Examination Of A Fractured Existence

        Maybe existence is a jigsaw puzzle. A multidimensional, dynamic, sensual tapestry, solving itself moment by moment, eon by eon. The philosophers, scientists and seekers to this point were always doomed, because the puzzle - existence - could only ever be solved to the extent at which it existed, in its totality at any given time. And therefore, even the most encompassing postulations, would only be accurate relative to the capacity of existence at that point, but also entirely susceptible to its very own shifting nature. The same nature that holds within itself those questions as a possibility. 

Then at some point in the continuum, it will have reached its absolute; its perfection, and time will no longer be required, and space will be defunct, for once solved, it negates its own purpose for existing in the first place. But this will not be a sad or devastating event - for those within the realms of such an existence, would find it possible to touch the extent of that perfection, the whole, and they would find it possible to witness the pieces that brought them to their present. 

And they will know. (Not only will they know, but they will know that they know)

And they will also see that, given perfection as an end, perfection must therefore have existed at every juncture of the constant, in every element of its own reality, though impossible to witness as a preemptive.

Existence would be aware of its end at all times, of which I am a part, of which you, are a part. Existence, without a definitive answer, is not without an answer definitively - only so much as it can know within any moment of flux, until there is flux no more...

The Wilds, North (A Perilous Existence)

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There are wolves here.
But it's not the wolves we have to worry about.
There are eagles and bears too, but we do not fear them.
The winters are harsh, and long.
But we build fires and have made adequate shelter in what mild summer we do have.
And of course the vodka is strong and warms our blood. 

No earthly breath disturbs the silvery blue lake that stretches out to touch the horizon away yonder, nor makes the dense pine forest behind us whisper even in hushed tones.
The beasts we tend to feed us and clothe us, and they move with the seasons, surviving only as the land and climate allow them. We move with the beasts, and though we herd them, tether them and slaughter them, though we perceive ourselves as their master, we would soon perish without them. We must respect them.  Though many think us superior, we are not.

We are beasts as much as they. 

So you see, all life here is dependant upon another, and to survive, one must accept his place in the circle.

We are beasts as much as they. 

We move with them through the seasons, and of course, the wolves move with us. All bound by common fate, all pursued by the same tormentors. Beast and man and a certain demise - a conclusion that never lies. 

Yet one predator remains, who only hunts the man. And though he survives all else, it stalks and stalks, and superiority crumbles at its knees. No beast or friend can save the man, who's own mind will not save him. 

There are wolves here - but it's not the wolves we have to worry about. Condemned with minds that will destroy themselves, we replace our weakness with superiority - elevation in the ranks - but fail to see that in a circle, none exceeds another. 

Under duress beasts don't bend, and will exist just as before. Whilst the mind of man that howls in the night, will one day turn, and prey on itself. 

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The Scarlet Tree

It stood alone, amongst the harsh and dark trees of winter, at the edge of a small, ancient, village. A village that never appeared on any map.

It was said that for every heart that felt the touch of love, another leaf would grow anew, shimmering the most lovely crimson on earth.

Autumn held no sway over the tree, and only a broken heart would cause a leaf to fall and fade, naked and exposed upon on the ground.

And the broken were many.

In times of darkness, amidst the terrible wars of men, it would stand grey and bare, when the entire world was nearly bereft of love. 

Always though, compassion and humanity would return. And with it,

The Scarlet Tree Of Love.

The Hollow (That Which Fills The Emptiness)

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She had taken the day off work, and had taken leave from the grips of her hurting heart. She had driven along a winding ocean road, driving further and further from the frantic city, where she had left the shattered pieces behind her. She didn't realise that not only was she escaping from, but she was being pulled, drawn towards a music that she didn't know existed - yet.

She felt it in her chest at first, but couldn't distinguish where that faint sense - that distant harmony - was gently humming from. It was not so much sound, and more as if the night had crawled inside her, cold and blue and luminous, and swum across the giant empty ballroom of her heart. The space, which only weeks before, had been so full of pretty, coloured lights, and warmth, and laughter. Brimming and bubbling with songs that seemed to sweep her into graceful rapture, and a man who had taken her night after night, dancing for her, dancing beside her, dancing within her. Dancing. Dancing. Dancing.

Then gone.

