In God We Mistrust

This calls for wisdom:

Let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast,

for it is the number of a man,

and his number is 666.

If we really trusted God money wouldn't exist!

In Tarrant County (Fort Worth), the property tax assessor sends out his notices with "In God We Trust" stamped on them in large block letters multiple times. He does not do this because he trusts God! Rather, it's money we truly trust to "save" us. A man's religion in the truest sense is in what he places the safeguarding of his life. If God is love then when is the last time you saw someone trusting love? It happens, but rarely.

But of course we have to say we trust God, especially when we emblazon it on our very own golden calf. The total mass power of this mutual agreed delusion is equal to a million billion suns. The amount of energy bent to keep the fiction of money alive is not comprehensible at this point. But rest assured we are bending the universe and when we finally give out and the universe irrevocably snaps back into place, we will be in for the shock of a lifetime - all our lifetimes, that is. To admit we are committing this horrible sin of waste is too horrible to confess.

Yet we must.

"Let me know if the numbers work." It's a phrase we say without thinking. It's a comforting phrase for it implies we can boil life down to something concrete and finite. It also absolves us of responsibility as we pretend to be helpless before the numbers beast. Put pollution controls on cement kilns? Put food in front of every man, woman and child? Let everyone work as much as they need? Only "numbers" can answer those questions. If the numbers say no then we poison our land, air, and water in petrified paralysis while claiming purity of heart.

They called him an hippie communist anarchist -
then had him crucified.

In Flint, the numbers said to poison the people. We are so contaminated by the beast we think nothing of it, only alleged radicals and anarchists are outraged. But it those who are not outraged who are the radicals and anarchists, destroyers of the world. So successful is the lie pontificating the beast gives us order and safety that causalities in that cause are acceptable. We poison for the greater good! Yet, were I to feed lead to a single child I'd be called a monster for the ages.

In the Sixties we dreamed the dream - but never lived it. When the dream does come for real, the unleashing of energy will be a supernova as we are no longer beholden to maintaining this binding fiction. Sauron's ring lives. Our rage and seething intensifies with every passing day, furious at our lack of freedom, fighting shadow monsters in mock resistance, waiting in agony for the dam to break. It's fucking excruciating. And only gets worse until resolved.

Still not convinced? Well, Nature always has the final say. It's funny watching us dictate to the universe. High priests of the economic religion spout infamous nonsense parsed from the soul. We bless our perfidy from on high, awed by the power of propaganda, thinking ourselves clever in worship of the number beast. If you think the lie only a small twist, unimportant and "understandable", perhaps even (laughably) prudent, then consider how you'd feel this is what our money looked like - and if you could even bear it.

Who we are without money is who we truly are

Fall From Disgrace: An Assassin's Confession

Look at them. Stupid sheep herded along to their next assigned destination, fighting for table scraps from their masters who laugh as they scramble in dutiful obedience like abused children clinging to their abusers. Suckers looking to lottery wins as their only hope because each day is the same, stuck in the same rut until death, celebrating a life that never was. They don't care. They don't know how to care. This world gets colder by the day.

Asset 47 walked away from the window in disgust. He'd read about the poisoning of the Flint, Michigan water, a crime so vile and incomprehensible it should be an outrage heard around the world.

But it's not.

Because sheep don't care what you do to them. Especially in the name of the money god. Asset 47 was fully aware of the vile actions the government is capable of doing. He knew the secret spectator thrill the sheep got from looking the other way as evil is committed in their name, thinking that same evil would never attack them. The evildoers delight in this, knowing the rot it causes in the sheep's souls, guilt disabling them from fighting back. That's what gives the evildoers their edge: they know no guilt.

The more he saw of the world, the more Asset 47 took comfort in his path. You can't fight the government. You can't expect the sheep to fight - ever - even if their own lives are on the line. The game is rigged from top to bottom, from puppet peasants to puppet Presidents. But he was going to be on the winning side. Fuck the people. Fuck the assholes he worked for. They deserve each other. By burrowing so deeply inside the system, by being willing to do what others wouldn't, he had the power of the world working for him, not against him.

What exactly was everyone else thinking?

Asset 47 didn't know and didn't care. He got to live the Glorious Lie. Lying for a purpose is sweet. The Invisible Man. He was out of the sewer of poisoned politics, leeching layoffs, and the rest of the insanity careening ever further out of control. His fortress was impregnable. All of society would have to fall before his turn came to pass. The wrongs he committed were desperately denied by everyone but a few disregarded radicals.

