Her story...

She was birthed onto this world, with no choice over the vessel she’d occupy. For all she knows, she could have wanted to be a duck and spend her life in a lake somewhere, or been an olive tree in some Arabian desert. But at such stages in time, there are no such ornaments as choice, the big universe barks at how such a lofty thought could be conceived. She was instead given this life form to occupy. What to make of it?

She left the nest, each day trying to piece together the laws that maybe. Surely this living thing came with a manual. She needed quiet time to make sense of it all. So she left those of her race and ventured alone into mans old habitat. There she learnt about creatures of the world. But they cared not much for her and went about their own things. With time she felt a growing weight increase its load over her, a kind of unhappiness. No, not a physical weight, but some unseen force blurring her vision. Something felt amiss. She happened to be reminded of a musing in philosophy, about whether or not a tree falling in a forest made a sound, if no one heard or saw it. Could she really be sure of her beingness, if there was none to echo against, to let her know if they liked how she looked today, and report on the liveliness (or lack thereof) of her hair and skin. At that thought she saw the warthog she spotted earlier and thought of calling it over for a talk. No, she was not successful, dear reader, for no one here seemed to take the slightest of interest in her. So she decided to return to the land of her kind, and seek to fill the invisible void.

After many sunsets, she happened upon a person walking the other way on a path. They were a little taller than she was, but with same dark skin, only smoother. The person had a slender body, but had arms, legs and a core that betrayed no weakness. Sweat glistened over their neck; must be son of the town’s farmer this one. Then she happened to meet his gaze…the scariest and most exciting moment of her life. She felt like one peering into a precipice, and knowing they wouldn't succeed against its lures, that they would be pulled in and be at the mercies of some strange force. The velvets of his lips parted as he addressed her, a voice which to her sounded like a sweet melody, one more eternal than anything Stravinsky could have ever dreamed up.

That night, with her head to the boy’s chest, amongst the meadow and river sounds, she dreamt.

She was on the forest bed of some jungle, eerily quiet. Then sounds seemed to return from wherever they had been withheld, and her vision was a slowly focusing blur. She heard the voices first before the wispy smell of smoke. “She’s up”, said a groggy voice, followed by a staccato of grinding sniggers that she reckoned could have only come from a dozen ogres. Sure enough, the behemoth that strode to her side and bestraddled her didn’t fall short of one of those hideous beasts you hear of in fairy tales. The stench of his skin was a deathly warning, his nearly toothless smile and scarred face told of a tumultuous inhuman existence. He lowered himself onto her to the roar of his companion’s approval. She feared what was to come next, and nearly cried upon realising the source of the biting she’d been ignoring around her wrists and ankles…as it was nothing but the leather binding they had used on her. She thought she heard a wooshing sound somewhere, followed by a couple others. The Ogre grunted, trying to follow the source of the sound, only to have its head suddenly explode into a gory violent crimson, like a bursting watermelon, its lifeless body slumping sideways. All was quiet now, except the fading scales made by a quivering arrow that had buried itself in a nearby tree bark.

She doesn’t know how long she had been writhing beneath the corpse trying to free herself, when a mighty strong hand curled itself around her and lugged her on its shoulders. Something about the powerful hands of her new capturer told her it was futile to try attempt an escape. But something was different about her new capturer. Being carried like a sack of potatoes, she couldn’t see much. The capturer had long black silky hair, that reached the back of the knees. The girl could see their glistening ebony skin, as it stressed and relaxed from the action of considerate calf muscles, wrapped in taut sheets of dark skin. She was reminded of the greek myth concerning the tribe of Amazons…for it was now clear to her that her new capturer was a woman of considerable strength...she doesn’t remember whether it was the rocking motion or the fact that her head was upside down for long that caused her to fall asleep…

She woke to the sight of warm flickering light, golden, and the crackling of softly burning wood. There was a hint of myrrh and other incenses in the air. Her head turning to follow the scent met the gaze of an enchantress, or at least that is what she thought. Her hair seemingly caught in an eternal billowing wind, like the living snakes of Medusa. She met the eyes of the enchantress, their corners disappearing into the recesses of her hair just as they were about to curve out of the outlines of her head. Fighting the enormous gravity of her eyes, the girl dragged her gaze to take in other exquisite features of this ebony spectacle. She saw the fullest lips she had ever seen before, glistening and beguiling, had a gravity of their own. Much she cannot remember of what happened afterwards, or perhaps it were that all of it was dwarfed by the supreme feeling of awareness that now swept over her. The feeling of immortality. It was a differently shaped chest she was sleeping on tonight, but the same heart was beating underneath it. She looked up at her, to get a better view of her face, feeling supremely calm, as though resting on the very bosom of the master of the universe, and listened to the powerful rhythm of life, pulsating.

