This instant,
such a trite … concept?
how?
but where?
where
am I?
I was in a wash
room?
face in front of a mirror
projected back only in distorted
sense of self
I am my
self
a towel?
The simplicity of the main compound
pure pragmatic aesthetics
utility
and yet, ironically
no, paradoxically
opulent.
"The feeling you've been having is real."
"Inside of your head; it is, in fact, real.
And no, I'm not
referring to why you were in the woods."
"The brain functions by switches flicking
off
and on
with biochemical magnetism."
I was dumbstruck. Is it proper
etiquette that I complement the table?
Pardon?
"Again, with the guilt."
This is a dream?
"You are not guilty. But believe me,
it's coming around fair to everyone."
The great it…
"But didn't you cry out drowning?"
He smiled
whiskers twisted…god this has to…
be a dream?
reaching out with a bread basket
"Here; eat."
We ate
and he spoke of history
quite different from the truth department
and different from her story
yet as if word
for word
I knew the story he told by heart
Potions and voodoo…
"…if you will."
He looked at me
and I looked at the scars on my hands…
who can say what is real?
"Come, friend. Let's go for a walk;
as I said, you have much to see."
So, we left the dining room for another.
It was an impressive
little armory;
if one should be impressed?
I felt torn
utility
and the semantics of a fist
but still, as always, guns
always…
"Ah, here, some rope and a machete;
because, who knows?"
He turned and led the way out
through the entranceway,
where we were greeted by
breaking dawn…
"It's getting to be daylight, which is risky;
but it's the best time to really see."
The soft back-lit glow of the
gate and the two gunner towers
and the last glimpse of the garden
made me shudder…
Almost immediately we were back into
green night
through a spider's web and my skin
crawled, desperate exhaustion
and wild eyes…
But the mist hushed me,
awed by the emerald spectral shift.
I shiver from the guarded silence
like an alarm echo,
two men passing through.
…does the earth tremble?
"How else could the city be built?"
endless halls of doorways,
vertigo floors,
the grid woven through Amrika
"Perhaps life learned long ago to distance
itself
from the will-imposing primate."
We continued on with some pace,
weaving through the gaps
and clearings in the underbrush.
Watching him jump patches of thicket
I was struck by the thought that
he was well practiced
at moving through these woods
when—
"Shh— "
he motioned over toward a large tree
whispering,
"We can't stay on the floor anymore.
There are patrols and ground sensors.
But we haven't run into any snipers, so…"
he pointed up
How did I get here?
Crash course and general rules…
"It's better to rest than to hesitate;
but you risk less gravity if
you keep moving."
We began to scale this massive pillar
I clutched desperately to any vine
space in bark
toe hold scar
until it became, in a sense, faith
in the trunk
and the stomach toppling
thought of looking
down
"Here, we should catch our breaths.
You can climb higher for
a view
or out if you want to scout ahead."
But I clung to the thick branch petrified
for a brief moment—
a sigh of open eyed acceptance.
Reaching my arm out to grab the next
branch higher
the stretched skin finally calmed
and returned me from that adrenaline buzz
and chest pounding affirmation
still reaching up
all of this
washed away in a bird's sun,
muted by the rushing wind.
"We thrive as conqueror and conquered."
What?
He swung out
between
two branches
swinging out again
trapezing his way out to where he paused
and the ripple of leaves rolled by
Caught, I had no choice but to follow
him and made my way across
white knuckled like some childhood
terror remembered.
"You know, they used
to use radiation to treat cancer…
perhaps this is fitting."
Pardon?
"Impossible.
What other way is there?"
And he pointed through the trees
for my own eyes…
their factories,
where bullets and bomb
and sky tearing death planes
not human life
are assembled…
but are we all guilty?
who could be innocent?
Has there ever been peace?
"So the Truth Department prints…
The war is over; how do you feel?"
Lies.
He chuckled at that
from behind a slightly smug grin
"I suppose you are that naïve.
Do you believe in Light and Dark
as well?
There is only continuum,
only varying shades.