Who is left to live? The Nazism of corporations silently creeps through soul after soul like the Angel of Death. At last, a holocaust no one will declare unholy! "Can this be true? Can it really be happening?" Thoughts too horrible for a sheep to bear. The bad shepherds have led the sheep astray from the lush lands until life is nothing more but a mad scramble for survival. That way no one notices the betrayal of the shepherds who are still hailed as good even as the flock dies.

To make his way of life work, Asset 47 knew he could have no vulnerabilities. No family, no pets, no dreams. Nothing outside himself to be used against him. Wholly self-contained. Half the world is trying to save the world from itself. Other half trying to destroy it. No one trying to save their soul. No, that would require stepping out from the pack, finding your own way, a life apart. And that's exactly where Asset 47 wanted to be, looking outside the window a man on the inside.

In movies, to create more interesting conflict, assassins are sent after each other quite often. In real life, it happens so rarely as to be negligible. They are a brotherhood in a club that values its aloof culture above all. Taking out a fellow member would be most distasteful. Even with the scarcity of contact, your fellow assassin is the nearest to family you have - and that need stays regardless of choices to the contrary.

Asset 47 had sweat stained dreams of which he would never speak. He knew his brothers in killing had those same unspeakable dreams. That was their bond. You could see it in their eyes. Asset 47 never forgot those faraway looks he glanced. The recognition. The sense of so many parallel lives kept him alive in the middle of the night screams. Every asset grasps onto those same lifelines.

But now they were to be broken.

Asset 47 never feared an attack from within. He was apolitical, apathetic, and unapologetic. Play games, he did not. But his masters were not so quite religious on those points. While loving and cherishing their assassin toys, the idea of feeling beholden rankled them on occasion, causing that rare order to go out: destroy a toy. A proper pretext was dutifully found, a necessary evil, no choice; their hands were bound. But really, it came down to the simple desire to kill and feed the insecurity to feel in control.

Asset 47 always thought if he were to be killed the most perfect time would be during his weekly walk in the countryside. But his calculating mind also figured that since that was so obvious, no one would dare take that chance lest they fall into a trap. Sometimes a psychological barrier is the most impenetrable. But this one he overvalued.

The first shotgun blast did not kill him. Wasn't meant to. Asset 47 saw his own blood for the first time. His killer was chosen for his quiet ruthless cruelty, one who wouldn't hesitate to rip the fabric of the fraternity; cold to the core. But every living creature has its appetite and the Cold One fed on the fear of his victims: maim first.

In Asset 47 he found a gold mine of dread.

"No! No! Don't do it! Don't kill me!" The totality of terror of a wasted life hit Asset 47 in thundering avalanche. "I lied! I've been lying. I don't want to die like this!"

The Cold One could not repress the smirk that came to his lips. Stupid fool thinking of life! How pathetic. The idiot has done everything he could to sabotage his life. What was he expecting? A dream come true? Naw, man. Only thing you got coming is the nightmares you been hidin'. You really thought you could escape? Dumb ass bitch.

"You don't understand! She's not coming back. She's never coming back...Oh, God, this can't be happening to me!" This is turning into a mercy killing. Too late for love. How big a lie you been livin'? Time to die. "I don't want to die. Help me to live! Somebody please help me? There's nothing for me now. She won't talk to me. I can't live with this! I can't go on. I can't...I can't...," Asset 47 sobbed.

"You don't have to," informed the Cold One, finishing the job, more grateful than ever that his turn had not come.

But come it did - as he too entered the long line of Fatal Futile Men finding out too late what they really wanted in life.

The Last Rodeo

"A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do."

The words echoed lightly around the captive audience in the cramped gymnasium. Charlie took an emotional swallow like he always did making these speeches.

"That's what I told myself. Bullheaded stubborn is what I was. Not wanting to admit to reality. I thought I was indestructible. I thought if...I though if I believed it hard enough it would be true. And I did believe it. Real hard. Still, it was creepin' up on me how it was getting harder and harder to believe. But I didn't listen. I didn't do what a man had to do. And that's how that bronc put me in this wheelchair...for the rest of my life."

An active soul since his youth, Charlie's existence in the wheelchair laid forth a cruel fate he could not understand. He loved his life growing up on the farm with its vast vistas over the flat plains of the Texas panhandle. A boy could dream anything he wanted out there and becoming a rodeo champ consumed his life. It was his destiny, in fact. All the breaks rolled his way; a natural on the circuit. The smells, the rhythms, the anticipation - rodeo life fed him and thrilled him in one long continuation of his boyhood dream.

