[Sentenced by the Trail, I ran to get Advice of Counsel - the first took my hope, the second my worldly possessions. I'm left only with the right of appeal, the longest of long shots, uncertain if silence is perhaps the wiser course. I cannot help but feel the fool by speaking but what have I to lose! Is there no return from the position I'm in? Tell me in absolutes so that I may know the wisest course. It seems the more I struggle to be free, the more I'm trapped. And yet to do nothing is to train in vain for a world to change.]
To the dearest Court: My criminality cannot be disputed. My cleverness betrayed me. Who can be my counsel when standing before God? How can I un-know my crime? Look at the absences in my life! There's only one explanation: none. I can't go on like this, eaten alive under the giving sun, pressed into the army of the dead, my life hanging by a court appeal, my last option, shouted to a deserted moon.
However cruel or deceiving or wrongheaded or errant the Court may be makes no difference in my fate. Your worldly sentence is a fool's errand that steals your predicted profit. The Court betrays its future when acting unjustly; a dark cloudy mind speaking only to itself, doddering dunderheads given power and life because forsaken madmen would choose such a course. Woe to the judges for they squandered their mercy at the living time of trial, weaving a web to ensnare both guilty and innocent alike.
In my time of trial, I drowned in suppositions, lunged at evaporating apparitions, prayed to false idols in supplication. In these I placed my trust but rage my only harvest. Now I crawl before you a pathetic beast, drinking from the cup of shame. Each dawn I die, a thousand slashes in the night reminding me of my treachery. Raging, and raging more, pushed beyond the limits of humanity. My gasping soul can find no air.
Thus I write then tear up a thousand arguments for my fate, followed by a thousand arguments more, ad infinitum, for I can neither be silent nor speak as the Court has ruled. If freedom's wish is so foully forbidden, I must ask of the driving fear behind it. Does the Court find direction by denying mine? Yes, you know you have no obligation to answer me, but does the Court believe it has no obligation to answer? Is time your friend in this matter, or a growing enemy that looms over you that grants no appeal? Is that why you would deny my request, because yours languishes in silent refusal?
I'm of two minds, but only while serving one does the other seem correct. From one mind I strain to reach the other, as visible as a rainbow but just as elusive. This is where my freedom lies, in this constant pull that allows me at least a false argument of hope to get through the passing day, but like a prison courtyard I travel in circles only to end up where I started, so even when trying something new the result is always the same, rendering a cruelly familiar feeling I've yet to escape since the beginning of this ordeal that is so certain of my guilt yet withholding explanation - supposing any concern on my part unwarranted - safely ensconced in stubborn ignorance by claiming justice may be served outside the purview of truth while courtly retaining the trappings of reason that gives comfort to the uninformed and the ill-tempered who wish to draw no ire so as to remain blind to their peril not realizing that only perpetuates it.
So you see, I ask you not to do for me, but to do for yourself. We shall wail together or sing together - but together it will be. It is not the impossible dream the prosecutor argues. The Rider on the Pale Horse has still not arrived, proving hope is still with us. I have no leg to stand on. How does one piece a ripped flower back to life? But to live without meaning can serve no one's interest. Love is coming to us all.
[Like a man walking the plank, each nervous step I took returning to the Court burned into my memory: the angle of the sunlight, the darkening of the corridors, the counting down of time, the inner debates, and the final fleeting excitement of knocking on the door one has the words to change the world and plant a flower anew. But this sign I did see:
COURT BARRED FOR COVID WILL NOT REOPEN CASE CLOSED
"Look, Harry, I don't wanna here nun yur shit 'bout how we gotta "do this", or gotta "do that". Shit gonna werk itself out juss fine withouts any help from you, OK? People gonna do what people gonna do." "How very COVID of you," I replied.
I've never told this story of when I was a kid. Looking back, what a frivolous time that was, when we could afford to waste time pretending the important was unimportant and the unimportant was important. Sort of like heatedly contesting a call on a tennis court while artillery flies over from an encroaching war. Ignore what's incoming at your peril. I guess it's always been like that, artillery is just getting closer now.
Jerilyn Hink's Dad sought to impress me. This must have been somewhere around when I first started high school. Don't know why he felt this need as I was sitting in the living room waiting for Jerilyn to get ready to go out with me. I'm sure he sensed I was feeling vulnerable before a date and as we all know, waiting is the hardest part. So he starts in.
"I was in Patton's Third Army in World War Two." OK. I hadn't seen the Patton movie at that time but knew enough that he spoke of a legendary force. I was yet to participate in any world wars, though. Score one for the home team. Don't remember much after that though I do remember thinking the history buff in me would of loved to of seen any memorabilia he had. But, alas, he did not offer and I didn't want to give him the opening. But I also got the feeling of a person trapped in time, that the war was his life and, returning home, his life was his war. I shuddered a bit, never looking at a world War II movie the same again. There were no victors.