Ethical Truth is subjective, at best.
Truth is only simple order,
functionality—mechanical and heartless.
We're all guilty because
we continue to rut."
But there are facts,
irrefutable.
People can be made to see,
learn…
"Silly monkey, this must happen."
But there's still hope
so long as—
"No.
I am sorry,
but we are lost."
That's absurd pessimism.
"No. You still cling to your childish
optimism.
But there is hope."
The odds were…
He tied the rope to a branch,
"We'll drop in here to get closer."
Once we were on the ground, he took
the rope and wrapped it around
the tree, like a vine.
What about patrols and sensors?
"Try not to get caught."
damn him
dash from one point
to another, crouch
dash again
we finally hid behind some brush
by a deep concrete walled drainage ditch
approximately a hundred meters from
a fence, razor-wire inviting.
he pointed at a building
stopped in front were two
large buses
lines of people streaming out
eight guards, armed—always guns
"That's a former labor camp."
Don't use euphemisms with me, please.
the lines were corralled into columns,
dividing them into three different groups
"Sorry.
It was a slavery, torture, and death camp.
I worked here."
So then, humans are not manufactured
in industrial plants…
damn.
"No, only better ways to kill the
already constant supply."
And the war's still on?
"Yes."
And I had a family…
"Yes."
Are they dead?
"Yes."
consider it,
"There was climate change and extinction.
We cracked our own shadowed code
and survived.
Our own planet rejects us…"
and a dirty smirk, "but there is hope"
seething somewhere was
a hatred
the desire to stomp his chest in
"Why do we have war?
There's so many of us,
it makes business sense."
if he is really
right,
"So long as we're only numbers,
there's too many of us…"
Just then a plane roared by
I went duck to conceal myself
but stood motionless
a chicken in a rain storm
awed
But is this really our solution?
"Yes… but there is hope,
Life will survive.
It has survived for billions of years.
And with each toppling,
it learned.
Some being will learn
from our mistake.
They will laugh at the sky,
understanding that riddle…"
Which?
"By sheer probability
the roulette chambers are six loaded,
falling rocks are craters,
and sterilizing energy radiates
in every direction;
even our sun, rising anew
each and every day,
will die.
The Universe is hostile—
still,
life.
But they will learn,
mourn our tragedy."
I could not find tragedy in this
only pathology
consumption to vulgar levels
corruption
idolatry before our self
made
and twisted
slave-masters.
What tragedy?
"Imagination."
How is that tragic?
"I have fought to protect the small property
my family
and friends live on…"
I'm sorry, I don't understand…
"With the right motivation, do you think I'm
the only person able to conceive a nuclear
solution?"
What do you mean by ‘right?'
He smiled at me,
though sadly,
"As a group, we slaughter our own pigs
grow our own rice.
We laugh, entertain,
and provoke each other; share in
honest fellowship…
How do you protect your daughter from
an instantaneous sun
dropped heartlessly overhead?"
i had a daughter…
"But such acts cannot be done half-way
so friends, of course
will help friends,
see to it that this is
a continental event…
but not only that, there are global bonds;
friends will help one another
make sure things are tended to…
No one will be forgiven their insignificance."
But I don't understand…
Why?
"Because minerals are all that are
truly required for mining."
Could this really be possible?
"A human took a step on the moon nearly
a century ago."
But is there any other way?
"If you can press the button first…"
Or hope the bitter universe crashes
from above.
on that,
silence
***
My day had turned to night had
turned to day and turned to twilight—
If all is lost
could all be lost?
We continued on
back to the gates
with the two guards
snipers
guns, always
and I began to think of the village
and their promises of paradise…
I have to get back.
"This place does not exist."
I shook his hand
and moved to follow his directions back
to a split
and through
an overgrown path toward a
beaten trail
across a bridge over a calm flow,
when he pulled me in close,
not quite an embrace,
but silently pleading
"I want to apologize;
my only defense is that
I was following orders…
Do not forgive."
through the woods
and the pastures
returning
with new perspective.
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