Soot. Sooth. Soothe.
…chronic discontent,
a marathon runner
restless, a wonderer,
his forever struggle drifting
past the hills,
fearing plateaus.
He arrives, desperate
and breathless, at another house party:
"I need to see a
man about a god. That is, a dog."
Receive their
tinkling laughter. Complicit.
Some snide lip
curling 'round a cigarette.
Kom ons raak a bietjie dagdronk
God. Damn. Feel.
Good.
Feel welcome, here in
the company of emotional vultures.
Sophisticated. Kak classy.
The DJ sets up his
beats in the living room, still
Outside the one they
all wanna fuck strums and sings
She's still sleeping
her way through the riptide of being so
badly wanted, and the
consequences of affectation.
It's another
popularity contest, they say, out there in the Real World,
now that school's
out, or so I've been told (when they told me so).
"When,
exactly?" "Oh, did they?" "What time is it?"
Her chords jarring
now against the insistent electronic beats.
All hail the robots,
let the Games begin
the glory of the
binge again
the weekly weekend
purge just
a runner's frame as
his testament and
in our temple is the
altar to the flailing god of ego.
You know, the one
we're told to serve, because he is Great and Good. Ergo:
dyed green, although
they never quite tell you that.
"Wow...when did he get so strong?"
"Guess we
weren't paying attention…"
Oh but we are paying
with
attention. Time is
money; currency.
Consider what's
current?
Thank God, though,
Grace made it to the party.
And they still invite
her, drawn
into the ferment on
her fringe there's
the calling; still,
and small, but insistent.
Okay sure; right now
it's drowned out by the beats, and
by her skin trapped
under your fingers. But,
but it will be back.
Go ahead, mark my words.
It's possessed of a
mother's persistence.
You can't drown out
silence forever.
You can try though.
You can always try.
Sigh.
Up and down the Hill,
hearts
of stone are worn to
numb nothing.
To accept: Love
unlocks the doors to hurt.
To realize: beyond
those door are the fields of Life.
Would you farm them,
ploughbearer?
Would you guard the doors?
Or are you still
pacing back
and forth, a servant
of the wall pendulum,
brandishing
another rat-reason:
"I wish!"
"But…"
"I can't, I – I
don't have the time."
Time.
You see your time is
given, bought, and bartered, but
it can also be made; you must make time.
You must.
I'm serious, you can
sleep when you're dead. And you do.
They know this, of course, but so do you.
A splinter in the
mind.
Use it.
Here's that voice
again; so small, so true:
it's up to you, it always was.
Because really
what else is there to
do?
Point fingers?
Play the blame game?
Okay, child. If you
must.
When you're ready,
I'll be there too, and
so will your
backpack.
Oh don't worry, it's
already fully loaded:
don't worry, and
never fear.
But, you know, it's
okay to be guided by your beasts
sometimes I mean
you feel for a reason.
The weight of a
feeling can change the world,
those who carry their
compass of self-inflicted responsibility.
And of course your
mind is a tool too, incredible, but
also Pay Attention to
those chance encounters, to
(the old man at the
bar, that
girl who wants you to
break the rules, and
a friendly passer-by,
offering steamed rice and tea atop the mountain)
all that's unplanned
product
of circumstance, 'coz
abundance is
birthed from
unconscious
collectives.
(they are not an
aside)
And be nice. To
everyone. Probably they've just had a shitty day and, likely
so have you. Why make
it worse?
So you force the first smile – yes you – and then
see what happens next.
Most people are nice.
Birds of a feather flock together.
Start to gather great
Thoughts. Use them. Weave a cocoon.
Trace out the Big
Ideas your ancestors took for stepping stones, as cornerstones,
or as lifeboats for
when the tides get rough.
Remember that guy
Noah?
Well maybe God did it
the first time, but now it's us fucking with the weather.
I'm just saying.
Okay, well, where to
from here? Why not
leap for the moon,
maybe make it halfway.
What they leave out
of the cliché is that halfway up are clouds,
and that's way better
than the dirt below. Even if it's just for a passing moment.
What they leave out
of the platitude is this:
You can simply carry
on
from wherever
you find yourself, or
have landed.
It's that easy.
Really, you can
begin again. Anytime,
anywhere.
Realize you already
do, you just didn't realize, and accept
the only constant is
constant change.
Mark my words.
I'm serious.
Memo to my future
self:
"All systems go.
Set the controls for the heart of impossible."
Read between the
lines, and keep
looking for Truth in
the middle;
where it always was.
.:.
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