The illusion of victory
Following year is when I got my godawful paper route. Seven day a week ball and chain but the pot of gold I got in return made it worthwhile. To get your money the onus was on the poor bastard carrier. You paid for the papers up front then got your profit on the back end, going house to house on your route collecting cash. I got such money from Rudolph Hessen at 1025 Mary Ellen street. That's a fucking address I'll never forget.
Privately, I called him "Adolph" as a joke on his German nationality. First few times it didn't register, then the pebble under my mattress got me to thinking. He's about the same age is Jerilyn's dad and I get from Adolph that same cold streak feeling. But he would have been on the other side with that thick German accent of his. But if he's over here and everyone's good with it and America is all shiny and new like we always claim, he couldn't have been a bad guy. Or if he was, he saw the error of his ways and became a nice, safe, greedy capitalist like the rest of us. I mean, he always paid me his paper bill on time (not the case with all my customers!). How bad could he be?
That was my metric for the time, anyway. All I wanted was girls.
But that feeling of inadequacy that Jerilyn's dad made me feel still irked me so I decided to open up to ol' Rudolph and pick his brain on his WWII experience and then at last I'd have a trump card I could finally play on Patton Third Army dude. The reply I got to my stumbling question was not what I expected.
At that time I'd never heard of Roman Polanski's masterpiece. Sure as hell didn't sound like a WWII movie! I replied in the negative.
Then he quotes this line: "Most people never face that at right time and right place, they are capable of anything."
The way he said that last word put the fear of God into me. It's the main reason I've never related this incident before. That was not something I wanted to face, either. What sort of sinister urges were lurking in me as I lusted after Jerilyn's oh-so-hot legs? God knows my desires overrode my guilt. But did that guilt make me a Nazi??
He was studying my face for my reaction. I didn't dare dig deeper. Then he gave me a crooked smile with those coffee stained teeth of his. "You want to know what I did in war? I was camp guard."
Years earlier - when I thought Hogan's Heroes was an accurate depiction - I checked out a book from the school library to read how we kicked German ass. All I recall of that book was the jaw-dropping feeling of horror I'd witnessed when finished. No way in hell I wanted to hear about his "camp" experiences. My little fucking plan blew up in my face.
I got out quick as I could though I felt Rudolph's eyes spying on me every inch of my escape. I gave up the paper route just so I'd never have to see him again. Only later, safe and alone, did I explore the feeling of that encounter further.
I tried to convince myself that maybe he mean prisoner-of-war camp. "The Great Escape" in keeping with the movie theme. But no one speaks like he did, emphasizing the word camp, unless he meant one of those camps. God damn him! Why is that beast roaming around free? He took a piece of my innocence.
Later, I took it even further. Things would happen over the years to trigger that hidden moment. I did get up the nerve to watch Chinatown in college and about jumped out of my skin when I heard the line Rudolph referenced. Other various episodes tested my stubborn blind eye. Only in the most solitary of moments did I ponder the atrocities committed. "Most people never face that at right time and right place, they are capable of anything." I could still hear that same Germanic cadence clear as day. At first, I wondered why he'd even share that with me, maybe he was even making it up. Then it hit me. He was as alone as I was when thinking of it - only more so.
These are the kind of mind worms that can invade you when you don't ever face yourself, susceptible to the most baseless of rumors. Rudolph was a miserable fucker no matter how badly I wanted to paint him with American made happiness. Out on my own, I discovered that dream to be a nightmare. The worst in us still wants to make life a tennis game, arguing over line calls as if they were life and death (and vice versa). But ugly reality keeps seeping in and it won't stop until it's all the way through. We're giving permission for people to be Nazis again. Maybe that's why ol' Rudolph smiled - he knew it'd come down to this.
The beginning of the end of her life began on a Tuesday morning - only she wasn't there. The Spring dew had just burned off by a rising sun as Nature had rubbed her eyes awake, filling the air with sweet scents of suburban grass and honeysuckle bushes and carefully arranged flowers. To an innocent, it was a chance to live forever, breathe in life's eternal promise long rejected by Mankind; a time to join to the infinite universe. Hope was all there was.
But the tragic figure who fell onto her front lawn from his exclusive world-class sports car had cut the strings of hope, leaving him with one final desperate act: Payback. To him, the shining bliss of the morning sun was a curious enemy to betray his shortcomings. Buying the stairway to heaven had been a devil's bargain and the bill had come due. The ugly repulsive gun he held under the chin was his last friend in the world. It did not torture him with questions, it simply obeyed. None of his other decisions had worked out - either from his own sabotage or Nature's refusal. All he asked was one moment where his will be done - for appearance's sake he would allege it to be God's.
