What I'm thinking--June 25, 2016

I came across my anger, as if I had never seen it before. It was alien and unstoppable. All around the room, their faces made me mad. It was the inconsistencies, the lies and the ignorance which set my mood aflame. I wanted to say “I will not suffer fools”, but that would be too cruel. I love them, all of them, I do. It’s just that sometimes I have to be hard to stand my ground. They tell me to express my inconveniences and my issues, but do it in a civil manner. Whenever I try to be civil, I am met with this arrogant threat. It is hypocrisy

It’s all a myth. When you disagree, you cannot be civil. No matter how calm you are, to some, they will never be able to accept that you disagree with them and that you wish to tell them no. I wish to tell them no, all the time, just for the fun of it and just to make it even with my decades of yes’s. I want to say no and with that no, stand straight and tall in my convictions.

Some of them want to instill fear as a means of control and then say that you are trying to control them. IT’s a form of manipulation, old really, and when first introduced with this manipulation, it can be startling to the senses. Once you encounter this trick, you can conquer the symptoms of fear. Fear, fear fear, they love to use the tool of fright to deny they have an allegiance with fear at all.

I came across my anger and at first I was ashamed by it. I prayed against it and I held it down with all my might and 200 stacks of books that I read week to week.

“Be kind”, “Don’t make assumptions” and “Control your temper.”

These are supposed to be sage words. These words are supposed to remind you that you are not a slave of fear and anger any more.

So, why, when I finally get angry, do I feel like I’m finding my worth? It’s confusing at times, it’s hard to not get angry at ignorance and evil. And yes, there is pure evil out there, it’s the pride of mankind.

I came across my anger and I was reminded of my savior in the temple, driving out the vile. To anger is not to sin.

There is a time and palace and my anger is mine. I am not a slave to my anger, nor anyone else.

The only name I remember

To know a name is to command power. I wonder about this sometimes and the wondering leads me back to sleep. How can a name entrap a human being and force this human being to bend?

“I call your name and you must do as I say.”

This doesn’t always work, you know, so how shall this work on demons? You’ve seen the movies, the exorcism flicks and horror based movies. In the story, the name of these spirits holds dominion. Once you know the demon’s name, you can cast it back to hell.

“In the name of Jesus, I bind you and cast you out!”

Yes, that works in the movies. It works in reality as well, as long as one condition is met.

Faith.

This is where my wondering stops, right before I fall from the cusp of sleep. I drift into another place, filled with impossibilities and communions with the dead. I follow a path to a land where names mean nothing and faith is like the blood in my veins. Here I have faith but no name and there I had names with no faith. My quest, within the dream, was to fuse the two together so that I could fight my demons.

The darkness said no, but I kept trying to remember names when I awoke.

One morning I remember a solitary name and with it, faith of a mustard seed. I called to the father with the name on the tip of my tongue. My faith was burning like a grain of hot sand.

“In the name of Jesus, I bind you and cast you out!”

I spoke sternly, with one name on my tongue. It was a name I could never misplace.

It was my own.

“I cast you back to hell.”

Jake and Natie....I cannot sleep

“I know you want to see her, hear her or whatever, but it takes time.”

“Do you think we will get something tonight?”

“Maybe”

Jake had new equipment. He explained it to me but I have already forgotten what it was. Seems like he called it a spectrovolumizer or something like that. These devices are special made to detect things like cold spots and electromagnetic fields or whatnot. I guess I’m mutilating the names and processes of this equipment, but I wish to learn more. I want to do what Jake does. Jake talks to the dead.

“Jake, did you say that was a voice extramologer?”

Jake laughed way down in his belly. His smile was huge. He would have been cute if he wasn’t making fun of me.

He could barely speak through his guffawing. “It could be a prestidigitator working through the flabnoid erupter.”

I wasn’t impressed. Our neighbor had already said those ludicrous words while banging on his alternator with a screwdriver. I wasn’t the only one who was clueless. Heck, the world was infested with ignorance.

“Jake, I’m sorry. I can’t pronounce those words and I forget all the time. I just want to talk to her.”

