Day 88

I was prompted to write about lids. So here goes:
Lids are overrated. Really a lid is just an indecisive wall, with a better view, sitting on top to cover up the mold growing on the leftovers.
Every wall in a container is simply a lid that's made up its mind. No moving. No change.
I've little time for lids ... save for eyelids.
Eyelids really are a remarkable thing. Gateway guardians, entrusted with the task of  protecting those sweet doorways to the soul.
And that's just on the outside, keeping out offensive bits floating in the air.
On the inside, even more is going on.
How often does one stare at the projector screens for our dreams?
I close my eyes and see such sights. Every night, in fact. Whole civilizations rise and fall in the blink of an eye, all be it a long blink.
Sidebar: why did the adorable uncle/grandfather archetypes of my youth's popular culture measure sleep in winks? Surely they should have meant blinks. I don't wink in my sleep, not even in spy dreams when I'm required to be crafty ...
Lids also come as words.
Words which serve as a cork to a geyser, holding back torrential forces that need see some kind of release.
"I'm fine," is one such lid.
"I don't mind," is another.
"Sure, you can go." "I understand." "It's alright." "I'll be fine on my own."
Let the truth out. Not later when your own personal Pompeii leaves a landscape of ash and ruin, now.
It doesn't need to come out in the form of vitriol. You don't have to scald the skin of bystanders.
Just lift the lid a little bit. Steam up the glass while you look in the mirror, then make shapes in the fog.
Do this and catastrophe may be averted.
But what do I know.
I'm just a guy that hates lids.

Day 90

On watching blood leave my body.

In another world; major events in your life are accompanied by messengers. 

The bringers.

They bring with them heartache, pain, loss, but also love, bliss and contentment.

Each bringer comes in a different shape.

Some are seen as animals, padding along to meet you at your big moment.

Some come in grand shapes, cloaked in light or shade.

Some arrive as seemingly ordinary folks; you wouldn't even be able to differentiate them from the people on the street.

Depending on your life, you will meet some bringers more often than others.

You cannot force a bringer to come anymore than you can deny a bringer from approaching. For you cannot fake joy any more than you can reject your grief; you may ignore them for a time, but their very presence signals the futility of your denial.

You cannot trick them.

These creatures aren't guided by agenda. They are simply there. They are the bringers, and they bring these big moments in your life.

One day, you will be greeted by a vaguely familiar face. You won't know where you recognize it from, but you will know that you do.

Some work it out. Most do not.

Understandable, as it is the first face we ever see.

The bringer that is responsible for every other one that follows you.

The first. The last.

Most can't work out that these figures are one and the same.

Why wouldn't they be? In the end, we must begin again.

Day 87

I had a music box in my youth. Whenever opened, it would play a beautiful song.
A singular sort of song. It could tickle the corners of my mouth into a smile and squeeze my sides till a sigh would rush out.
No specific memory comes to mind. Just a general wash of comforts. Even thinking of it now conjures images of sunlight refracted through colored glass, while an unending spring flourishes in the background. Smells of baking.
On a particular day I was feeling particularly inquisitive, and so I wished to explore the mysteries of the music making box.
I opened up the casing, with as much tenderness and care as my tiny hands could offer, and inside I found gears and bands and other moving parts I couldn't know the names for.
Disappointed by my findings, I set to work restoring the thing.
I put it back as best i could, but the song never played quite the same.
I'm sure I replaced some part or part incorrectly; this was likely why the melody was soured.
I put it away. And it was forgotten.
Many might say I should never have opened up the box. It would be best to be caught in awe.
I can't argue with this viewpoint.
I, however, lament not becoming a better tinkerer or a musician, or composer.
I don't lament looking past a facade. I do regret not going further.
...
Did I do it?
Did I metaphor?

Day 89

What shall we dream on this night?

I'm in an ocean of juice - never have I been more conflicted about my feelings on drowning.

You are on shore, building us a boat to be crewed by chimps.

I'm in no hurry to be saved. You're in no hurry to save me. But we both know that it must be done.

You rescue me just in time, as I was starting to cramp up. It is true that you shouldn't swim so near to drinking.

However, all is not well on the good ship: ship good (I know. I know! The boat was named by committee.).