He kept waiting for the moment of interference that always sidetracked his plans. What would it be this time? A neighbor rushing in in the nick of time? A sudden downpour from the blue sky? Or maybe a failure of physics with the gun malfunctioning. It's always something.
"Time to put God to the test."
His body lurched forward with the shot, leaving a twisted lump of tragic lawn art. Within the hour she'd been horrified at her downtown office. She needed to come home right away. An unthinkable event had occurred.
A month before she'd received an unsigned post card in the mail: I AM IN TROUBLE. The words were printed with a shaky hand, infuriating her to the bone. "I'm sorry, I cannot help you! Don't do this to me. Leave me alone! Go your own way."
But the card had no ears and under no circumstance would she speak to the sender directly. He'd made his bed and now he could die in it for all she knew. "I am not your savior!" How could her silence not make him understand? She was pushing 40, childless and alone. She kept her door closed lest he walk in. That kept everyone else out too.
The police cars, the hearse, the yellow tape, the curious onlookers, and the oblivious bees greeted her arrival. The downtown job she had taken was supposed to have given her life meaning. It had failed. Pulling into her driveway she couldn't help but feel a connection between the sight on her front lawn and the void in her own life. Damn him! Painful, awkward questions would attack her like Custer's last stand. She was perfectly trapped. They'd seen her drive up. She couldn't stay in the car. She couldn't hide in the house. Inquiring minds wanted to know.
"Do you know this man?" "What was the nature of your relationship?" "Had he contacted you recently?" "Why would he come here if you barely knew him?" "A note in the car said: 'Now you know the truth.' What does that mean to you?" "We're going to need a full statement."
In my time of dying
She begged off claiming illness in her stomach. She burst into the house, scaring the beloved cat. She gulped a glass of hastily drawn water wishing she could exchange places with the lifeless form outside. None of the old escape tricks would work. Yes, this must have been the same doomed sinking feeling of foolishness Custer felt. But neither then nor now was an accident of fate.
The next few days and weeks were a drunken blur. In her previous life she was a political junkie cursing the governmental policies of perpetually kicking the day of reckoning down the road. "You can't go on like that. It only makes it worse!" The immediacy of her own dilemma made those thoughts yesterday's news. A steady drinker her entire adult life, she immersed herself whole hog as even the slightest whiff of sobriety sent her into a tailspin of black unreality. How can this be happening to me? I can't go on like this. I can't go on...
Sympathetic friends and neighbors offered support but reserved an eye for judgement. She'd had to of done something to bring this on. She knew his name. It was not random. Had she help drive the poor man to suicide? What was the real story? Spoken or not, the demand was there. Again, no way forward. How could her silence not make them understand?
The FOR SALE sign went up soon after. But upon thinking it through, where could she go? She didn't want to run across her neighbors at the grocery store where she'd be pointed out as That Suicide Woman. Yet she'd grown up in this part of town and yearned to keep her roots. Should she move to new jack city, be a stranger with a mysterious past? The literary side of her loved that story-line but she had no desire to live a life of sighing lies. In fact, it was her hidden desire to be a literary star that led to this trap. How ironic that in her efforts to avoid public embarrassment by secreting her dream she'd constructed that very outcome - irreversibly. Nature collects in full.
The relationship with him was supposed to be safely buried, perpetually kicking the day of reckoning down the road. They'd once shared a harmony in their words, reaching a place not to be found apart. But how real was this dream? Rather than face the possible ruination of lifelong ridicule, they aborted the dream in its womb. Later, he realized his fears had driven him too far, reaching out to her over the years in vain hope. In his final act of desperation, he'd branded her for life.
"Dream or die," she wordlessly cried. How could anyone not understand her silence?
Three samurai leaned forward in hushed tones over a table at Takagi's Noodle Shop. The square wooden cups of sake had been heavily used, absorbed by their grief. As usual, Takagi's was bustling that evening but the high-ranking men were not disturbed by the surrounding patrons - especially with such serious looks on the faces of these three. Something was not right in the Owari clan.
"I admit it. Something is wrong with Tashima. I did not want to see it, but after today I have to say he's no longer one of us.
"I've been telling you! Ever since the Osaka trip! Something happened."
"But Nakamura found nothing when we sent him! He retraced every step."
"That was two months after Tashima. The trail was cold by then. Whatever incident occurred is lost to the four winds."