Sweeping through her chest in cool, rhythmic pulses, that song of starless nights continued as she drove, now growing in it's faint crescendos, almost knocking the very breath from beneath her lightly heaving breasts. She hardly noticed the dazzling morning ocean playfully dumping itself onto the beaches she drove passed, wondering only how, to breathe beneath the pain.

Soon the road turned inland, and though still winding, now it made its way through tall, ancient forests, canopies above and fern thickets below, and silence but for the purring of her car, and the swimming depths of blue inside her, strengthening still.

She was strong and resilient, but she felt trapped inside herself, and did not know what to do to escape the wrenching hurt inside. She slammed on the brakes and came to a skidding halt, and tall forests bent eagerly above her. She eased herself out from the drivers seat, and sat on the ground in front of her car, and held her head in her hands. Then she heard it. An ancient chorus of broken souls calling her name; calling her name in breathless, endless harmony. So haunting, and yet so lovely.

The swimming sense churning coldly inside her, beautiful and dangerous, was moving in time with the rising and falling of those voices, asking of her things that she could not understand. She stood, and gently pulled a fern leaf from in front of her, and found herself at the mouth of a gaping hollow of the oldest tree she had ever seen. And it sung for her, and it sung beside her, and it sung within her. Her little car still purred gently behind her, as she stepped forward, into the voice that knew her pain, into the voice which filled her, and the filling of her was better than the emptiness, and she stepped forward once more, into the mouth of that ancient hollow, and was never empty again.

Now her breath is the cool south wind, and her heaving breast the swaying, bending trunks, amidst the forest that called her name. She is home amongst the beauty of the broken souls, who sing together for those who couldn't escape the pain, who sing together; 

who sing together.

The Human Immersion

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Enchantment Or The Road

There is a road sitting beneath me. It chatters at me incessantly, prodding, suggesting, pointing the way. It is so charming, so sure of itself, so convinced that it is the way. 
It is so difficult not to move with it, not to do its bidding.

I watch it stretch out into the fog, disappearing, alluring. 

And then I turn to my left.

And stop. 

Suddenly the road is quiet, for I have found enchantment in the stillness, in the unmoving. 

I have found the way, and I need not move, for the road can haunt no man who has chosen to step aside. 

There Are Taller Things Than You Or I

There are taller things than you or I; they carry moments in their hands. They leave no footprints though they clamour; nor lament for those they brand.
There are taller things than you or I; they bend towards our fear. They infer with blades of silence; in the eyes of those held dear.

There are taller things than you or I; they fill the vacant earth. They enshrine by act of torment; they remind us of our worth... 

Esmerelda May

The voracious tongues of winter
Lash a bay bereft of smiles
And the courageous city lights
Have been stripped of all their wiles

The beleaguered streets obscured
By the leering growth of dark
Its all too eager appetite
Menacing like sharks

With deception as the mother
Of the children of the earth
And perception of the masses
Savaged of all worth

The ensuing disarray
Had ravaged generations
Left pursuing an illusion
With haunting desperation

And all those veiled hearts
Stood facing the wrong way
And failed to discern
All that the winds were trying to say

Yet purity remained
Like an insult in the midst
In obscurity it hovered 
A tiny lamp deep in the mist

Astride a thousand questions
At the edge of the bay
Upon the final tide of innocence
Sat Esmerelda May

A confused and tumbling ocean
Made its way up to her feet
Fumbling through the sand
Of which she’d made her seat

It was no small thing to find
Though dark and surging to and fro
Those falling waves when crashing down
Burst awash with a white glow

That night three bottomless wells
Purged the depths of their fears
The oceans might, the teeming rain
And an endless stream of tears

It’s a curious thing to find
When you turn your back on time
And all its furious gyrations
Cease their rhythm and their rhyme

When the one remaining measure
Is the pounding in your chest
Pertaining to the treasure
You’d forgotten you possessed

And she’d never felt so lost
As she hurled her questions at the sky
Each one swallowed by forever
Then marching off to die

Yet upon the winds darkest harmonies
Your voice will carry further
And Esmerelda’s starkest moments
Took flight with boundless fervor

And so time lost its footing
As she took to her feet
A line crossed, no turning back
Where heart and reality meet

Her reachings pierced the fabric
Of the framework of eternity
Thus breaching the elastic dark
That holds us in uncertainty

Though fleeting was her glimpse
Into the colours of the Inbetween
Her meeting with the shade of truth
Revealed an ocean unforseen

Oblivious to ignorance
Its relentless current swelling
Pitiless, pervading all
An endless stream so telling

Yet the plumage of her fading race
Had overwhelmed its hue
Now wading through the undertones
Though once resplendent and imbued

She slipped unnoticed through the city
Iridescent in the grey
Like remotest, distant memories
Set free when the tether frayed

When the pure are forsaken
And wish for their release
Who are the mistaken -
Those who remain or those deceased?

