Journals16
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Winter Thoughts
4 min read
"A man writes because he is tormented, because he doubts. He needs to constantly prove to himself and the others that he's worth something. And if I know for sure that I'm a genius? Why write then? What the hell for?"
I think reality is truly a product of our own creation. It's a beast we give birth to, train, nurture, bring up after our own fashion, teach our lessons to. It's a coal that is pressed through our furnace, a breeze from our lips. And what is more than this? If it's all our own doing, if every facet of life is chiseled by our unconscious desires, then what's the point? I can easily imagine falling under the blissful stupor of an opium slumber. There's nothing left at this point! Of course, there's the world, there's conquest, there's desire and fulfillment. But reality isn't what is to come, reality is the bare present. The gift contains whatever you put inside it, a present to yourself. I read Conrad and London and Byron and Dostoevsky and I'm filled with the weight of other men's thoughts.
Profound thoughts, grand thoughts, barren thoughts, images and words of the lowest and highest, the most sublime and depraved, and they all feel like a piece of me that I've found before, a word or idea half formed and vainly grasped at, lingering on the edge of my awareness, skirting the flame of my consciousness like timid moths. Is it dark? Surely, it can be. Is it light? Well, do you want it to be? Bliss seems only a decision away, a realisation that there's no present but what you make.
Relativity in the utmost, existence wrought from careful, tedious intention. A plane of existence that coincides with others insomuch as there is cohabitation, but nothing further. A thought, once uttered, is false. There is companionship, but never true knowing.
Humans are capable of the most vile, wretched acts; but they are human nonetheless! Does that not lend some definition to the soul? After all, we call the most bizarre tendencies of animals merely a part of nature, and therefore neutral in evaluation. Is there not a similar standard for human behaviour? A scale weighted against our insanity? Does this then suppose a greater measurement that demands nothing but what is?
I notice in myself days of exuberance and ecstasy that is seemingly unaccountable. Joy, stemming from something absurd, such as the arrangement of clothes upon the floor or the proper alignment of morning routines. Inexplicable, unrepeatable sequences that produce happiness and a feeling that, beneath it all, everything is right with the world. Then there are days of mild enduring, where there is nothing tremendous or lamentable, but simply existence and passivity. And then there are days of mouldering scorn, of resentment and detestable, grudging animosity towards the unsympathetic world which does not understand.
Feelings of longing for something greater, of sublime loneliness, of isolation from humanity abound recklessly and torment without restraint. But where do they come from? Are these simply the natural, capricious tendencies of the unfathomable human soul? Is this the condition of living, precariously shifting from one pole to the next?
It seems that if these are continued experiences, there must be some truth to them, some particle of singular reason that might be quantified and relied upon as factual, as honest. But the feelings are so transitory, so fleeting, and come at unbidden hours. The same conditions one day might represent the manifestation of entirely contrary sensations. It leads to the conclusion that there is nothing save what I create. But this is tenuous! Do I allow my environment to enslave me, to engage me at its will and distort my feelings with its arbitrary composition? I want something more reliable, something internal that I can call upon to obtain a sense of self-reliance, a measure of peace that is within my power.
One recurring truth seems to be, however, that there is no kinship but with yourself. Humans are creatures of familiar habit, and whatever is not understood or part of their tedious routine is vilified and surgically removed without hesitation. This is no valid basis for gauging what is right and proper and true, however. Such a measuring device can only be gotten by the user, and to rely on the tools of others is to hopelessly abandon any chance for inner harmony. I must think on this more, it seems ill conceived at this point, but I feel as though there is a mark, and I am getting closer to its centre with each volley.
I think reality is truly a product of our own creation. It's a beast we give birth to, train, nurture, bring up after our own fashion, teach our lessons to. It's a coal that is pressed through our furnace, a breeze from our lips. And what is more than this? If it's all our own doing, if every facet of life is chiseled by our unconscious desires, then what's the point? I can easily imagine falling under the blissful stupor of an opium slumber. There's nothing left at this point! Of course, there's the world, there's conquest, there's desire and fulfillment. But reality isn't what is to come, reality is the bare present. The gift contains whatever you put inside it, a present to yourself. I read Conrad and London and Byron and Dostoevsky and I'm filled with the weight of other men's thoughts.