Their ruminations were drenched in the sorrow of a lost friendship. Tashima's ready wit had made him a hero to the other three. Many generations removed from the unification of Japan and the time of war, boredom was an enemy difficult to slay, of which Tashima was a hearty fighter. Rituals and ceremonies came and went, but the long drawn out days lingered on, stifled by political intrigues that flowed from the Shogun down to the clans. Being unambitious and apolitical gave the group an air of freedom they relished in these stagnant times.
But now Tashima was one of them, the plotters and seekers of power; men who rotted from within. Maru's beheading proved today it once and for all.
"Suspicious" was the word that kept coming up after Tashima's return from Osaka. "He's suspicious of everyone," grumbled his colleagues. It was if he walked down the street with one eye looking over his shoulder. Had he made an enemy on his trip? Who would dare attack a clan member in Edo, the Shogun's capital? No one understood what had to be a baseless fear on Tashima's part.
Paired with this new fear came a lust for power. Like a seeping dam it started slowly then burst forth amid Tashima's naked power grabs. The very people he previously so piercingly mocked became his courted allies. Tashima turned his wit on anyone who got in his way, cruel and unjust in his words to please to the elders' ears. An honest clan was hard to find in Tokugawa era Japan and Owari was no exception as their leader craved flattery with a constant hunger.
Tashima framed Maru in order to take his place. It was an open secret. Apparently the elders' gave their blessing for Tashima's treachery, telling him to find a pretext for Maru's removal. With this act, Tashima's transformation was complete.
The old Tashima was sorely missed by the three grieving samurai at the noodle shop. Frustration, anger, sorrow oscillated through them like a roller coaster in an endless loop. They wanted to save him, to curse him, to let him go - then repeated the cycle of emotions.
"It does not matter what happened in Osaka! That was six months ago. He's lost to us."
"But if we knew we might save him!"
"He will never speak. A demon took his soul along the trail. Perhaps a sly fox swindled him, and it's the fox's foul soul that has taken over."
It was with no pleasure Tashima's former friends began to refer to him as "Kitsune" [The Fox Spirit] behind his back. The name gave a rationale to his sordid ways, an explanation that could be understood. These things happen, they mused, however painful the outcome. Still, a gnawing nagging feeling remained that the fox was not done. His mayhem was leading to meifumadō, the demon path to hell. It's one thing to hear of a Kitsune taking possession, but to see it with one's own eyes!
The hushed tones of the samurai that night were part of a larger "quieting" in the clan. Kitsune were greatly feared for their cunning and wiliness and to underestimate one could prove fatal. But how to defeat one? No one knew. In helpless awe, the clan warriors observed Tashima's ascent. The elder's encouraged the Kitsune talk as they felt that increased their power - even as they failed to realize the fox was coming for them too. The next few years saw terror go unchecked, no recourse found in either man or nature.
Tashima's old gang had moved long passed dejection to resignation.
"How cruel the ways of nature! One minute a man, the next minute a fox."
"But Tashima was smart! Would take an exceptionally tricky fox to get the best of him."
"But look how clever this fox has been! He's unstoppable in his rampage, making wild accusations against everyone, no matter how false. Everyone sides with him even though they know better. This is an exceptionally cunning beast."
As time passed, Tashima's voice became the loudest in the clan, even over the leader (who also deferred to him in fear). With palms facing each other, he made the fox's gestures as he spoke, moving them in and out as he summoned hell's energies straight from the river Styx. With this, no matter how false his words, no one could refute them and survive. Any accusation - or any praise - could be leveled at any time. The worst and the weakest defended Tashima vociferously so that they may gain the fox's favor even as the flow of banishments and beheadings wrought the most outrageous evils never before seen in the thousand year history of the clan. It all seemed to happen in the blink of eye.
When Tashima was made leader, wild celebrations were had as the Owari had changed from a clan to a cult. They'd assumed an arrogance, a supposed superiority, over rival clans who stupidly clung to a sense of reality. The fox clan had mastered truth, they claimed. The Owari had become the talk of Edo - though to the disgust as many who despised them as followed them. Then the Shogun announced an upcoming mandatory meeting of all clan leaders at historic Osaka castle.
"I'm doomed!" cursed Tashima to his closest confidants.
Even as chief accuser of conspiracies, Tashima was also chief conspirator. His eager sycophants asked what they could do to help to prevent his fall from power.
"Find Sozoku The Rat in Osaka! Find him at all costs and kill him!"
Sozoku the Rat was a legendary drunkard and swordsman of Osaka. Unlike a regular man, drink increased Sozoku's skill - even he not remembering the feats he executed while drunk. But he was also notoriously unaccepting of fools and loudmouths he came across. And Tashima had been such a loudmouth.
