timothycomeau.com > writing

Nos

November 1996

Body and soul therefore have an intensely historical character and find no proper place in what is new, in thing that have just come into being. Nevertheless, we have plunged down a cataract of progress which sweeps us into the future with ever wilder violence the farther it takes us from our roots. It is precisely this loss of connection with the past, our uprootedness, which has given rise to the 'discontents' of civilization...We no longer live on what we have, but on promises, no longer in the light of the present day, but in the darkness of the future, which, we expect, will at last bring the proper sunrise.
Carl Gustave Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections

NOS

There is no remembrance of former things,
Nor will there be any remembrance of later things
Yet to happen among those who come after.
-The Preacher 1:11

My body is empty, my flesh a shell
The yolk of my heart is growing no embryo
I am empty, I am hollow
My roots clutch no soil
Nor do I exist hydroponically
I am suspended

Between two worlds and yet neither
The sun nor the moon sheds light on this land
Time and space fall aside
And darkness envelopes angels, men, and whale
Singing songs of time

Where amongst the dead souls departing
I arrived and was fused to flesh
And awaited the times of death
To emerge into the Light
Where I expected more, something different, all was not right
I laid in my crib, staring at the ceiling
Fuzzy blue framing the vision, thinking
O what have I gotten myself into
My ego awakening within its meat house, so small so small
I want to buy an automobile

I

I said let there be light but I was separated from the light by the darkness
And I thought it is not good, the light bulb had burnt out
With a flash of lightning, the electric gods betrayed me,
And have made me blind

Yet I lie with woman and became one
One became two
But when I looked through her eyes I thought
I did not know you

For I know nothing, but you do not understand
Understand?
You do not understand
Understand?
I ask you to listen, to think
To connect with your soul
Buried under rum and coke
And dance music

Voices from a box voices from a box
Through a cable, see it in the wall?
Voices, what a tiny city is contained within
Voices voices voices
"I've created Lutherans!"
I hear the voices I hear the songs, they will not dissipate
Music! Purple shapes floating in my ears and I anticipate

Being human, amongst the sea of souls
A face in the crowd, so I walk out, leave the home
On my way I am asked
"Spare some change"
I have only enough for myself only, for a coffee
"Sorry"
"Have a good day"
Behind me the businessman, bank account full of stars
"Spare some change?"
He ignores him
More than enough change to spare
More than enough Change to become inhuman

Home at last from the battlefield
Where the sky is scraped and bleeds acid
The corporate war, this soldier
Raises brown socked feet with decorative trim
To frame the evening news
Patronization, sports, lies, propaganda, misinformation
Based upon a true story, these stories are never fully told
What ever happened to the boy who spiked his chocolates?
Based upon a true story, this tragedy is a must see
That won't happen to me
But it did

At the coffee shop I drink I think I stare
I read I write I play with my hair
Overthere a woman holds her cigarette perpendicular
The man lights it with a lighter that is certainly particular
The smoke flows in and out in and out with the mysterious rhythm of breath
Hovering above the heads, reaching down to touch the ember
The path of the forces of life, it is diffused
By the winds blowing from the electric gods
Spinning spinning hypnotizing me
Circular motions and I go down toward
The center where I am a drop from a greater ocean

Coffee cup in hand
The television tells him stories
Books decorate the walls
And advertisements dictate his course of action, his life
That he's hungry, and the he should eat the big mac
That his children would like this toy for Christmas
"Trust us, we know, they spend more time with us then with you, and
They want to see this movie, but so do you."

You do not think at all
You don't have too
So much has already been done for you
Don't ever think
Think
Don't ever think
Think
Thoughts are fogs, fogs blind
Think
There is no more need for new thinks
Humanity does not need more advances
Any more romantic dances
Nor more music, no more art
We need sweet TV lunacies
To blind and render dark
The glory, the light, the illuminating truths
Do not think, do not read, do not read this
Put aside this text turn off the recording
And plug into the hive
Turn on the television, watch it all live
The magic screen the wonderful tube
The electrons moving through me and you
The voices have returned
They keep calling me by name!
Ghosts, demons, angels
"The world at six"
News reporters

I see the wings

II

Flowing from the distant land of the past and percolated over electric stones
Is the coffee river which I now sit drinking, looking
Around seeing
The faces seemingly untouched by Time and their clothes
Eventually I shall remember as strange, their faces withered, their cell phones quaint
And on a stroll in autumn, the crisp brown leaves whispering beneath my feet
I shall caress the breast of nostalgia and wonder
What is real?

I am not the same person I was as a child

I've driven through valleys
Over the roads on which I have seen
Housewives hanging clothes
Seen people mowing grass and rocking on porches
The lawn chairs and the beer
I have seen the mundane things
Sun filtered blue through windshield
Trees glistening with their new clothing
"Look honey, I've bought something green!"
And up ahead the shimmering scene
The light at the end of the tunnel
Through which I am forced

These things I remember

Deep within me, yet unseen
Memories voices vices visions

In the past I knew knowledge
And I was wise
The trivialities I watched with appreciation
For I knew the shortness of life
I lived for the moment and now I realize I shall grow old
Grow old grow old
I shall flow in the river of time and watch the illusions
Rise and Fall
And I will be history made manifest
Sitting in a chair neither electric nor comfortable
Staring at a monitor connected to the world
Staring at the birds building a nest upon the branches

Today again, something new
And yet thankfully one constant remains: the sky is still blue
But there is a plane tearing it in two

III

Where are the trees that trace the thought of god through time?
Where are the tools which I created from everlasting stone?
My father - I have caressed and analyzed his skull in an anthropological lab
I have seen his face not in memory but in a museum window

And although my body may be new
I have watched Mozart play and have seen Beethoven conduct
and now I push a button to see them again
Feelinng so old so old so old

And in an art museum I see there artifacts of human creativity
Stolen from a god through a supernatural battle
Now wanting to apologize, pointing our radio telescopes heavenward
Heavenward
Heavenward
Heavenward
Where voices await alien ears

To escape I lie down and nap for an hour
Where I no longer know myself as me
And I converse with I and I am far away from the source
What are these test tube fabrics I wear?
What is this art which hangs on museum walls?
Where am I going? Who am I? What do I want?

I want to rest for a few seconds with certainty

Knowing that tomorrow I will walk under a pink sky
And welcome the sun rushing over the horizon to greet me
And banish the darkness from my soul
With hollow promises of futures foretold.