But a dream come true can cut both ways. Stepping outside the arena back into the "real world" angered Charlie. There, the supposed golden child didn't get all breaks he felt he deserved. Over time the anger devolved into rage. As a famous champion, his tantrums and outbursts were tolerated and even hushed up. "The price of genius," some would say. Unhelpful friends made excuses for him. Those who rode his coattails only wanted to keep the party going.

He'd met Terri, a phlebotomist, in a hospital after an accident. She was everything he wasn't and her honest humor and thousand watt smile stole his heart away. Charlie figured marriage would be just like learning to ride a wild bronco. He'd already figured that out as the answer to life - only he couldn't rope his problems and tie them away so easily. Terri refused to be caged and since Charlie refused to see any other way things could work he misconstrued her actions as a refusal of his love.

The most maddening part of those years was his feeling of a grand but vague foolishness. Part of him felt like he was on the precipice of paradise and the other a step away from doom. The constant questions and unreality swirled in his head - made worse when a bottle was added. He withdrew more then ever into the ring, the only place of clarity. There he could "win". In so-called real life winning was a miasmic mystery.

When the marriage ended, seeds of doubt first entered his mind. Maybe he hadn't had life figured out after all. His sense of destiny started to crumble. He'd had it all for a while, right? Didn't that prove him right in his life's choices? Why had it stopped working? Charlie was so certain he'd found the Answer. So proud and confident. But now...

One morning he pulled up to the arena in whatever town it happened to be. Charlie stopped the truck but something kept him inside. It was as if he was lost, plunked down in a foreign land. He didn't even know what was doing there. His childhood sun was gone from the sky. The glistening railings didn't want him anymore. The pull to stay in the truck and not move was overwhelming. Just let go and never come back.

But a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.

Charlie had never suffered a serious injury - until that day. Everything was off: his timing, his feeling, his heart. He wanted to quit the circuit and run back to Terri, to work on fixing what needed fixing until it was fixed. That scared the hell out of him. How could he commit his life to something that might never happen? How could he...fail? Nobody knew his need for her, they only knew of his glistening career. In the arena he was regarded as brave beyond doubt. He must stay in that cloud at all costs. To be labeled a coward would be to wipe out his life's work.

The force of will required for him to continue rose to draining levels he could never sustain. Charlie knew if he kept on that course he would die. His drinking got heavier and more violent, events so bad they could not be covered up. "I know I'm going to die. Just don't let it be today." Reduced to that final pathetic prayer, Charlie stepped into the ring one too many times; angry, unstoppable, unreasonable. But he didn't die. He got worse: a wheelchair for life.

The suicide attempt with the pills was feeble. But it opened the door for probing predators of the worst kind: do-gooders. They would run his life for him, filling him with false praise and delusional adoration. Firmly in their foul clutches, they put Charlie on display as an example of mock responsibility in a world obsessed with mocking responsibility. They told him his life could still have meaning as he lied for the "greater good."

That's how Charlie found himself paraded around to school gymnasiums like he was in now. His was to be a cautionary tale of woe, of how he'd found God, been a stubborn man, and changed his ways. The newspapers and holier-than-thou's ate it up. Article after article recounted his story and his "discovering a new kind of bravery outside of the ring." Even Charlie began to half-believe after a while. What he didn't do - what he could never do - is come clean.

"Truth is I'm a loser who ran away from his wife - and life. And I'm still running today. I'm angrier than ever and if I had a chance to get back in the ring I'd take it in a heartbeat. All these speeches you so heartily applaud are nothing but bullshit put up by these meddling assholes trying to tell people how to live their lives. If it was up to me, I'd just go ahead and die. That's all I really want to do. I've got nothing. Please let me go." That narrative wouldn't play so well in the papers. Ironically, it was the one speech that actually might do some good.

Rolled backstage out to the handicapped van that shopped him around the country, Charlie overheard two young rodeo-ers.

"That old man is a fool! He couldn't cut it and now he's whining about it. What a waste of time."

"I don't know. Makes me sorta scared..."

"If you're scared, don't get in the ring. That's how you'll end up like that has-been."

"I'm not like him. That was his whole life. Hell, I'd hate to have to spend rest of my life doing nothing but bulldogging and hangin' on to high rollers. Shi-it, I'd rather be hanging onta Jenny!"

The two boys let out a conspiratorial laugh, not noticing a self-propelled Charlie rolling furiously toward them having overheard the conversation.