As a young cocky samurai sent on an important errand for the clan, Tashima loved testing his rapier wit in a city he dearly wanted to impress. In practice, his swordplay was exemplary but he was untested, never having been forced to face himself. Riding this was wave of invincibility, he dueled Sozoku in a battle of wits at the legendary Shimada Shoten sake bar. Tashima won this battle however not realizing it would lead to a further battle - of swords. With a surrounding and knowing crowd, Sozoku displayed the bedazzling skill he'd use to "slice the topknot off" Tashima's head. Had that had happened Tashima would have been disgraced for life and his family name ruined. His mouth had written a check he could not pay.
Facing certain ruin - and a bloated bladder of drink - a puddle formed at his feet much to the amusement of numerous onlookers who quickly dubbed him "Hakama ki" [Yellow Pants]. Tashima ran as a scalded cat deep into the night, having failed to face himself, never to trust again. If only he'd hadn't been so cocky! If only...if only...if only...
Naturally, this was not the tale Tashima told his inner group. He slandered Sozoku as a born liar who'd say "the nastiest of things for no reason" and he hated Tashima for having bested him in both "sword and word." Incensed and outraged, Kitsune followers swore to avenge him, their lives had meaning. The Fox smiled.
Unfortunately, as a worshiper of incompetence and a having a perpetual need for adoration, Tashima had only the the clumsiest of fools close to him. Blindly rushing to Osaka guns in hand, five assassins shot down Sozoku - and all five were promptly arrested. Having incredibly failed to remove the Owari insignia before committing their crime, a trial was demanded of Tashima to explain his men's actions. The Kitsune knew only one playbook.
"It's a hoax! These accusations are lies made by my enemies! I barely know those five men. What are their names again? Someone told me but I forgot. The facts are lying to you all!"
The Shogun tribunal was the buzz of Edo. While the Kitsune was vehemently decrying the process as "rigged", he maniacally did his best to rig it in his favor, offering huge bribes to the corrupt judges of his fate. While many of his detractors we sure the truth would doom The Fox at last, he manged to stave off revelation on the back of the weakness of his fellow man. The Fox rejoiced in his triumph of evil under the sun, safely harbored in Nippon's downward spiral ending in two atomic explosions to jolt them back to reality.
CODA: Two centuries later in a land far, far away, a corrupt but successful businessman spawned a child. The boy had dyslexia, an undiagnosed condition for the time. He did poorly in school, as would be expected, wrongly feeling himself inferior to his classmates. These Sozoku moments of embarrassment he felt he had to hide at all cost. Forever trying to live up to his father, he dedicated his life to creating an illusion of success for himself. Though wanting to be a successful businessman as his highest goal, he bankrupted six companies in a row - yet sill refused to admit his failures. He turned to the only type who'd consort with him: criminals. In crime he found his calling - but even more need to cover up!
He too ascended to be leader of his country, ruining countless lives, putting blood on his hands, doing irreparable harm to the planet, waging war on reality itself. And once again, out of the smallest of incidents, the greatest of tragedies can come.
Two men jump off a building. On the way down one says to the other, "How's it going?" "So far so good!" he replies.
***** Two men jump off a building. On the way down one says to the other, "Hey, I think we fucked up!" "I'd appreciate you not using that kind of language around me." "Why, thank you! That's an important topic considering our present situation."
***** Two men jump off a building. One realizes they're wearing parachutes. "Hey, do you think we should open our chutes?"
"No! Then we'd have to admit we did something stupid in the first place and people would laugh and make fun of us."
"Don't you think it would be worse if we hit the concrete and die wearing unopened chutes??"
On the way down first one says to the other, "How's it going?"
"So far so good!" replies the second.
Noticing the oncoming concrete, the first says, "Hey, I think we fucked up!"
"I'd appreciate you not using that kind of language around me."
"Why, thank you! That's an important topic considering our present situation."
"What situation? You sound like one of those negative nabobs."
"You sound like one of those dimwit deniers."
"Do I look dead to you? You should learn to be more appreciative of what you have. Right now, give me a list of ten things you're happy about or everyone will will know what an ingrate you are! Number one for me is we're having beautiful weather today."
First one realizes they're wearing parachutes. "Hey, don't you think we should open our chutes?"
"No! Then we'd have to admit we did something stupid in the first place and people would laugh and make fun of us."
"Don't you think it would be worse if we hit the concrete and die wearing unopened chutes??"
"I refuse to live my life at the mercy of so-called reality. Facts are for losers. I make my own facts."
"History will speak ill of you!"
"I'm a winner not a whiner - and winners write history! I ask you again, do I look dead to you?? You can't win this argument long as I'm alive!"