Profound thoughts, grand thoughts, barren thoughts, images and words of the lowest and highest, the most sublime and depraved, and they all feel like a piece of me that I've found before, a word or idea half formed and vainly grasped at, lingering on the edge of my awareness, skirting the flame of my consciousness like timid moths. Is it dark? Surely, it can be. Is it light? Well, do you want it to be? Bliss seems only a decision away, a realisation that there's no present but what you make.
Relativity in the utmost, existence wrought from careful, tedious intention. A plane of existence that coincides with others insomuch as there is cohabitation, but nothing further. A thought, once uttered, is false. There is companionship, but never true knowing.
Humans are capable of the most vile, wretched acts; but they are human nonetheless! Does that not lend some definition to the soul? After all, we call the most bizarre tendencies of animals merely a part of nature, and therefore neutral in evaluation. Is there not a similar standard for human behaviour? A scale weighted against our insanity? Does this then suppose a greater measurement that demands nothing but what is?
I notice in myself days of exuberance and ecstasy that is seemingly unaccountable. Joy, stemming from something absurd, such as the arrangement of clothes upon the floor or the proper alignment of morning routines. Inexplicable, unrepeatable sequences that produce happiness and a feeling that, beneath it all, everything is right with the world. Then there are days of mild enduring, where there is nothing tremendous or lamentable, but simply existence and passivity. And then there are days of mouldering scorn, of resentment and detestable, grudging animosity towards the unsympathetic world which does not understand.
Feelings of longing for something greater, of sublime loneliness, of isolation from humanity abound recklessly and torment without restraint. But where do they come from? Are these simply the natural, capricious tendencies of the unfathomable human soul? Is this the condition of living, precariously shifting from one pole to the next?
It seems that if these are continued experiences, there must be some truth to them, some particle of singular reason that might be quantified and relied upon as factual, as honest. But the feelings are so transitory, so fleeting, and come at unbidden hours. The same conditions one day might represent the manifestation of entirely contrary sensations. It leads to the conclusion that there is nothing save what I create. But this is tenuous! Do I allow my environment to enslave me, to engage me at its will and distort my feelings with its arbitrary composition? I want something more reliable, something internal that I can call upon to obtain a sense of self-reliance, a measure of peace that is within my power.
One recurring truth seems to be, however, that there is no kinship but with yourself. Humans are creatures of familiar habit, and whatever is not understood or part of their tedious routine is vilified and surgically removed without hesitation. This is no valid basis for gauging what is right and proper and true, however. Such a measuring device can only be gotten by the user, and to rely on the tools of others is to hopelessly abandon any chance for inner harmony. I must think on this more, it seems ill conceived at this point, but I feel as though there is a mark, and I am getting closer to its centre with each volley.
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Rat Kings
7 min read
I find myself slipping further and further into a quiet assignation of mental reclusivity. The gearing of my mind adopts the slender, delicate mechanics of tacit operation, functioning smoothly in the near void of nurturing companionship. There is an aether of incomprehensible flourishing that whirls about me, a clamorous decorum of social acceptability that defies either proper reason or my inability to cope satisfactorily under its grudging torpidity. Perhaps, as was once speculated, my ‘think machine’ is broken, and the pristine gizmos inside have gone dreadfully awry. Or, perhaps as I think more likely, there is a fundamental and flawless disconnect between the nature of the steam that powers my own caprices and those of other men.
Perhaps, by rule of chance, every so often there is produced a die with uneven sides, and no matter the manner in which is it rolled, will not land upon the same side as all the other dice. We are from our earliest moments commanded by primal edict of natural law to comply with the garrulous mewling of the herd; we are ordered and begged and jeered, and if we yet do not comply we are denounced and thrown out upon our heels, scourged for lack of understanding on both sides. And indeed human society grows upon these mores and commandments, and great monuments are erected to those paragons who exhibit the finest qualities of self sacrifice and perseverance towards the propagation of the herd’s ideals. Cities and civilisations are built upon the foundations of communal operation and single minded unity. Always the dissident voice sets the choir on edge, and never is he hard to find. The imprecations are maddening, and the act of abstention abominable. Dear God, is the meaning of it all just simply get on with it, to do what must be done? Why does my prism produce lights that fascinate only me? Why do the looking glasses of others hold delights for them that I cannot measure or fathom? Are my eyes crafted of different stuff?