"You gotta do it! You hear me? You gotta get in that ring. Prove yourself a man!" The two boys looked at Charlie in a state of disbelief - then contempt. Charlie's handlers raced desperately to wheel him away before he blew his cover and the entire do-gooder charade. "You can't just do what you want! You hear me, boy? Get in that ring! Get in that goddam ring!"

EPILOGUE: The pious woman who frantically wheeled Charlie away from the boys tried to drown out his words with profuse apologies of "This isn't the real him." and "Please ignore this tirade. He needs his medication." Skilled, practiced and vicious lies protected the perfidy. But that only reinforced the boys' idea the adult world was nothing but a hypocritical lie - and that helped them to resist joining that hypocrisy.

Charlie's hell lasted until the day he died, unrepentant and, frankly, unaware. "Losing isn't supposed to happen to me." He never accepted the idea he wasn't still on the winning track. In magnificent manipulation, the dreaded do-gooders played on his guilt, forcing the words out of him they wished to hear. Had Charlie awoken to his reality he could have shoved aside their treachery and broken free. But he was too afraid to do that, for then he'd only be left with his anger.

A Dream At Seventeen

He had a dream
At seventeen
To remain unseen
Before the Scream

Monsters in the house
Saw him as a mouse
Whom they must delouse
Before the neighbors grouse

This beast of burden
They keep hurtin';
Say their love is certain
From behind a curtain

He hears it will get better
If only he could let her...
But since he cannot get her
He writes one last letter

To speak out is to be alone;
In TV sex they never moan;
What I feel must not be known;
To the grave parental clone

Oh parent dear
You live in fear
That when you're near
You bring the tear

Like killing drones from the sky
Justice returns from on high
Exposing each and every lie
Breaking chains that make us die

In tender moment a mother paws
But out come sharpened claws
If the child does give pause
To living with her holy laws.

Two bloody faces shine of Eve
If you die one will grieve
If you live one will leave;
Hell smiles as we deceive

Dawning sun asks me to stay;
What of my living needs? I say;
Bills of the soul I cannot pay;
You must earn the time to play!

No eyes or ears has their god
Proud myth of the successful fraud;
To doom is the path they trod
Onward pills! they do prod

The sorrow of the twilight times
Darkened art seeps from our minds
Praising dreams we did not find
Hangman sings in beating rhymes

To this world they say I owe
Its heartless line we must toe
But you do not say the truth you know:
In your heart love did not grow.

The Un-Savior

For he so hated the world
he gave his only misbegotten son
so those who deny will perish.

"I thought you said you were smart, Harry."

"Smart ass, not smart."

But that was only the beginning as the whole room was against me.

"I remember you saying that too, Harry. I distinctly remember the word 'genius' being thrown around."

"Harry's always acting like he's the smartest one in the room."

Actually, that happens when I forget to act. Three on one, kicking me in the nuts right out of the blue. Look at all those shit eating grins. Any opening and they dive right in. Wise guy who started this continues his assault now he has his team lined up. We'll call him Curly.

"Look at this year end stories list! ISIS tops them all. They'll take out the whole world! And we're looking at Emperor Trump turning the White House into a casino. The streets are the Wild West with the cops and the crazies shooting everybody in sight. Climate reform is a joke, cats sleeping with dogs! What can we do, Harry? What does the genius say??"

I lend one eye over to Curly looking at him like the mental glue-sniffer that he is. Sad part is, in a way I envy that. Moe and Larry take the silence of my dismissal as a sign of weakness.

"Einstein Harry to the rescue!"

"Give us the answer! There must be an answer! We're waiting..."

I'll test how serious they are in their ribbing.

"I always thought the answer was to blame the Jews. Simple answers for simple minds!"

"Who you callin' simple?"

"Yeah, give us a real answer."

"My brain hurts!"

Painful as it can be, I suddenly see the wisdom of our God given mortality. Not dead yet, though.

"Turns out I do have an answer." Then I flash a winning smile.

"Bullshit!" "Yeah, right!" "Whatever..."

Time to turn the dance around. "OK, you came to me. Suit yourself. Have a nice ignorant life."

That buzzed around their dusty heads for a few moments, unsure how the shoe got on the other foot but helplessly determined to go forward.

"OK, what is your answer then?"

Six expectant eyes stared upon me. Dramatic effect required I pause. "Why would I tell you guys? Part of intelligence is in not trying to figure everything out."

"I knew it. You're full of shit."

"He just pretends to be a smart guy!"

