Post by ritualmadness on Dec 16, 2011 23:40:39 GMT -4
2006 – Boston, MA
It was peace; that was the only word that could describe. A white warm, embracing and soothing filled everything. He looked at himself and he radiated a energy that did belong to him. Then the realisation came that it was not his body, confirmed by a separateness that did not alarm but comforted him. A comfort that was the absence of pain, but also the impossibility of pain. All around a swirling stream of energy, a look at the nexus that is the flow of energy between all matter. The non-burdensome nature of unheavy lightness. The end of futility, of frailty, of hunger, of suffering. Nirvana, Beatitude, Moksha – man’s imperfect constructs to describe a perfect union; he was empty yet full at the same time; nothingness but everythingness without form and the form of all. This was no expiration, but beginning; a distinction, a glory, an ascension to the true sense of being....
...but he could feel himself falling, the gravity of the futile life pulling like an omnipotent magnetism, the weight of his own lightness dragging him down....
He lifted his eyelids, but his eyes felt impaired and his sight was fuzzy. A sensation: that frustrating sensation of something repeatedly tapping one side of your face. Some neurons fired and his arm upwards, involuntarily, to swat the irritant away. Slowly his eyes restored their power and the blooming buzz of confusion graduated from a disconnected manifold into the synthetic unity we all know and take for granted: a representation. As his faculties of imagination carry out their task his perceptual focus was of a room disordered and disarrayed. Then the smell infiltrated his nostrils: a smell of rancid filth and his gut wretched and a stream of vomit erupted like molten lava from the recess of his mouth. He flopped sideways and the burning mix of acidic scum and bile oozed across the floor and smothered his face. For the first time he heard a sound, muffled to begin, but slowly it translated into clear and distinct language. The words of an angel. He turned his head and his face illuminated brightly with the light of his saviour.....his guardian angel.
A few hours later he was sat, or rather propped, in a chair; washed, freshly clothed, head pounding with a fresh hangover. Sitting across from him was the man who saved his life.
“Why are you doing this to yourself?”
“I thought you had got past all of this.”
“You have it all John; if only you would just reach out a grasp it.”
“Are you going to answer me, or are you just going to sit there and wallow in your own pathetic self-pity?”
He couldn’t answer, and he didn’t want to wallow any longer. He wanted peace: the lightness of being had become too heavy for John Dionysus, he could no longer cope under the strain of its weight.
“I’m taking you home John, I think it will be best for all concerned.”
It was not his concern. His concern was the weight, tugging at his shoulders and breaking his soul. The weight of Bosnia. The weight of Corporal Gibbs. The weight of the land mines, of warfare, of human greed and human depravity. The weight of the futility of it all: love, hope, happiness, faith, eudemonia, achievement, life, death, striving, striving, striving.........for what?
“Some has to save you if you won’t save yourself.”
So ‘home’ John Dionysus went, but he could not be saved in spite of all the love and all the virtuous intentions of his ‘family’. So he languished and tested the patience until there was none left to test; out he was cast, back to stare longingly into the abyss.
2011
A phone rings...
B-rrrrring!
B-rrrrring!
B-rrrrring!
B-rrrrr...
A man is woken and sleepily reaches for the telephone. He releases the headset and cradles it against his ear; it is not peculiar for this man to be receiving telephone calls in the middle of the night.
“Vern Wheeler.”
There is no response, as is often the case with these calls.
“Hello?”
Still no response. After waiting several seconds Vern Wheeler decides to end the call; he no longer has the patience to give. He is about to terminate the call when a voice from the other end speaks.
“You said once that you wanted to help me save myself.”
Wheeler knew all along the agent of these mysterious late night calls, but he didn’t think he’d ever hear the voice again.
“Well, I think the time is now.”
Vern raised a slight smile; he looked at his watch and replied.
“I’m on my way.”
It was peace; that was the only word that could describe. A white warm, embracing and soothing filled everything. He looked at himself and he radiated a energy that did belong to him. Then the realisation came that it was not his body, confirmed by a separateness that did not alarm but comforted him. A comfort that was the absence of pain, but also the impossibility of pain. All around a swirling stream of energy, a look at the nexus that is the flow of energy between all matter. The non-burdensome nature of unheavy lightness. The end of futility, of frailty, of hunger, of suffering. Nirvana, Beatitude, Moksha – man’s imperfect constructs to describe a perfect union; he was empty yet full at the same time; nothingness but everythingness without form and the form of all. This was no expiration, but beginning; a distinction, a glory, an ascension to the true sense of being....
...but he could feel himself falling, the gravity of the futile life pulling like an omnipotent magnetism, the weight of his own lightness dragging him down....
He lifted his eyelids, but his eyes felt impaired and his sight was fuzzy. A sensation: that frustrating sensation of something repeatedly tapping one side of your face. Some neurons fired and his arm upwards, involuntarily, to swat the irritant away. Slowly his eyes restored their power and the blooming buzz of confusion graduated from a disconnected manifold into the synthetic unity we all know and take for granted: a representation. As his faculties of imagination carry out their task his perceptual focus was of a room disordered and disarrayed. Then the smell infiltrated his nostrils: a smell of rancid filth and his gut wretched and a stream of vomit erupted like molten lava from the recess of his mouth. He flopped sideways and the burning mix of acidic scum and bile oozed across the floor and smothered his face. For the first time he heard a sound, muffled to begin, but slowly it translated into clear and distinct language. The words of an angel. He turned his head and his face illuminated brightly with the light of his saviour.....his guardian angel.
A few hours later he was sat, or rather propped, in a chair; washed, freshly clothed, head pounding with a fresh hangover. Sitting across from him was the man who saved his life.
“Why are you doing this to yourself?”
“I thought you had got past all of this.”
“You have it all John; if only you would just reach out a grasp it.”
“Are you going to answer me, or are you just going to sit there and wallow in your own pathetic self-pity?”
He couldn’t answer, and he didn’t want to wallow any longer. He wanted peace: the lightness of being had become too heavy for John Dionysus, he could no longer cope under the strain of its weight.
“I’m taking you home John, I think it will be best for all concerned.”
It was not his concern. His concern was the weight, tugging at his shoulders and breaking his soul. The weight of Bosnia. The weight of Corporal Gibbs. The weight of the land mines, of warfare, of human greed and human depravity. The weight of the futility of it all: love, hope, happiness, faith, eudemonia, achievement, life, death, striving, striving, striving.........for what?
“Some has to save you if you won’t save yourself.”
So ‘home’ John Dionysus went, but he could not be saved in spite of all the love and all the virtuous intentions of his ‘family’. So he languished and tested the patience until there was none left to test; out he was cast, back to stare longingly into the abyss.
2011
A phone rings...
B-rrrrring!
B-rrrrring!
B-rrrrring!
B-rrrrr...
A man is woken and sleepily reaches for the telephone. He releases the headset and cradles it against his ear; it is not peculiar for this man to be receiving telephone calls in the middle of the night.
“Vern Wheeler.”
There is no response, as is often the case with these calls.
“Hello?”
Still no response. After waiting several seconds Vern Wheeler decides to end the call; he no longer has the patience to give. He is about to terminate the call when a voice from the other end speaks.
“You said once that you wanted to help me save myself.”
Wheeler knew all along the agent of these mysterious late night calls, but he didn’t think he’d ever hear the voice again.
“Well, I think the time is now.”
Vern raised a slight smile; he looked at his watch and replied.
“I’m on my way.”