The first one pulled his rip cord, rocketing upward to salvation. The second one hit the concrete in instantaneous death.
"Well, I guess he won the argument if not his life."
A war-torn smoldering planet of rubbish. Seas littered with debris to last a thousand millenniums. Air destroyed, infected with disease and pollution. Deforested land, sapped of minerals for growth. Water poisoned from factories and a fractured earth. Heaping piles of toxic waste like boils upon the planet. The point of no return had passed. The damage irreversible. From paradise found to paradise lost.
And God asked, "Why?" "Sorry, God, we had no choice." A migrant farm worker spraying poison on food replied, "This is my job. I have to do it or my family dies. No choice." The farmer replied, "I have to spray on poison or lose too much of the crop and I die. No choice." The corporation that owned the farm replied, "We have to maximize production or we go out of business and we'll die.No choice." A shareholder in the corporation replied, "If the stock falls I lose everything and I'll die. No choice." The shareholder's child replied, "If I rebel my parents will cut me off and I'll die. No choice." The child's teacher replied, "If I teach them not to obey I'll get fired and die. No choice." The teacher's principal replied, "I have to make the parents happy or they'll leave me to die. No choice." The taxpayers who funded the schools replied, "We have to support the schools or the government takes our homes and we die. No choice."
The leader of the government replied, "If I don't give the people what they want I'll fall from power and die. No choice." A wealthy man who supported the leader replied, "I have to make it so I can take all I can or others will take all from me and I'll die. No choice." The wealthy man's wife replied, "I must support my husband or I'll be divorced and die. No choice." Their priest replied, "I must support those of means for the church to survive or the church will die. No choice." A finance man who attended the church replied, "I must worship my numbers or be left to die. No choice." A polluting factory owner replied, "I must do what the finance man says or lose my factory and die. No choice."
Military men who defended the factories replied, "We must follow orders to kill or we will die. No choice." The military's nation replied, "We must make war on the world or we'll all die. No choice." The world's liars replied, "If we tell the truth we'll be crucified and die. No choice." Then God replied,"As always, I'll take you at your word. Nothing can be done. Goodbye." The world replied, "But wait! You can do anything! You're free to do what You want! Please give us a world where we can live." God replied,"I'm sorry, but when you say you have no choice you leave meno choice."
The void of night awoke Masa. Looking over to his right, Hisaka was gone. The bed's emptiness had jarred his slumber. He expected himself to panic, to return to the days of the Sinking Feeling, before Hisaka. Instead, his mind went into a free fall, abandoning any cares, entering a state of rest. It will be alright. The entirety of his being wished to return to his slumber, not wondering where Hisaka had gone. He lived resignedly in a time of trust.
In a quiet pond, a pebble is as a boulder when tossed within. So Masa's movement, though slight, made ripples of uneasiness he could not deny. He got out of bed, putting on his summer yukata, and ventured forth against his desire.
She was nowhere in the house. It bothered him that this did not bother him. Why didn't he enter into a state of anxiety? Did he not truly care for her? Was he just using her as an escape? Had the dream been too good to be true, after everything that had happened?
The honeymoon phase had ended. No longer fresh, the marriage was ripe to mature to the next phase of growth. Masa had never been down that road before. With his hand in hers, the universe was their natural playground. It seemed obvious this was intended for them all along. In the misery of his previous life, he'd felt that was his just desserts for crime or crimes committed. In pure unworthy faith he'd asked to meet a soul like Hisaka. That he actually did was both shocking and expected.
"Must I live at the mercy of small minds?"
But had he been alone too long? Had he been selfish to bring her back to the rural life he loved so dearly? Surely, her love of nature was not an act and she loved the majesty of the mountains and the prehistoric scents of the fields as much as him. But she'd come from the city and Masa's experience was that urbanites often worship at the temple of prosperity as a singular goal. Hisaka was from a rich merchant family. Did some part deep inside still yearn for that world? Her towering purity made her a god in his eyes - and she was presently nowhere to be found. Masa stepped outside onto the back deck.
Go back to bed, you idiot. It's Hisaka! She has never let you down in even the slightest way. The stars are laughing at the sight of you wandering around.
Masa's sudden self-consciousness was belied by a flicker of light from the tea house in the far corner of their garden. His lips released a small smile.
OK, now will you go back to bed, baka-san?
He bargained with his better angel he'd move quietly so she'd never know of his checking on her. Unfortunately, he would know. But Masa backslid to his former ways of not facing the life before him.
The stone pathway was cool and smooth under the floating Japanese moon. The urge to stand on the path and enter timeless eternity was overpowering, like a lost childhood dream. So he did, Masa raising his hands to the sky in communion with streaming emanations, and if the archangel Gabriel appeared or the sky lit up with thousands of flaming meteors or a UFO landed welcoming him aboard, he'd have thought nothing of it. He was alive on a dying planet and the whole of the world should celebrate a victory to be shared.