I "fall" into their predictable trap. "OK, you got me. But not like you think. What you guys don't get is I don't want to save the world. I want to destroy this shithole so we can build something real. I'm keeping the answer to myself."

"You're keeping it because you don't know!"

"He just wants to act like he's right and everyone else is wrong."

"He can't destroy the world anyway."

"Sure I can. I use my secret weapon all the time. Works like a charm. You guys really want to debate on whether or not the world is falling apart? Go ahead, defend it, ISIS-lover."

"We're not going to listen to your negativity!" "Some parts of the world are seemingly just fine!" "Shit, OK, what is your secret weapon??"

"Nah, you hurt my feelings. Don't feel like talking now."

"You can't con us. You can't defeat the whole world. Brilliant scientists are working on solutions every day. Hand crafted political solutions are being constructed. We're only getting smarter. It's you who is the dummy! Tell me how you can deny all that!"

Oh, the triumphant looks on their blank faces. "Oh, easy, " I drawl. "I let them think they're right."

I wish to God I had an X-ray of their brains at that moment, the amount of crashing gears and flywheels flung outward must have provided a hilarious sight to the gods. Words would start to sputter out then falter like an engine coming to life. Finally, a completed sentence was able to escape.

"Whatever!"

I then clicked on the TV remote. "Hey, look! A 'Fast and Loud' marathon. I like the part where they drink beer."

"You're an idiot!"

"You're a fucking idiot!"

"You're a stupid fucking idiot!"

Should I tell them they'd be less bitter if they just simply became my blind disciples? "Quiet! Aaron is explaining air ride suspensions."

"Harry don't know nothin'. There's no secret weapon."

"If you had a real answer you'd come out and say it anyway. Yes, sir, you would!"

"He can't say nothin' 'cause he's scared. He's scared everyone will laugh at his stupid dumb answer."

Why am I suddenly getting the urge to put out roach traps? "The only thing that scares me is you three are eligible to vote."

That only stirred up the hornet's nest further with an outpouring of blabbering, perhaps in a fit of subconscious guilt. Sometimes you have to give barking dogs a bone.

"OK, OK! You want an answer? You really want a answer? I'll give you an answer: the answer is love."

After a stupefied moment all three broke out laughing.

"Knew he had nothing! Love won't help anything. Any dummy knows that!"

"You gotta have armies around the world so we can have wars and be safe!"

"You need complex geo-political negotiations between strife torn lands to keep the world divided."

"You need large scale all-encompassing blackmail to keep people in line using fictional concepts like money."

"Love won't bring any of that! Ha ha ha."

Like many people, the stooges are only eloquent when in the wrong. Spouting moronic mantras of the world gave them a feeling of support that allowed them to feel smart and special. Sort of like voters. My response was to switch channels to check out Erin Burnett's tits. This filled my three companions with smug confidence, assured I was unable renounce their arguments.

"Got nothing to say now, do you?"

"Kumbaya boy just wants to give everyone a big hug and solve all the problems in the world!"

"We just owned your ass! Shut you up like a child! Come on, hot shot, what do think of that!?"

Careful not to let my eyes wander off Erin's bountiful breasts, I (deliberately) mindlessly replied: "I think you're right."

Space Buoy #Omega-68529

"Oh, Jesus, a space buoy - nowhere left to run. How far have I gone? What did I do? What do I do..."

At the edge of the universe is the edge of reality. Only the deathly desperate reach this place. To close an eye is to die. Space scavengers patrol in ceaseless pursuit of prey, vampires with no life of their own who must subsist on the lives of others found. Expect no quarter, no reason, no hesitation in their hungry hate. And who is there to speak out against them? Their victims are too dead and the fools who follow them speak well of their wicked ways.

What can I do to survive here? Can anyone survive here? How long can I avoid the patrols? My heart can't stop racing. What will they do? They'll find me, hunt me down, tear me to pieces. What else can they do? Start a rock slide or maybe surrender. No, that was a movie. No happy endings in real life. I'm cornered. I ran too far. Is there a way back at all? Is there no way to make amends?

DOW-DOIZ
     dow-doiz
          DOW-DOIZ
               dow-doiz

That alternating signal noise is the heartbeat of insanity. Floater fragments drift through my mind's eye.

And thus she came with heart aflame to tear apart the sky.

Demons birthed from mother earth screech, "Now's the time to die!"

Souls of killing holes flee from land to shrinking land.

But the tide that terrifies finally takes her by the hand.

DOW-DOIZ
          dow-doiz
          DOW-DOIZ
dow-doiz

You only get away with this once. Now what do I do?