Or is this rambling pseudo philosophy merely a tried and tired prevarication for the uncertainty and incapacity of my own social functionality? Are these, indeed, sour grapes? But what does second guessing accomplish. The wheels of the mind are mired enough without this added burden.
I will not believe in ultimate relativism! There is a rule of human accord that is bound by aeons of unfaltering conduct, and I rest sustained by this belief that there are boundaries of moral decay that cannot be whisked away on the wings of mere arbitrary relativism! Human perception is a tool for guidance and right operation that by the nature of man is altered upon its hinges by each successive generation. What our fathers believed was right and true seems to us a glimmer of the true light, and we proceed to interpret that light by notions we think clever and insightful. We believe we are the preordained possessors of the keys to change and enlightenment, the final culmination of all human achievement, and that no eyes or minds have ever beheld or conjured the thoughts we think so brilliant. We are enamoured of our own greatness, and this bourgeoisie mentality, this squabbling rabble of mendicant philosophy is capable only of producing the most mediocre of human beings, creatures bereft of the ability to look beyond their contemporaries and witness the poverty of it all! There is no valour in society, no gleaming truth in the huddling of the yearning masses. If rats think they are gods, what of it? And what of the man who sits on the plateau and shouts that it is no good; the man who drinks the water and finds it bitter, bitter on his pink lips. What then? Is there isolation enough to realise the gulf between such a man and the distant crowds he walks among? Or is there hopeless romantic fantasy in the pale image of the lone prophet, shouting from the mountain tops into the raging wind? If I am too near the source, I cannot tell. But it is a brazen fire that burns and tells me not to be afraid, not to doubt or question the path that seems right to me.
The weight of it, the sheer size of the thing is so unbelievable I scarcely know what I have hold of. What elder titan ever looked across the infant expanse of cosmic wonder and was more surprised? The gravity of what is at stake, the sheer vastness of human consciousness that is welling up beneath the very scurrying feet of society, and incredibly ignored! This wilful, sinful ignorance is appalling; that man can perpetuate his slumber with such ease and lack of care—that he and I gaze upon the same visceral signs of our nascent being and are not both startled by the same flicker of imagining, the same wondrous sense of life and grandeur. Where is his mind? Where has he put his storehouse of intellect? I am not a spirit of some higher pantheon; my flesh is his flesh, my mortality the inseparable bond that binds us even through our dearth of commonality. Yet his awareness is like to me a dim flame that gutters in the slightest breeze, a breeze that stirs my own furnace into a roaring blaze. Am I defective? I have only these two conclusions, that either I am a broken, inharmonious note in the song of man, or that for some reason beyond reckoning a piece of the true puzzle has fallen in my lap from grace unknown, and somehow in my feeble grasping its vague edges and corners have made sense to me, the outline becoming clear. But both of these conclusions are horrible; who could choose to be blind while all else see plainly, or to have sight alone in the land of the visionless?
And it is fine, here, on paper, reclining in the sombre peace of my room. The words spill effortlessly and fluidly, as though copied from the mouth of another. But in person it will not do; as I walk about the streets the words stall on my lips, my tongue chokes on its own utterances, and I am just another of the vagrant caste I swim with. But, I think it doesn’t matter. If our eyes do not report the same measurements of the identical world we share, then whatever pearls I might offer wouldn’t be received as well as I can hope. Children and beasts can’t gauge the value of their own toys, and so my ledger means nothing. It is perhaps a great indulgence of vanity that impels me to produce these words, these thoughts; a fulgurous torrent of self placating whims that stab wildly at any little truth they find. There is some truth though, I am sure--some guiding principle which indicts the harried spirit to climb and seek surer footing. There is a depth of understanding, the breadth of which appalls the sensibilities of the highly cultivated, civilised mind--a mind which must needs buckle beneath the weight of this realisation if he is not sufficiently shored up against it. But my feet are dragging now, and the hour is late. The one thought, the flicker that draws me back ever anon, is simply this: there must be more. There must be more than what we are given, what we are asked to receive, more than we are asked or told is valuable and good. I do not know what it is, only that the treasures of my kin do not stir my soul or produce in me a sense of wonder, as is so readily apparent in their happy eyes.