He took my hand and lead me over to the couch. There, lined up against the edge of the rug was three devices. One was large and the other two no smaller than a cellphone. He was making a list of what he needed for the trip. Apparently, these were his ‘prime babies’ as he called them.

“You see this?” Jake picked up something that looked like a calculator. “This is my portable ‘spirit box’. You wouldn’t believe how important this thing is.”

Jake took the little electronic and sat down on the couch, pulling me down with him.

“So, how does this work? Is it complicated?”

“Okay, when we get there, we will first use the infrared thermometer to detect cold spots. You see, where there’s a ghost, the air will turn icy. The temperature will drop so suddenly that chill bumps will appear on your skin. It’s true. Then, we use the other devices in unison-EMF meters, ion detectors and cameras. You know you want the good old fashion photos as well, huh…”

“Wait, slow down, Jake. What is an ion detector?”

“Natie, you wouldn’t understand if I told you.”

I hated it when he assumed that I was an idiot. A good hard frog on the arm would fix that. I punched him and punched him hard.

“Ouch! Okay, look. An Ion detector is another way to detect a form of energy. Except this one detects radiation or static electricity.”

“Oh, so why does a ghost make static electricity.”

“It doesn’t. Let me explain something to you. When a person dies, they do not go away. Nope, never, they simply transform. I know you’ve heard bunches of people talk about this before. It’s not new. Anyway, we are energy, plain and simple and when we die, our energy persists. It weakens but it does not cease to exist. We no longer have a body and therefore, we cannot speak, see, hear or anything of that nature. Are you following me so far?”

“Yes Jake. Clear as mud…I mean a bell.”

I take this opportunity to roll my eyes because I grow weary of waiting.

“Okay, so imagine your loved ones who have passed into this different state of being. They may be trapped here or simple have no interest in going somewhere else. Don’t ask me about God or anything because I want to approach this from a secular viewpoint for now. So, you’re dead, bear with me and pretend a moment, Natie. You’re dead and you wish to talk to someone who is alive. What can you do? If you cannot talk because of lack of vocal cords, then how do you get the message across?”

“I don’t know. I would have to do something or just wither away in desperation-if withering of anything was even possible.”

Jake smiled. “If you were dead, you would take that energy you had left, which was you, and you would push that energy toward the object of your communication. That is what you would do.”

“But you said the energy was weakened by death, right?”

“Right, but think of all the electronic devices! This is what they do. I have no idea how these entities learned to do this, but they did. Whatever is left of you could have a consciousness, somehow, maybe an electric powered soul or some sort which was so thin that it was vapor. I have to stop before I get to a place I am unfamiliar with and get lost trying to show you the way. Listen Natie, all this stuff serves an important role in what we are going to do. If you want to talk to her, just you wait.

“Do you think it will happen, Jake? Do you think she can come through to us?”

Jake brushed my hair from my eyes and kissed my forehead.

“I hope so. I cannot stand to see you suffer so.”

Ghosts down by the Volcano

I visit here often. It’s a barren flat land riddled with zig zagging cracks. The sky is dark, of course it is, because only in the dark do secret things congregate.

There is fire, lava and dark rock at the bottom of a pit. I sit by the edge and think about those who’s love I cannot shake. I sit there watching fire blaze up over the boiling lava, and I close my eyes to see it more clearly. Sight, as I have learned is only partial to being able to see. Sight, in honesty, works its magic from somewhere deeper within as well.

I’m not always alone here. I call them to me. Most of the time I remember how many there are. Let’s see, I will have to think a minute…Maybe there are 12 or 13 of them. I watch the ones that I can remember as they shuffle from behind a large outcrop of black rock. They are bewildered because they do not know how they got here or why. They cannot understand the possibility of this place. Then they see me. A wave of recognition makes them whisper questions one to another. I surmise they want to know why they are together and I am there waiting on the edge of the chasm. They are unsure, but they start to gather that they are all connected to me. Some of them know this immediately, while others are strangers which gather the information through exchanged glances.