Her eyes opened one last time. The sound of the river wisening her senses. She was back in the meadows, in the embrace of a different kind, but still pretty much the same. Looked into the still sleeping face of the boy and felt her heart torn apart. A part of her wished she hadn’t woken up. And yet another part of her was filled with an even greater sense of belonging to this real world. It was getting lighter and one could make out the outlines of the surroundings. She rested her ear on the ebony chest and listened to the eternal rhythm. She smiled and strengthened her embrace around him, as if weary that he too may be part of one of her dreams, only to wither away with the opening of her eyes. The farm boy smiled in his sleep, and held her closer. She wanted to stay like that for as long as possible; for she was reminded of a quote from a book by some guy Mitchel:

“Souls cross ages like clouds cross skies, an' tho' a cloud’s shape nor hue size don’t stay the same it’s still a cloud an’ so is a soul. Who can say where the cloud’s blowed from or who the soul’ll be ‘morrow? Only Sonmi the east an’ the west an’ the compass an’ the atlas, yay, only the atlas o’ clouds.”

The Haunted Pearls

Everyone has their own haunted place on earth, plural perhaps…places. Special places that seem to lie in wait, just for them. I’ve found one of mine this summer holiday. I always find that the process of coming across these places on the metaphorical map of your life’s journey seems to be an inexorable one...as if you were meant to go through the dark valleys and shadows they afford, and dance to their sordid music, the bizarre notes plucking away at your brain’s neurons, derailing them. All of it is (usually) initially below conscious reception, but the effects are soon palpable.

So I went through my haunted place this summer…it was in the form of a ground floor apartment I had rented out. I would be all alone, when the sordid music would start playing. With time, the music took effect…it won over my own body…causing my own bodily units to mutiny against the integral structure that is me. Whenever the music played, I would be "choked", and wouldn’t be able to swallow anything, food, and sometimes even liquids. But so powerful was the spell of the music, that after a time, the music wasn’t required for me to gag, I choked of my own accord.

...I am hungry, but cannot eat; hungry, but cannot eat. What kind of mutiny is this…mutually assured…

Thus I tell myself I have to leave this place before this bodily anarchy takes permanent hold.

This mutiny, although (and probably because it is) at a microscopic level, is an incredibly potent and humbling reminder that although claiming to be the conductor of my bodily orchestra, I cannot make the perfect life-giving symphony, if the vital pieces in my body are so unhappy as to not play their notes. They are unhappy and try to push me and you away from the disturbing thing, trying to communicate with us by causing a little discomfort. So I have to leave this place. If not…if I persist here...I fear that the mutineers will not be so insightful as to realise that they are just about to lunge me, and by extension, themselves, into an eternal precipice.

Whoops! …its usually kind of hard to turn back from these sort of things once they've been allowed to happen.

But I left. I left before all of that could happen. Before I could be overwhelmed by the melee. I’m back again…conducting the orchestra of my life. Each time growing more careful…careful in trying to make sure every part of me is happy.
I’ll be out of there even before the vapour of a complaint condenses into my conscious, from the bubbling hot-springs of the subconscious. Yes I will leave, even if you promised me the moon and stars. For what worth are these things, if I do not have any peace of mind left to enjoy them.

How The Ocean Kills you

What a funny tittle for anything right…But now that we’re already here might as well look into it, no?…”How DOES the ocean really kill you?” Straight off the bat the temptation would perhaps be to say that it kills you by drowning you…that is technically correct of course, but perhaps as correct as saying the matador kills the charging bull when the tip of his sword finally finds its heart. We of course know there is more precedence that “kills” the bull…more that disorientates it, moving its fate ever closer to that inevitable moment.

With regards to the ocean, the most obvious killing element is the water. Ah yes, water, a noble compound in and of itself. We love water, we need it…without it we cannot have that relaxing shower at the end of a long day nor attend to any of the other human hygienic needs. But forget all that because without water we simply cannot live. Yet out here in the vastness of the ocean water becomes an enemy; a foe with intent to kill, to murder you. They say too much of a good thing…here in the most literal sense.