And so the gravest of convictions
Began to whisper in her heart
Esmerelda away
Away; you must depart

She weaved her way passed laughing ghosts
Who knew nought of shadow teeth
Who grieved not for the loss
Or for the maddening current underneath

Through narrowing streets to city's edge
She hastened toward her goal
Where harrowing art climbed the walls
The remnants of lost souls

Then the concrete left behind her
The city in her wake
And so completely unaware
Of just what was at stake

Though the music of the writhing grass
Tried to warn her so
And the sheets of driving rain
Whispered all she needed to know

Through the manic fields rainbows swam
Sweeping madly here and there
Like panicked beauty cornered
Seeking freedom from despair

A single teardrop left the eye
Of Esmerelda May
And mingled with the glistening field
Which suddenly then turned grey

For the last time she began to cry
And collapsed into the grass
She cast her eye across dark skies
Then slowly, gently passed

Nameless, shapeless figures
Blackened the coming dawn
With a morose and gaping sameness
Atop the spires they adorned

Then all at once without a sound
Swept down into the city
And drowned all with deathly darkness
Without preference, without pity

Yet it had not been without cause
That Esmerelda’s field had greyed
It was merely pregnant pause
Whilst a path for truth was made

There had been rainbows in her tears
For her tears were borne of truth
Like the graceful falling leaves
Of golden Autumns youth

(Do you know the reason why
Rainbows visit us in halves?
It’s because they’re anchored so,
And from pure realms flow their paths)

And as her essence joined the Inbetween
There was made a space on earth
In a sense a channel
Through which a second storm was birthed

From above the raging seas
It swelled with fresh conviction
And weaving beneath that dark reprise
The shapes of sinister affliction

The dawn was proven impotent
And humanity on its knees
But the new storm swirling above the world
Would shift the fate of these

It gathered up its seething mass
Roaring with contempt
Breathing songs of thunder
With the fiercest of intent

Then a single shaft of softest light
Streamed in defiance through the sky
As if the very heavens laughed
And opened a single, churning eye

A thousand luminous rainbows
Appeared blazing in the breach
Numinous they hung
Arrayed far beyond eyes reach

Then dissolving, hissing, screaming
Unearthly anguish from below
As the pure, streaming rain
Took like acid to the shadows

Contorting beneath the onslaught
Oh how those dark shapes fled
Aborting in an instant
Their long laid plan of dread

Then for the first time in so long
Silence behind the rain
A stillness in the rhyme
And a delicate refrain

Though still wept that cleansing storm
Upon the slowly calming bay
Still fell the cleansing tears
Of Esmerelda May

The Evolution Of Joy

You know you are having a good day when your poor little human mind can no longer contain the pure, unbridled, euphoric explosions that bubble and brim from within your heart. All of the seven words in your vocabulary escape you, and everything is wondrous and stupefyingly exciting. 

The large, dull humans laze about, and do not grab at the incredible treasures strewn, shimmering from the very world around you. Nor do they run to and fro, eyes wide and faces riddled with sheer, unbounded elation. There is no time for the pondering of such trivial behaviour though, for the world is so full of joy that any distraction may keep you from ever discovering it all.

The large humans relax on the grass, and serenely drink in the warm summer afternoon, and the enthusiasm of the little one bouncing around them. They smile, and know that there will be no end to the joy from the world they have created.

The Captain And The Storm

Only as a ghost, is she seen today - this day was the last she would ever know calm water. 

One man alone noticed that the crew were not mirrored in the peaceful bay, as they crossed the boarding platform. That man was the Captain. He boarded  silently, and eventually steered her into a brooding North Sea.

It was a storm born of lands scarred by wind and ice. It was a storm that was unleashed from beyond affronted, ancient mountains, and it raged its way across the sea, with one intent.

Those who see her now, find it possible only to recount one thing; a captain, standing tall, staring from the cabin, smiling at the wild ocean ahead of him, before it fades again into a freezing ocean, that never forgets.