Perhaps, by rule of chance, every so often there is produced a die with uneven sides, and no matter the manner in which is it rolled, will not land upon the same side as all the other dice. We are from our earliest moments commanded by primal edict of natural law to comply with the garrulous mewling of the herd; we are ordered and begged and jeered, and if we yet do not comply we are denounced and thrown out upon our heels, scourged for lack of understanding on both sides. And indeed human society grows upon these mores and commandments, and great monuments are erected to those paragons who exhibit the finest qualities of self sacrifice and perseverance towards the propagation of the herd’s ideals. Cities and civilisations are built upon the foundations of communal operation and single minded unity. Always the dissident voice sets the choir on edge, and never is he hard to find. The imprecations are maddening, and the act of abstention abominable. Dear God, is the meaning of it all just simply get on with it, to do what must be done? Why does my prism produce lights that fascinate only me? Why do the looking glasses of others hold delights for them that I cannot measure or fathom? Are my eyes crafted of different stuff?
Or is this rambling pseudo philosophy merely a tried and tired prevarication for the uncertainty and incapacity of my own social functionality? Are these, indeed, sour grapes? But what does second guessing accomplish. The wheels of the mind are mired enough without this added burden.
I will not believe in ultimate relativism! There is a rule of human accord that is bound by aeons of unfaltering conduct, and I rest sustained by this belief that there are boundaries of moral decay that cannot be whisked away on the wings of mere arbitrary relativism! Human perception is a tool for guidance and right operation that by the nature of man is altered upon its hinges by each successive generation. What our fathers believed was right and true seems to us a glimmer of the true light, and we proceed to interpret that light by notions we think clever and insightful. We believe we are the preordained possessors of the keys to change and enlightenment, the final culmination of all human achievement, and that no eyes or minds have ever beheld or conjured the thoughts we think so brilliant. We are enamoured of our own greatness, and this bourgeoisie mentality, this squabbling rabble of mendicant philosophy is capable only of producing the most mediocre of human beings, creatures bereft of the ability to look beyond their contemporaries and witness the poverty of it all! There is no valour in society, no gleaming truth in the huddling of the yearning masses. If rats think they are gods, what of it? And what of the man who sits on the plateau and shouts that it is no good; the man who drinks the water and finds it bitter, bitter on his pink lips. What then? Is there isolation enough to realise the gulf between such a man and the distant crowds he walks among? Or is there hopeless romantic fantasy in the pale image of the lone prophet, shouting from the mountain tops into the raging wind? If I am too near the source, I cannot tell. But it is a brazen fire that burns and tells me not to be afraid, not to doubt or question the path that seems right to me.
The weight of it, the sheer size of the thing is so unbelievable I scarcely know what I have hold of. What elder titan ever looked across the infant expanse of cosmic wonder and was more surprised? The gravity of what is at stake, the sheer vastness of human consciousness that is welling up beneath the very scurrying feet of society, and incredibly ignored! This wilful, sinful ignorance is appalling; that man can perpetuate his slumber with such ease and lack of care—that he and I gaze upon the same visceral signs of our nascent being and are not both startled by the same flicker of imagining, the same wondrous sense of life and grandeur. Where is his mind? Where has he put his storehouse of intellect? I am not a spirit of some higher pantheon; my flesh is his flesh, my mortality the inseparable bond that binds us even through our dearth of commonality. Yet his awareness is like to me a dim flame that gutters in the slightest breeze, a breeze that stirs my own furnace into a roaring blaze. Am I defective? I have only these two conclusions, that either I am a broken, inharmonious note in the song of man, or that for some reason beyond reckoning a piece of the true puzzle has fallen in my lap from grace unknown, and somehow in my feeble grasping its vague edges and corners have made sense to me, the outline becoming clear. But both of these conclusions are horrible; who could choose to be blind while all else see plainly, or to have sight alone in the land of the visionless?