The ocean water is also poisoned…made vile by the salt of the rocks. You can of course give it a go, especially if you intend to end things quickly. Its not like normal water…he is not like normal people…this person…he is poisoned…and he surrounds you, seemingly pervading every nook and crevice of your life…attempting to suck you dry of life…that’s what salt is great for anyway, its able to preserve food because it mops it dry. To a living person however this is a process not unlike being slowly roasted alive…

Then there’s the capricious nature of the ocean…like the alcohols from chemistry class, the ocean is volatile. Today it is your friend…it is calm and occasionally laps at your face almost teasingly. The sound of the rippling waters is relaxing…reassuring. And then before you know it a tempest has risen before your very eyes. A friend turned foe. All the camaraderie that preceded now being revealed as having been part of a well-planned subterfuge…a gambit to disarm you. It batters you to and fro like a cork in the middle of the sea…though at this point you might as well just be a cork in the middle of the sea. He is now your enemy and there’s no doubt about it…he threatens to suffocate you. You try to seize this moment of his phrenia to catch and call him out for what he really is…but just as you try to confront him concerning his evilness, the tempest recedes and the waters go back to normal…lapping at you coyly. “what do you mean,” the waters say…”we’re are friends…look here I give you fish…take…eat…see I’ve already salted it for you.” But you know what you know. You are, however, more intent at quickly burying the hatchet (because...suffocation...is this what waterboarding feels like?) you grudgingly accept this olive branch. In any case, you are famished.

And then as you begin shearing the sinews of raw fish with scurvied gums and teeth, you feel a growing burning sensation as the shadows afforded by the clouds part and give way to the furnace and menace of the sun. The intensity of the orange ball of radiation is unrelenting and you soon lose interest in the fish….the gift he gave you. He feigns ignorance of this all but he couldn’t be more aware; you can see him seemingly unable to help himself from smiling…what is he smiling at…? He’s certainly not mocking you…that’s not possible…you’ve just renewed your vows…but he IS mocking you! What a vindictive scumbag! He has you right were he wants. But you remember that you are a fighter…a swimmer. They used to call you the human fish back at school, the coach was proudest of you. With this remembrance comes a renewed resolve. You will defeat this grinch.

But you soon realise that this vindictive scumbag seems to have amassed a rich arsenal of sleazy tricks over the ages of ancient existence…sleazy and effective…you feel something nibbling at your toes…a shark’s fin flickers past the corner of your eye…or was that two…or three…a school of sharks! What a sadistic, wretched, shameless scumbag! “Bah humbag!”it seems to say…no doubt he wants you dead, as the sharks circle around you in formation…but killing you now would be too easy…its very easy to cut the flesh and cause a mortal wound. He wants that which his knife, hands and menace cannot reach…your “soul”…your “will” to live…that which drives you…the engine of life. He wants you dead and inanimate like himself. You once more consider confronting him…to catch him out of his hypocrisy by confronting him with what he is doing to you. But to achieve this would mean taking your eyes off him and looking under the water to see and point out whatever it is that is nibbling at your feet. But you feel you can’t afford to do that as doing so would not be unlike burying your head right into the bowels of the beast that is trying to kill you, shoving yourself down its throat. Thus the stare contest continues…

Then it suddenly goes dark (or at least it seems to) as the sun sets to the west, seemingly snatching its blanket of warmth as it does so; thrusting you into a world of cold and icy water…icy water that stabs at you like a thousand knives. He leaves you gasping about and visits his friend the moon, far up in the heavens. Together they have their backs to you but they keep glancing back at you, if only to see that you are indeed suffering and whether they should perhaps stoke things up a bit. They don’t talk you. What do you they call it…? The silent treatment? And this moon…who once used to be your friend, giving you light in the dark of night is now the enabler of this monster. So sad…

They invite you to come join them…I know right, as if. Nonetheless you contemplate how you could get to them…perhaps still trying to hold on to some false hope. Come on, all you need is a rocket and a bit of fuel. The ocean must have tonnes of fuel buried in its bowels…as for the rocket…

But somehow you survive….you find land with the returning of the sun. People pull you to shore and you ask them for a minute so you could look back and give him a piece of your mind. “I’ve defeated you, you CRAZY MORON!” you shout back from the top of your lungs, triumphant but feeling very weak, almost regretting your decision to scream, threatening to obliterate your last energies. You shout back at him a couple of times…perhaps he’s just too angry to reply, the moron. But then it slowly dawns on you that what you were dealing with was mindless…he was not your average person. The ocean has unlimited resources and its bowels contain the buried skeletons of those it has bested by wearing out. The crescendo is at the moment they lose their will to live…or when it has grown so weak that their body finds the strength to disown it…and there, left without a will or “soul” to possess it…the powerless body slowly sinks to the bottom of the ocean…were the elements will conclude matters (the ocean never gets its hands dirty). You have a mind to lose, and as for him, he never had one. A huge deficit in the faculties that are meant to power consciousness…and thus he’s your friend one second then your nemesis the next, you being a friend-turned anathema. Whimsical mindlessness.

The moral of the story is to avoid the mindless sea;to not visit nor invite it into your home. You might think yourself strong and greatly resolved, but against a foe with unlimited arsenal, afforded him by the state of his mindlessness, you almost always lose in a drawn-out war. “When a sociopath is beckoning, do not join the game” (Martha Stout)