Beyond the buoy is the curvature of the universe, warping existence like a funhouse mirror. To step past is to become a penny on a railroad track stretched beyond repair. But we the Unworthy cannot enter the time dimensions lest we destroy them. No way out. Truly, the beast does sit upon the throne.

I have seen the beast and it fears I may speak its name. It knows its time is short but many are those who are planning futures as if it will rule forever. Their lives will be swept out with the tide. Who can bargain with the ocean? That's the fool's bet the beast wishes the blind to play. That and to be driven to the edge of a space buoy...

                    DOW-DOIZ
     dow-doiz
          DOW-DOIZ
               dow-doiz

How long has that buoy been bleating that signal? I have to obey the boundary it marks. Who hasn't seen the corpses of those who step beyond? Hideous, mangled bodies testifying to last moments of irrationality. That's the real battle, isn't it? Between the rational and irrational. Forsake fortune for fire to "prove" your poisonous perfidy pure. To step beyond is to take illusion to its logical conclusion.

I can't stay here. Even as that infernal signal is driving me mad, blood drops of life drip from me in ticking decay. Only next to the curvature of the universe can you hear the space winds. Once a soul-stealing sound like that is heard, life is never the same. The winds block the daily musings and chatter from reaching here. All you hear is the terrifying black silence that swallows words from your lips in cruel abortion.

When I tell people this is not sustainable they claim
I'm either "crying wolf" or being "negative". I really,
really, really don't want to live with you.

With nothing left, I hold onto the buoy and step beyond. Like a body holding onto a tree in a high wind my body stretches out as I slip into the curve. What I see when beyond the buoy is not supposed to be seen. I can see a billion dying suns setting on the horizon of our dimension into impenetrable black, above them another horizon of infinite color. That must be the borders to the time dimensions. I have the final ultimate proof of this dimension's sinking doom. But soon I will let go of the buoy like the morons before me who stepped past, my mangled body drifting back to be mocked and desecrated, horrifying children.

This vision dies with me in stillborn tears, my life pointless to the end.

Worst Christmas Ever

This truly is hell in every sense of the word. Not a bone in my body wants to go on. Nothing is worth enduring this. I knew you were my last chance, Emily. I would have done things for you I'd do for no one else. And I would have done them without misgiving or doubt. But to be with you I had to walk into the light. Instead, I hurt you and ran away.

I think about you almost every day. As life has continued to disintegrate for me I cry out for your friendship. What do you do when a piece of you is missing? Wandering through this world of monsters a half-person in need. Even if I could shake the feelings of regret I'm still left with the overwhelming abyss of emptiness before me. I've done horrible things, Emily. Things before I met you I didn't want you to find out about. You can only face the people you don't care about when you're this ashamed of your life.

That's a cold, cold fate.

I'm stuck in the masquerade world as my true face decays from a lack of light. I told myself removing me from your life was the right thing to do. I still grapple with that. I can see now that whatever would have transpired it should have happened honestly. I don't know what it is this part of me that refuses to communicate. I beg God for the words to fix things between us. Writing here is the best I can do. And what is that?

I can't live outside of your world and I can't stink it up, either. That's the classic definition of purgatory, isn't it. It has crossed my mind that since I trusted you I could have gone through doors I am otherwise unable to and be closer to being the person I need to be. Dear God, to have lost that...

They have plans for me, Emily. Evil plans because that's all they know how to do. I dreamed of meeting you and hugging you for minutes on end. We knew each other before we ever met. I feel like a child left behind in the woods. There's no part of me that truly believes there's hope. I feed myself tormented lies to make it through the day. No one can hear my voice in the woods. I can't not want time with you. I never could.

The Idiot

Star Warts: The Whores Awaken

"Can corporate Hollywood have a soul?" That was the question going in and the answer was as bad as I feared.

We want anything that does not remind us of us - and we're willing to pay for it. Truth is a dirty word. As time marches on, more and more truth is scrubbed from our creative output. Imagine making "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest" today. Imagine our head-in-the-sand society wanting to see that ugly reflection. We're not digging for the truth anymore. We're burying it. Bury it with special effects and you have a hit on your hands!

Was there one character in the film you cared about? No. Was there one element in the film original or unpredictable? No. Was there any magic of the first trilogy? No.

We want to have our own heroes same as yesteryear. That's why we still have our awards shows, etc. going on just as if the art done today is still of the same quality. So there will be many cheerleaders for this film proclaiming victory and departing the field (quickly!), hooting and hollering how the old guys aren't in touch anymore and the new generation is as good as ever.