And it is fine, here, on paper, reclining in the sombre peace of my room. The words spill effortlessly and fluidly, as though copied from the mouth of another. But in person it will not do; as I walk about the streets the words stall on my lips, my tongue chokes on its own utterances, and I am just another of the vagrant caste I swim with. But, I think it doesn’t matter. If our eyes do not report the same measurements of the identical world we share, then whatever pearls I might offer wouldn’t be received as well as I can hope. Children and beasts can’t gauge the value of their own toys, and so my ledger means nothing. It is perhaps a great indulgence of vanity that impels me to produce these words, these thoughts; a fulgurous torrent of self placating whims that stab wildly at any little truth they find. There is some truth though, I am sure--some guiding principle which indicts the harried spirit to climb and seek surer footing. There is a depth of understanding, the breadth of which appalls the sensibilities of the highly cultivated, civilised mind--a mind which must needs buckle beneath the weight of this realisation if he is not sufficiently shored up against it. But my feet are dragging now, and the hour is late. The one thought, the flicker that draws me back ever anon, is simply this: there must be more. There must be more than what we are given, what we are asked to receive, more than we are asked or told is valuable and good. I do not know what it is, only that the treasures of my kin do not stir my soul or produce in me a sense of wonder, as is so readily apparent in their happy eyes.
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Featured
1 min read
factorone33.deviantart.com/
I guess the ordeal was worth it! ^_^
My picture, random-anomaly.deviantart.com/…, was featured. Cheers!
I guess the ordeal was worth it! ^_^
My picture, random-anomaly.deviantart.com/…, was featured. Cheers!
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Rafters of Heaven
2 min read
I awoke from fitful sleep this morning as much a new man as anyone ever has been. My mind was alight with the passion of fevered revelations, and I felt reborn in my new awareness. For the first time in my life, I feel fully at one with myself—in tune and present in mind and spirit. There is a wholeness that exudes from my latent arousal, this lifting from slumber, that stirs me as the land is stirred by the footsteps of approaching giants. I feel the tread of my soul, marching indomitably, pursuing the vein of its right and proper course—like a wayward leaf that is caught in the mighty current, now suddenly bends the majesty of the river to its own will: a gnat who becomes a dragon, an ebbing star erupting into supernova. I cannot put this feeling fully into words, nor elaborate the complexities of what it entails, but I feel at once at peace and exhilarated, borne up by a self fulfilling prophecy of greatness. I have flung wide the shutters of my mind, the stale shadows flying before the wonder of inevitability. What matter if I stand alone? I wait with joy the coming years; though I see them through a shrouded veil, they glow brighter than the sun. I shall walk with the patriarchs of old and sleep beneath the pillars of the cosmos, for there are no walls built that may gird my soul, nor rafters spacious enough to contain my gaze. Joy and sorrow will be mine, and sown by my own hand. I will make obeisance before none, nor make my arm weary holding the candle that lights another man's dreams. Whatever dreams may come, they are my dreams, and I shall greet them with the embrace of one who knows his own.
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No Gods or Kings, Only Man
6 min read
I woke this morning from a curious dream. I had met a girl, young and beautiful, with blonde hair to her back, and Azorean eyes. I was myself; that is to say, in the dream I was who I am today. Yet she was full of youth and innocence, ardour and passion for love and commitment, cherishing the splendour of romance and ennobling its highest ideals. She worshipped at the altar of Love, and for her, I was the very avatar of this supreme belief. She loved me with all her might, though she was reserved and gentle of spirit, kind and never untoward. She loved me fiercely, but without abandon, with a serene calmness that belied her true feelings. For my part, I cared for her, but was not drawn in by the same joy as she, and remained unmoved—though appreciative—of her companionship.