A mutiny occurs, and we are both at the mercy of the dread captain: captain dread (stupid monkeys).

He demands we walk the plank and fall to our high fructose doom.

I'm ready to accept my fate, but you complain that the plank ain't been tested, and so refuse to walk an untested plank. Clever girl. The captain tests it for you and in the style of Wile E Coyote, falls to his sweet sugary end. 

And thus, the mutiny is overturned.

You sail us to the beach, that special beach where all beaches meet - you know the one.

And you ask me what I want. In an impossible world where I can have anything, what would I ask for.

I don't know. I reply as such.

You tell me I'm about to wake up and warn me not to squander this moment.

My last act in a world where anything is possible; is to take your hand in mine. We watch the purple sun set into a mountain of cheese, while fireworks launch and un-launch and just to launch again.

You lay your head on my chest and ask me to remember something very important.

I look down at your smiling face, and wake up.

Day 86

And so he carved a child out of a block of wood.
It was not his first, and it would not be his last. But each time he did so, the craftsman felt a little relief.
For into each one he poured a secret. Just a little one. No more impressive in isolation that a single piece of a puzzle might be.
However, puzzles are most impressive when all fragments are assembled.
So. What image would they make, these sons and daughters of a lifetimes of work?
When allotted side by side, in a designated order, what might one witness?
Hundreds of these statues, created in great detail. Yet it is only, truly four faces.
Four faces in every age of their life. Imprinted on his memory, now etched onto immobile faces.
And by carving them, he could finally forget them.
And the secrets whispered? Each one began with the phrase: Forgive me...
His sins aren't of great interest. It is his struggle that is unique.
For he had unknowingly joint that woeful sect of artisan, one which pours out their grief upon the canvas in hopes that absolution will somehow pour back into them.
That what they offer up to some unseen deity, will be transformed.
Shame into triumph. Jealousy into love. Sorrow into beauty.
... poor man. People forgive people. He'd have been better off whispering to a real face. One not frozen in a moment from his memory. One that can be affected by his words, and in turn affect him.
Even a mirror would be better.
This is not to say the alchemic change will not occur. Pain and horror are many times the fuel for serenity and peace. However, this can only be granted for the witness. Not the actor. The audience is the true device by which this miraculous filtration may occur.
They are the magicians.
Not the artist.
This, sadly, is often never learned, and if learned: learned too late.
Still he carves. Still he suffers. Still his secrets are sowed into the unchanging smiles.

Day 85

I'm searching for a word that I'm not entirely sure exists.

A word to describe a realization I had in the wake of a feeling that came and went.

The definition I'm currently working with is

"A brief sadness brought on by the sudden realization that you have never felt so deeply for a romantic partner as you have for the moment that just passed. That you lament the passing of the moment, while also feeling immense gratitude for having been able to experience it. You embrace the turn in the clockwork, unconcerned by the knowledge that the best cannot linger no matter how much we should like it to. Simultaneously in love with an instance and painfully aware loneliness and solitude in such an infatuation."

...

For now let's call it self-lamenfatuization.

Side effects include a high pitched frequency felt in your heart when you look in the mirror; which will quickly pass, but whose sensation will haunt the bearer for some time afterwards...

Day 84

In feverish dreaming, I remember:

In a cave. Alone. I sit in pitch black.

It is difficult to fathom the layers of shadow before me. I cannot move, for fear of the dark.

Open your eyes. 

A voice whispers. It is soothing and calm, yet powerful and chilling. My remaining senses are enveloped by the vibrations of this would be guide.

Open your eyes.

They are open.

So then you can see?

No, I cannot.

Then you must have yet to open your eyes.

I do not argue, as the juvenile argument has strange wisdom in it.

Close your eyes.

This I do.

Now: Open your eyes and see.

This I do. And now this I can.

The cavern is alight with blue flame. I know this fire is not real. No warmth, only luminescence. A faerie light that only I perceive.

Now nothing is hidden from you.

I trust these words to be the truth, but somehow know that a price has been paid. Some compact has traded a part of myself for this new vision.

Despite this feeling of dread I whistle; only to hear my echo's chorus. I click my tongue for percussion.

I am alone in this wonder. In a darkness that can no longer encroach me, making music that will lead me.

Nothing shall be hidden from me.