We die for no reason. I was dying for no reason.
Uncontainable joy flowed through his arms, encircling the globe, skyrockets as night. Feeling himself once again, Masa continued to the warm glow of their tea house. He was fortuitous in his juvenation, for that gave him the strength to face the vision he found.
"Ura Kage!" he whispered in awe. Double shadow.
Hisaka was sitting forward writing calligraphy, a favorite practice of hers, in front of a lone candle, but she cast two shadows on the wall. She was a god with two souls. Masa had her soul of the sun's day, he knew. But of the moon? Was that soul his too? He'd never come across someone of Hisaka's breadth to cast a rear shadow. His rapidly blinking eyes could not confirm what he was seeing. Then she stopped writing, sitting back on her haunches, as if she'd realized something. Hisaka spoke softly, staring at her handiwork.
"Arigato! Arigato! I could never write like this before. This is the best of my life. Together we soar. I am so proud."
As Masa crawled forward even with her, Hisaka did not turn her head. They each wept healing tears as a single shadow danced on heaven's wall.
I turned down the sound on the TV as I heard a clawing, scratching sound on my front door. My small apartment easily gives away my movements so I stayed on the couch and instead opened the Ring app on my phone to view outside. Frida! It's fricking Frida. She looks awful. Look at her hair sticking out everywhere, like she's been pulling on it for days. She's sliding down on her knees...crap, she's twisting the door knob!
Luckily, I keep the door locked at all times. But she was not letting up.
"Let me in! My blood! My blood is poisoned..."
Her fingernails kept trying to dig into the hardwood door but to no avail. Her voice was raspy and ragged as if she'd been screeching for hours. I hadn't seen her in ages. I thought she hated my guts like when all my relationships end. Of all people, she turns to me. Is there significance in that? Or maybe I was just the closest port in a storm.
"Mad dogs are coming. You've got to help me! My poisoned blood dripping. They'll eat me alive!"
Hard to imagine anything more horrific than being eaten alive by mad dogs. Yet it has to be. Happens every day and I'm left helplessly witnessing and waiting.
"I can't hide. I've got nowhere to go. I don't want to die like this. I'm sorry I lied."
Lied - to me?? She never lied to me. I was the liar. I ran away like always.
"Pleeeease! I want to share with you. Come be with me. I'm nothing without you."
She really started clawing and scratching even harder, like a desperate animal trying to get out of a cage. I was frozen immobile on the couch, watching on my phone this crazed creature I barely recognized. Would it kill me if I let it in? I certainly got that impression.
"Do it, damn you! My insides are burning. There's nothing left, just rot and stench - rot and stench everywhere! You have to know what's happening."
I felt the pressure growing. She's going to die at my front door. Everyone will know I didn't let her in. I looked at the floor where the 5 o'clock sun seeped in through the blinds as if it were a sign of life. I needed to live. Was that my future outside the door? She had turned on herself. Frida had done so many wrong things she'd driven herself beyond the ragged edge. The hounds of revelation were upon her. There was a time we could have been something, I know. Does she think that time still exists?
Next I heard wails I'll never forget as the hounds caught up to her and everything she denied could no longer be evaded. It was savage hearing her eaten alive. I too have no way of sharing. My love sits on an empty shelf gathering dust, withering in the dark, praying for hope. But I always thought Frida had her shit together and was better off without the likes of me. I have my own hounds on my trail, just further away.
Then, in a sudden flash of horror, I realized I needed to get off the couch and check the mirror - and this is what I found:
A deceived child of the modern world found an ancient manuscript telling of a time before order and structure had come to her land. A time when predators roamed freely as laws were but a whisper rarely heard - and what could be heard was mostly orders to pay tributes to a distant emperor. How could a burgeoning nation survive with no check on chaos? Men of fighting skills used their wits to enrich themselves. The only community was a fabric of taking for oneself. Anything else was viewed as chains.
An organized nation would find easy pickings invading this island country. Piecemeal resistance would be no match for those disciplined in war. Even the predators who stood atop the mountain would fall. No one cared, though. No other way allowed for the freedom to live - even if the predators wrought cruelty under the sun. Why fight when there's nothing to fight for? Days simply pass until one surrenders to the void.
But perhaps every civilization has roots in a mother's love.
"What are going to do, lady? Your daughter is very beautiful! I'll take her as a prize to the river camp. My men will be pleased!"