How chilling.

The passionless will be passionate about passionless films. The empty will love the empty. The dead will love the dead. To see people raving over this warmed over terd is to witness detachment from reality on par with a Presidential debate. Our hunger for fiction leads down the path to boredom.

A droid has vital news that must get through! Boring. The droid happens upon the one place in the universe where a girl (unbeknownst to her) is imbued with the Force! Boring. Conflict between parent and child! Boring. "Luke, I am your father" only works once.

Feel my force upon your wallet

I would love to see a "making of" documentary of this film, of how they convinced themselves this was a good movie. I'd love to hear them spew forth on their grand intentions and how they executed them. Just how much of this was self-deception and how much was genuine contempt for the public? Were we to turn on this franchise this sort of abominable behavior would end.

For perspective, take the beginning of the film where we see a storm trooper acting strangely and then refusing to engage in mass slaughter of a village. Is it because he's a Jedi in disguise, coming to save the day? Is it because he has a backstory that has turned him against his killing ways? Is there some sort of secret agenda he has that conflicts with the empire? Nah, none of that. We never find out why he stops killing or why we should trust him as a good guy.

This is PC catering to both the left and the right. He refuses to participate in war but refuses to decry it. Here we are in America engaging in the most evil wars in our history and not even one nod on the soullessness of those endeavors or the price our soldiers pay as they commit suicide in droves upon return. Sure, they want to keep politics out of the film. Keeps out the heart, mind and soul as well.

There's nothing that's going to stop this planet from dying (outside of divine intervention) but let's at least be honest about it as we're going down. The soul you save just might be your own.

"Picasso In The Sky" Reference Notes

Since posting "Picasso In The Sky With Diamonds" I've received numerous notes and inquiries from classrooms and other interested parties around the world understandably asking for analysis and explanation. This doesn't happen with every posting but with a massive influx like this I feel compelled to respond in a follow-up posting to clear the air. I realize I may have to adjust this later if repeated new lines of inquiry come across my desk but here goes for now.

Did Picasso really wander the Spanish countryside looking for inspiration?
No idea. Only factual research I did was to check the year of his first cubist painting and set it in the year before. Historical fiction.

Are you saying with this piece Picasso stole his idea for Cubism?
Well, it's his actual quote about how great artists steal! But no, I'm making no accusations. I just wanted to give something that could be an example of thievery. Had Cubism remained in that blacksmith's hands it would never have seen the light of day. A parallel to this is Led Zeppelin stealing riffs from other songs, most notably the opening to Stairway To Heaven. But it's Stairway that made the riff, not the other way around. I think that is an important point when talking about Zeppelin's plagiarism.

What other lines are actual Picasso quotes?
"Painting is a blind man's profession. He paints not what he sees, but what he feels, what he tells himself about what he has seen." "Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up." "Art is a lie that tells the truth." That last one is my favorite. I hope my context did those lines justice in illustration of what he meant.

What was the point of a blacksmith discovering Cubism? Why couldn't he become famous?
Artistic theft was the initial thrust of the post so that element had to be in there. Another point I wanted to make was not all genius comes to light in a direct manner. I do believe that happens all the time. Stairway is a good example of that. The opening notes would have been lost to our consciousness if not for Zeppelin's use of them. Genius is half the battle, putting it into the light is the other. Doing one is easy. Doing both is when lightning strikes.

But how could a simple blacksmith come up with Cubism? Only a great artist can do that.
Who said he was simple? His life was rather complicated in my mind. The key line from his is this: "But I wasn't even trying to do anything." It seems like a throwaway statement but its meaning is twofold. First, it shows he had no external pressure to be a great artist like Picasso who was making art his claim to fame. Many, many an artist has failed under the pressure of having to produce. Picasso knew people with the blacksmith's kind of freedom were more likely to come up with The Next Great Thing. That's what sent him searching in the first place (according to the story).

Secondly, by not trying to do anything the blacksmith's true feelings were able to come through unfettered. It's like the story of John Lennon desperately trying to write a meaningful song. He tried all day and nothing came to him. So he crashed on the bed and gave up. Minute he did that "Nowhere Man" came to him. It's about letting go. Had the blacksmith been actually trying to do something meaningful the output would have been garbage.

