic, regret is inevitable, regret is human.  And we’re all human here, aren’t we?  Thus, I tell you the secret: become something more or less than human and you shall break away.  Or perhaps this is just narcissism on my part, a patriotic obligation to my species to assume that humans have some different set of values, of emotions.  Maybe rabbits, maybe they feel regret.  Maybe they wish they had saved their little ones, maybe they wish they hadn’t let their little ones die.  Because suffering, I don’t know if it’s pure evil.  I think it keeps us sane.”

And Holden didn’t believe him.  So he kept searching for answers, and he spoke to Jesus Christ on the cross.  “Truly this is the Son of God,” said Holden as he beheld the man.  And Jesus replied, “Is this really how it’s supposed to end?”  And so Holden said, “Yes, you’ll be remembered forever.”  And Jesus said, “Forever just isn’t forever anymore.”

Holden kept searching, and he saw the future.  First he watched cities burn and civilizations fall, and then it all began again.  And they forgot the past.

He knew that forever just wasn’t forever anymore, that eternity is false, that the truth is translucent.

But he couldn’t accept it, and he fought it.  He fought it oh so hard.  But when he finally gave in, he found himself praying at the foot of his bed, on his knees and screaming out words.  His hands tore at his eyes, his hair, and then he fell back, a broken man.

He was more than human.  He was forever.  But forever just isn’t forever anymore.

Voices like operatic angels screeching.  Can you hear them yell your name, or are you just drowning in your ocean of death, your sea of sorrows?

Picture a clear lake, the sun sparkling off the surface.  In the center fish jump out once in a while.  You can see for miles.  There is no sinister fog curling in the distance.  There is only water, the lake stretching out in front of you for all eternity.  And time doesn’t exist.  You sit there for days.  Maybe years.  And you smile to yourself, because everything becomes one and individuality, it’s a scam perpetuated by the media, by the corruption of society.  And society is just another adversary on your hierarchy of needs, just like hunger and death.

Picture the air, whistling against your face.  It’s cold, but it wakes you up inside and you feel the torment of the lost souls.  You dip your hand in the water and it rises up to meet you like a tidal wave.  The water envelopes you, becomes you.

And you lose your sense of touch.

And so you’re flailing, floundering, screaming in the water.  Can you hear their yells to you from across the void, across the dark expanse?  They’re reaching out to you with ghostly arms, but to touch them would mean pain, that insufferable feeling in your chest.  You’re not crying anymore.

And you lose your sense of touch.

It was a sad day for Platypus Ignotus.  The rain kept falling into her wide eyes, even though it wasn’t raining and she was completely dry.  She was related to Jared Ingleberry, who you might know if you’ve read about that eventful day at Underwood River.  Jared was her uncle.

There was no rain, and her face was somewhat misguided by the bright lights that shine down from passing school buses.  And the children filing out throwing metaphorical stones at her, they liked to see her cry.  They didn’t even know why, they had no motive.  They just liked it.  They were young sadists, living out the endless prophecy of evil.

Strings told her where to go, and she followed them blindly.  Were they human, or were they something more?  Were they animals, or were they something less?  Nothing could suffice her tireless mind.

And the gunshot wound in her side, it kept getting worse. And her killer, he stood miles away and yet was next to her.

But nothing of it was real.  She thought so.  But it didn’t matter anyway.   She was dead.

Or was she?

Platypus Ignotus was having a bad day.