 I beckon them to come sit with me. So we talk. It’s not laboured or uncomfortable at all. I want them to know that despite the world we live in, they have to fade. There are some that will not go, will not move into the darkness and away. When at last, I feel alone, all that were before me are gone away, I breathe in remorse and content. It is a strange potion.

The night is silent, save for a few crackling sounds from the churning heat below.

“You can come out now.”

I hear the flutter of wings from behind me. I reach back holding out my hand. Talons wrap around my finger and squeeze.

“Non dimenticherò mai l'uccello nero.”

Reclaiming home

Traveling to the west, only a few hundred miles, is akin to traveling to another country, well in a way. I cross the river into the central lands and there are different words, dialects and postures. I knew it would have some variables, but when I find the truth of it, I find it preposterous. Within a finger's joint on the face of my map, I can be completely misread. So be it.

It's lovely to be home again. Although it's changed, I know I prefer it. It's still dark, cold and wet, for the most part, but it's home. You know how home can be hell, but it's your hell? Yes, you see. Even if you return in a mortal coil unknown, you return regardless.

There are too many places to go, you see, because there are too many portions of me. Hundreds more miles south of here, I will visit another home to me. When I close my eyes, I will be there, upon the banks of another river. Music will heighten senses and smells will reignite nostalgia. Bustling crowds and the sound of bells awaken my memories now.

Again, it will be different. Only a few hundred, many three, and the dialect will change, the mood will deepen and I will have to tap into something else. Within a finger's joint, I will travel to another world, a modern world, one that is foreign, in all aspects, to the world from before. Just as in distance, in time...I will be completely misread. So be it.

Das ist meine kamph

Does it make sense to continue when the pain is so ripe? It is so vicious that an emptiness is left in its wake. I think of different ways to do it, every night. I fantasize about shooting myself in the head, taking too many pills and even walking in front of a truck. I think about other ways as well. It does get that bad, you know. It’s almost unbearable at times, and no one understands just how difficult living is. It’s hell, as if hell was a hollow place stuck in repetition. So, does it make sense? What meaning comes from this endless misery? Mein Kamph…

I know you wonder why it hurts too much. I have no simple answers and that only makes it more painful. There are too many words and too many images inside my head. I have a thirst for too many things, to boot. There is definitely a stimulus overload, an attack upon my senses. At any moment, someone could walk through my bedroom door and ask me what I was doing. I couldn’t tell them because I have forgotten what this story as supposed to be about.

Last year, I thought I was Cinderella. I lost my shoe in the midst of monstrous machines, grinding and molding steel all around me. A blue-eyed prince pretended to save me and in the process cut off my head for the queen. I was no longer Cinderella, but Alice. In the looking glass, I saw the truth. My face was not mine, but another. At midnight, when I was still on the verge of turning from Cinderella mindset, I turned to the prince in order to tell him my secrets. It was a time when I knew what I wanted and felt like human. It was betrayal, the night before he killed me. I knew it was too deep and he might drown without my unwilling sacrifice.

That was a year ago, wait, maybe two, or no, it was three. Time has passed, I have disentigrated and something happened to my muse. I cannot saw the darkness is gone, because it coaxes me to end it all. The darkness is different, and I think it doesn’t grow in the same vessels as before.

In times such as this, my words do not make sense. I think it is because the filing cabinet was tipped over, spilling the contents across the floor. Cinderella and the prince came waltzing in,  scattering files all across the room. They didn’t care how messy they were or how their actions would bring devious consequences. The wind blew twice, no thrice and the paper flew into the winds of time, scattered among the grasses in the field, between the pines and deep within the dark corners where the fairy hides.

I want to end it all, I do. I am in so much pain. Every day, full of sunshine and glorious blue skies, I see darkness. I hear despair, my chest is hollow in a dull thudding ache. I want to die, die as they died, all of them. All the humans die and it is over. Whether there be heaven or hell, nothing or nothing, I want to die. There is no point in fighting this war. I have no solution. I have no plans.

I have no art to spare. There is nothing left here.