One day she came to me with a surprise. She was very excited, and showed me paperwork for a house. I was to sign it with her, and we would have a house together. I couldn’t. I did not feel the same way about her, and I was too busy with other avenues of my life to begin to settle down with this girl. I refused as kindly as I might, though she felt immensely the weight of my rejection. Without tears, without much emotion at all, she told me with surprising conviction that she felt her heart was breaking. It seemed to be a process she could intricately describe, noting vividly every detail, each nuance of exquisite pain that shuddered through her. I was her first love, her only love, and this denial seemed to shatter every triumphant bastion she had ever known. She left me, and I didn’t see her again until much later in my dream.
When I finally saw her, it was in a cabin in the woods, living with her family. It was winter, and the snows had fallen heavily, and the mighty arms of twisted pines had gathered up the winter’s white bounty, hoarding it after their ancient and solemn fashion. I met her inside, for she had called the community together to hear her joyous announcement, and there was no time to send them away after her defeat; now they were a mockery of the ambitions which hopeless fancy feigned.
She wanted nothing to do with me, though I saw on the living room table a compilation she had made earlier, a dedication to her love for me. My name was written on the cover (though I cannot think if it was Pearson, or Garrett, or something else), and it bore the marks of fervent and tender love. I confronted her after some time spent in awkward embarrassment, and she barely acknowledged me. When I forced it, she said that I had ruined everything, that there was nothing left which mattered, and that love was a hollow institution that consumed souls. I tried to convince her she was wrong, and that it was simply not meant to be in this case. From somewhere she produced a placard and read from it. “I am like the white snows of Snowdon, unblemished by the greasy city streetlights. “ She told me it was from a Psalm, and though there was a little more, I cannot summon it from my dream. She said that though she had failed with me, she was still untarnished and awaiting her true love.
There is more to the dream, but it is merely incidental. This portion, however, strikes me very deeply. If ever we receive messages from our subconscious, I think perhaps it is through dreams. “…unblemished by the greasy city streetlights,”: There is much meaning in this, meaning that seeks to direct me, guide me, show me whither I wander before my feet fall astray and I miss my mark. There is still honour in the world, and personal integrity counts when you retire and find you are alone with your thoughts. To me it seems the threat of eternity is unmatched when set against the omniscient voice of my conscience. My compass has so far proved true, my path right, and few are the wayward step have I taken. For what good is intimacy bereft of love? What use is it to know someone with whom your heart shares no bonds? We are all animals, there is no doubt. But we are so much more. While our feet may tread the earth, our eyes gaze beyond the clouds—vast tracts across the limitless aether, thoughts unbridled and unmarred by the conquering worm, who is our oldest brother. Even as we are consumed, we look to the stars above.
A man must have convictions, or what is the use of life? He must temper his dreams with intent, furnish his desires with a carriage, and pursue them to their end. Convictions, beliefs, ideals—these raise us up from the commonalities of existence, lift us to the tiers of gods, whence we might command our destinies. In the crowd of the elder pantheon, we take our place as Olympians, past the clutches of Erebus. Climb, brother, climb! And to look to the furthest horizon and beyond, never limited by the squalor of mediocrity—is there not more?
This seems to me an omen of our intent, a glimpse into our purpose. A white linen may fly from the line and fall to earth, soiled for a moment; but it still retains its nature—a cloth once white, and yet still evidently so. But to take this white sheet and throw it to the ground, dragging it through the muddy puddles and sodden dirt, until it neither bears semblance to a white cloth, nor remembers it ever was—what is the purpose in this? Denying true nature, creating false existence, revelling in the stuff of which we were not made. Man is not meant to lie with pigs, though his flesh rises from the same black earth. His faculties equip him for higher things, pursuits beyond the furthest glimmer in the nighted gulfs which stare down on us through the primordial wastes of time. I would prefer to glimpse a false horizon of golden towers, than gaze upon the bare ruin of an empty land; and so would I rather follow my heart into the cloudy peaks beyond, even though I should only find ghosts, and hear the echoes of raucous laughter far below. Love has a home for me: brightest truths, purest trust in the universe, all were for me in the kiss of one girl. So I shall find my way, and be the merrier when my weary heart knows its own and peace comes at last.