In a time before swords he held a club in his filthy hand, dragging the girl away with his other filthy hand down the village street. He expected the girl's mother to scream and wail as happened in past abductions. The fact the woman's steady gaze did not leave him placed a ball of burning agony within.
"What power do you have to stop me? What are you looking at? You waste your time!"
His unkempt hair hung to the sides of his head, flailing outwards as his head kept swiveling back to look at the eyes that would not leave him. Then mother Jingū held out her hand in supplication for the return of her daughter.
"Shut up, you stupid woman! It's a man's world and we take what we want." He was about ten yards away now and wondered why this infuriating woman didn't give in. "You're a stupid fool!"
The hand remained the same.
"Put down that hand or I will put it down for you!" The predator halted, waiting for his demand to be complied. What he felt - what he could not articulate - was that his control was slipping away. Logically, he had no reason to stop. His strength and size was twice of hers. And yet he had stopped dead in his tracks, which enraged him to no end.
"Lower that hand or I will come and teach you a lesson." He'd roughed up people before and everyone in the village knew his reputation. He expected his arrow of fear to penetrate Jingū's heart. Instead, she began to sing.
A monkey in the Sannô shrine loves his red suit.
The monkey was invited by the Ebisu god last evening.
He was served a bowl of soup and grilled sea bream.
He drank up the first cup of sake wine and
The second cup of sake.
When the third cup came,
All the dishes were finished and he got angry.
What should he be?
"You dare mock me? Now you shall pay with your life!"
His large body rumbled towards her but as he got nearer she started to run. He screamed at her to halt as her smaller frame was too quick for him. "Run all you want! You shall not survive the night!"
He'd found what he wanted: an enemy on whom he could blame all his woes. Kill her and my problems are solved! The more she eluded him, the more this thought possessed him. He chased his fury as a dog chasing its tail. Soon, he began to falter from exhaustion. When this happened, Jingū would come closer, holding out her supplicant hand once again. At this point the predator was like a chained animal drug through the streets. He couldn't let go. To stop is to lose! And so he persisted until he was crawling exhaustedly on the ground in vain pursuit.
She towered over him with her outstretched hand. A few onlookers had noticed the spectacle and began to gather round, laughing at the pathetic sight of the prone predator. Hearing this enraged him further, using the last of his energy pounding the ground with his club at the feet of Jingū. As the howls of laughter increased, the madman's heart seized as his mind seized with madness' final possession. He slumped to the ground, never to rise again.
In Jingū's heart was room only for love. She would not let anything get in the way of that. That night was a turning point in the course of the village - and from that village to the next until the truth of what Jingū revealed had spread across the consciousness of the land. The internal struggle had begun. No sheriff nor sword can give life in the end. Only love can do that. All else will be seized by death like a thief in the night.
Please, please, please, let's stop with this "love" business. Love is going to get us killed. It ruin everything it touches. If you want to love something cool like a Maserati that be fine. Just don't be some wild ass crazy mofo lovin' love. That shit don't fly. Never has! Never will!
It be embarrassing even havin' to explain this. But we got hard times right now and crazy talk seepin' in 'bout change, but we gots to remain vigilant against such crazy! Stay the course, peeps! Don't be throwin' away thousands of years of Mankind's work first time something go wrong. Things gone wrong before! Ever see them change course?? Hell to the no, they didn't. We gotta honor our ancestors and keep living just like we always has.
Business is business. And without it we're nothing. You want to go live in "harmony with Nature" or some other fairy tale, go ahead, find you a comfy cave! Rest of us will stick with the real world, thank you very much. Nothing - and I mean nothing - can get in the way of business. Nature be here to serve us - not the other way around. We already got things figured out how they should be and us rich folks is living just fine. And them that got nothin' need something to live for. Don't be taking away their hope and dreams, you radical monsters!
Ya'll nutball idiots really want to give this up? No fucking way!!
We don't call it the "Almighty Dollar" for nothin'. We didn't put "In God We Trust" on them dollars because we don't. God loves money and wants you to have all you can get. After that, you can do all the lovin' you want. But get the dollar first. That how we built the greatest country in the world - just like God intended. If some peeps gotta die to keep our money business goin' then guess what? That must be what God wants! Just like when Him wanted us to kill Jesus so we could be saved.
Do you want to see everything we built done be destroyed? You want to see people starving and homeless in the streets? You want to see whole freakin' world come apart at the seams?? Then go ahead and put love first and see where it gets ya. I hear what them crazies say trying to lead you down the wrong path. They say we never tried putting love first. Well, of course not! Ain't never tried jumping off cliffs neither! Some things just so obvious wrong you never try them if ya got any sense. Times is hard, I know that. And we'll get through them just fine - just so long we don't be losin' our heads and turn to love.