But, of course, that’s how I feel tonight. Tomorrow, on the other hand, I could right as rain and bright as the sunshine’s smile.

I am unpredictable and utterly confused. There are few constants for me, they are dark, they are sordid and they are Godlike.

Till morrow then…

1817 Bromley

1817 Bromley

Father didn’t come home as he promised. It’s been days since he was to make an appearance. There were men, come calling, I heard them tell father to travel into town. Father was strange after that, but he promised he wouldn’t be long away.

I watch by the window because my heart is heavy for him. Although he is hard with me, I cannot stop feeling guilt for how I displease him, how I failed to be a lady. Even my book of poems fails to bring me peace-Rosetti, this one is dark and tragic. I cannot remember the name, as my book in on the floor.

There is a knock. I know it’s Erzebetha but I do not wish to see her or talk to her. I do not want to hear her breathe. I hate the way she looks at me with pity. I see it… I know something is not right.

“Mistress, you should get some rest.”

She tries the door but I have locked it against her. I pick up my book and sit back down at the window. I can feel the winter chill creep through the cracks around the glass. There's a raven, on the branch of a tree by the garden. He turns to look at me and I feel the darkness twist and churn within my chest. The black bird flies away and it deepens my despair.

“Leave me be.”

 The dark comes outside my reading, and with it more hopes dashed and tears welling.

“Father, please come home. I think I heard mother wailing from her earthen bed and the night birds sing a song that turns my blood to ice.” I whisper into the corners of the room, hoping some lonely insect might hear me.

 Father…

I close my eyes and I remember a face. It was a brown face with almond eyes and full lips. Yes, it was a native, I am sure of it. Of all things now and then, I remember that face, and yet I was just a child.  There is an image dancing, the bellowing deep throat calls ringing through a scorching night. I remember the fire, fire everywhere and the smell of death. Yes, I can remember this, just as I remember the ocean, the smell of musty salt water sloshing beneath the hull of the ship. I remember the great storms and the men who pulled me down into a darkness of the ship.

 I saw London and I see Bromley, a cold place, my home. There are so many memories rushing through my head now. I want to keep my mind occupied, I want to stop the horrors that my imagination creates and I have to stay awake. I know, if I fall asleep, I will wake with a new dread, an empty digging feeling because father has yet to come home.

I cannot stay awake. It’s useless. I feel it pulling me under, the arms of sleep. It pulls me beneath those crashing waves, those deep green, foam-crowned waves and it takes me back to that strange place. It’s not working. I wish to return home but I keep waking up on the red banks of the savage land. I see her, she is brown with long black hair and piercing eyes. She carries an infant in a satchel on her chest. There are others with her, Europeans maybe, three of them. Their voices converse in kindness and not condescending as the others. They stare down at me and frown. The brown lady speaks in a language that comforts me. I lift a hand to my face and gasp. My hands are brown, brown as the brown skinned lady towering above me. I feel my face and I imagine that I would look like the natives too.

Waking from sleep, I whimper. Images flood my mind as fast as I can catch my breath. My breathing is labored, just as my mind is fighting too. I push off the cotton sheets from my bed and rush to the window. The sky is overcast, hung with clouds. I turn toward my door and call to him.

“Father, are you here?”

There is nothing. I can hear creaks and moans because my home is silent but for the snores of the servants. I am no lady. My dress is stained, and I hold the hem of my skirt in clenched fists. In the looking glass, I see no signs of my salvation. I see her face. It is not my face, it is not the face of my father. I see something peculiar, something alien in that image. She looks back at me and shakes her head.

I trace the lines of my prominent nose, my lips and my almond eyes, all with the tip of my brown finger. I will never be what father wanted. Even the light from the window cannot illuminate my dark skin.

Father…

I remember the dead, in piles around me. I hear voices, angry voices sounding across the masses of savages. They are coming. I see them walking amongst the bodies, they are pale, different and I am frightened. I weep as pale hands lift me from dark dead hands.

Father…

My reflection whispers back to me.

"Wake up, spirit."