One day she came to me with a surprise. She was very excited, and showed me paperwork for a house. I was to sign it with her, and we would have a house together. I couldn’t. I did not feel the same way about her, and I was too busy with other avenues of my life to begin to settle down with this girl. I refused as kindly as I might, though she felt immensely the weight of my rejection. Without tears, without much emotion at all, she told me with surprising conviction that she felt her heart was breaking. It seemed to be a process she could intricately describe, noting vividly every detail, each nuance of exquisite pain that shuddered through her. I was her first love, her only love, and this denial seemed to shatter every triumphant bastion she had ever known. She left me, and I didn’t see her again until much later in my dream.
When I finally saw her, it was in a cabin in the woods, living with her family. It was winter, and the snows had fallen heavily, and the mighty arms of twisted pines had gathered up the winter’s white bounty, hoarding it after their ancient and solemn fashion. I met her inside, for she had called the community together to hear her joyous announcement, and there was no time to send them away after her defeat; now they were a mockery of the ambitions which hopeless fancy feigned.
She wanted nothing to do with me, though I saw on the living room table a compilation she had made earlier, a dedication to her love for me. My name was written on the cover (though I cannot think if it was Pearson, or Garrett, or something else), and it bore the marks of fervent and tender love. I confronted her after some time spent in awkward embarrassment, and she barely acknowledged me. When I forced it, she said that I had ruined everything, that there was nothing left which mattered, and that love was a hollow institution that consumed souls. I tried to convince her she was wrong, and that it was simply not meant to be in this case. From somewhere she produced a placard and read from it. “I am like the white snows of Snowdon, unblemished by the greasy city streetlights. “ She told me it was from a Psalm, and though there was a little more, I cannot summon it from my dream. She said that though she had failed with me, she was still untarnished and awaiting her true love.
There is more to the dream, but it is merely incidental. This portion, however, strikes me very deeply. If ever we receive messages from our subconscious, I think perhaps it is through dreams. “…unblemished by the greasy city streetlights,”: There is much meaning in this, meaning that seeks to direct me, guide me, show me whither I wander before my feet fall astray and I miss my mark. There is still honour in the world, and personal integrity counts when you retire and find you are alone with your thoughts. To me it seems the threat of eternity is unmatched when set against the omniscient voice of my conscience. My compass has so far proved true, my path right, and few are the wayward step have I taken. For what good is intimacy bereft of love? What use is it to know someone with whom your heart shares no bonds? We are all animals, there is no doubt. But we are so much more. While our feet may tread the earth, our eyes gaze beyond the clouds—vast tracts across the limitless aether, thoughts unbridled and unmarred by the conquering worm, who is our oldest brother. Even as we are consumed, we look to the stars above.
A man must have convictions, or what is the use of life? He must temper his dreams with intent, furnish his desires with a carriage, and pursue them to their end. Convictions, beliefs, ideals—these raise us up from the commonalities of existence, lift us to the tiers of gods, whence we might command our destinies. In the crowd of the elder pantheon, we take our place as Olympians, past the clutches of Erebus. Climb, brother, climb! And to look to the furthest horizon and beyond, never limited by the squalor of mediocrity—is there not more?
This seems to me an omen of our intent, a glimpse into our purpose. A white linen may fly from the line and fall to earth, soiled for a moment; but it still retains its nature—a cloth once white, and yet still evidently so. But to take this white sheet and throw it to the ground, dragging it through the muddy puddles and sodden dirt, until it neither bears semblance to a white cloth, nor remembers it ever was—what is the purpose in this? Denying true nature, creating false existence, revelling in the stuff of which we were not made. Man is not meant to lie with pigs, though his flesh rises from the same black earth. His faculties equip him for higher things, pursuits beyond the furthest glimmer in the nighted gulfs which stare down on us through the primordial wastes of time. I would prefer to glimpse a false horizon of golden towers, than gaze upon the bare ruin of an empty land; and so would I rather follow my heart into the cloudy peaks beyond, even though I should only find ghosts, and hear the echoes of raucous laughter far below. Love has a home for me: brightest truths, purest trust in the universe, all were for me in the kiss of one girl. So I shall find my way, and be the merrier when my weary heart knows its own and peace comes at last.
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