Saturday, October 25, 2014

The Speed of Darkness

The speed of darkness. Turns the head in a flash. Flutters the eye lashes. Like a humming bird's wings. Leaves me alone. Far from light.
The space of silence. Shatters the ear. Beats a broken drum. Like a cripple tapping his crutch. Against a hollow heart. Empty with remorse.
The touch of time. Freezes the brain. Stiffened the limb. Like hemp threads wound around a promise. A glue made of marrow. And motion.

The speed of darkness. Voids the tongue. Quashes words. Like a scarf over the face. Abandons me to dream. A formless shadow.
The scent of despair. Stops muscle.  Leaves longing in tact. Like a limb lost but not forgotten. A feathered memory. Plumage stripped.
The fingers of fate. Push and prod. Squeeze metaphor from throats. Like paste from a metal tube. Ribs crack. And breath is difficult.

The speed of darkness. Shocks and awes. Numbs the senses. Like a cat claw across my skin. Draws blood to the surface. Oxidizes life.
The dance of desire. Tires the feet. Defeats wallflower common sense. Like a parent's prerogative. Overrules logic. Out thinks thought.
The hand of God. Hammers deity. Pounds sacristy. Like a nail driven into the savor's flesh. Blinds the cruel dawn. In hideous waves.

The speed of darkness. Turns the head in a flash. Flutters the eye lashes. Like a humming bird's wings. Leaves me alone. Far from light.
The space of silence. Shatters the ear. Beats a broken drum. Like a cripple tapping his crutch. Against a hollow heart. Empty with remorse.
The touch of time. Freezes the brain. Stiffened the limb. Like hemp threads wound around a promise. A glue made of marrow. And motion. . .

Saturday, October 11, 2014

Non-Revelation

The years take their toll in wisdom. Once lost paradise is gone forever. People dominate the globe and people, with very few exceptions, aren't worth the clay that comprises them. The world is ugly because people are ugly. True evil is a problem with aesthetics, no more.

The planet from above is beautiful, but its beauty is illusionary. Take a closer look at Spaceship Earth. The world is crawling with vice. Sharp-toothed. Dagger-clawed. Drooling savages glutted on martyrs' blood. Filled with raw death. Fatted on kindly souls judiciously lynched.

The savior, his body cold and hanging from a tree, has saved no one. The prophet, dressed in perspiration and rags, cracks dirty jokes on a street corner. And the crowd, the crowd complies sponge-like. Absorbing everything and understanding nothing. Inanimate objects animated by chance, not design.

I take no comfort in the apocalypse. If I smile grimly it is more from a sense of relief than from joy at our demise. We are creatures who rose to the top of the food chain. And then, seeing no one capable of contesting our perfection, we proceeded to dine upon each other.

It took fifty years for this non-revelation to find the cynical soil of this fertile mind. Poisoned manna from a starless heaven. And I'm as culpable as any. Withdrawn within myself like a prelate on retreat. Contemplating my image in a fun-house mirror. Smirching at my foolishness and despair.

Cruel and capricious. Petty and pointless. The journey from cradle to grave is, as Shakespeare wrote, a tale told by any idiot. Meaning is a needle in a stack of ambiguous hay. Find it for yourself if you can. But don't prick my finger with your preaching. I've bled enough.

Random Thoughts on an Otherwise Sunny Day

Razor-blade arsenic pie. Yum.

Being bitten is almost always worse than being barked at.

Christmas at Kmart begins in September. Happy New Year, folks!

Since when did "have a nice day" replace "up against the wall, motherfucker" as the proscribed nicety for dismissing strangers at local businesses?

Wanderlust is overrated.

Count backwards from infinity using only prime numbers. I dare you. . .

People come and go, but there's always weather. What's up with that?

Judas needed love also.

I wonder: what does wildfire spread like?

I'm going out on Halloween dressed as Kim Jong-un.

I checked out a book on World War II from the library and found that a previous reader had defaced a photograph of Hitler by erasing his mustache.

Driving to work the other day I saw a sign at the fruit market that read "Deer Carrots." My immediate reaction was "Who's Carrots and where's the rest of the letter?"

I refuse to say "Ole Miss."

My one talent -- if such can be considered a talent -- is the ability to hang onto lost causes.

Life is what we do to kill time before time kills us.

Comfort food makes me retch.

It is a wicked mind that places order before justice.

What cannot be put into words always makes one cry.

I'm getting old. No doubt about it. When I see a pretty woman walking a dog I now find myself checking out the dog.

Pictures of other people's lives are a burden to behold.

Nothing interests me less than celebrity.

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Faith and Fraud

Deep thought does not result in faith. Faith is the product of questions never asked or questions asked and answers ignored. Deep down the most religious person knows that his faith is a fraud. He just doesn't have the strength of character to announce it to the world or even to admit it to himself.