So is this an allegory to your own blog as well?
That's an insightful question. Answer is "yes". I am like the blacksmith in that my pain drives me to write. But I cannot connect it to something larger. That's why I call this blogging, not writing. This is closer to writing exercises, something you don't expect to see the light of day. The stuff I wrote for the light of day I don't do anymore. And to return to that I would need Emily, who is gone with the wind. There's a moral component to being a successful artist that cannot be overlooked. Dreams are slippery things.

Clozure

"This sucks. This REALLY fucking sucks. Waterboarding got nothin' on this hellhole. Just fucking shoot me. There's no point to life, no reason, no hope, just being buried in this window-less nightmare until I die. I hope you're happy, God! I hope you're goddam fucking happy! Because if this is all life is you can go to hell!"

Aaron waited for a response - even a negative one just so he'd know he'd been heard from above - but only mocking silence filled the room of his father's medical lab. Aaron was drowning in drudgery but walking away from the money would only aggravate the situation as his current salary would certainly drop by a good three quarters were he to leave. The daily swallowing of this bitter pill poisoned him from within until literally it oozed from his pores in the form of stress lesions. Losing his skin snowballed his despair even further into dark depths of infamy.

"See, goddamit, you can never do what you want in life!"

This credo was a constant refrain in Aaron's lost life. Working under his father's thumb was salt in the wailing wound, driving him to pillowed screams in the night to be set free. Every day on this path was another day washed away by the universe. That too ate at him. Choosing to absolve himself, his father became the stumbling block to success, a jailor of his son. Aaron couldn't change the world or make God listen. What he could do is wish his father dead. With each passing minute the certainty of that as the key to solving his problem became firmer in his mind.

Aaron had spent his life under a blanket of family silence. He'd refused any relationships, alienating his classmates, and isolating himself during formative teen years, warping him for life. Having never lived life, he never understood life, watching others travel roads he'd never know. But no one asked him why he did this though the answer was clear in his head: he hated his father ever since being a small child. He vowed he must hide these feelings - or the fact he even had feelings - but who would want him then? "Life, is doom."

Physically and emotionally hideous, Aaron's torment became a daily death march of forced foul food. His sexual fantasies involved bondage and forced feminization by cruel women who channeled his self-loathing. But he still knew that at the end of that road lay only a cliff of loneliness - and loneliness he already had in spades. Wandering in the living tomb of his job sealed his fate. Death could not come soon enough.

It was a monster relief on days when his father was out of the lab like today. Aaron gave himself free reign to vent and rant to the cold, white fluorescent lights of the dropped ceiling. If he ever tried to complain to family members of his demise, his concerns were dismissed. How bad could it be? He wasn't dead. Aaron was just wanting attention, no doubt. As far as he was concerned, no one had a clue as to what he felt.

Then his older brother rushed in announcing their father had been in accident and needed blood right away. Instinctively, Aaron complied, handing a bag to his brother. "Better make another one just in case. He'll probably need it." Watching his brother rush back out the door, in idea came to Aaron for making his escape once and for all. With his father dead he'd inherent the lab and all its worth. Sell it, get out, start over someplace new.

The idea of actually living, of hope for the first time in decades thrilled Aaron's long starving soul to irresistible ecstasy. Yes, he would do it. He'd poison the second bag of blood and be free. After all, wasn't his life as valuable as anyone else's? What about his turn to live instead of pouting on the sidelines? The more he thought about it, the more right it seemed. Carefully and expertly so it could not be noticed, Aaron mixed a vial of deadly Clozure into the bag. How exciting!

Sure enough, his brother came back taking the bag with him. Aaron was surprised his feelings didn't give him away. He couldn't hide the guilt of what he was doing. He'd always felt guilt anytime he tried to live. Denial served as a perverse morality, making his falseness whole - if unbearable. But he'd banked on his brother being too distracted to notice and that was apparently exactly what happened. Besides, nobody really knew Aaron so who could even suspect this devious act?

If his father did die, Aaron decided he'd blame God. If God made the second bag necessary then it was God who did the killing. Aaron had certainly left a window open for his father to live if fate allowed. "Up to you now, God, if he lives or dies. Hope you're happy how it comes out!" The wait was like walking on hot coals with sweat literally coming off his forehead from hot flashes of fear and emotion. What had he done? Probably nothing. He'd always shortchanged God, he knew, and God would let his father live to teach Aaron a lesson.

Then he got word of his father's death.

*******

CODA: Driven by overwhelming and inescapable guilt (Aaron tried many therapies but without ever giving a full confession to the murder his efforts were wasted) he kept the lab open, working it himself even as his health continued to deteriorate. Any question of his having value as person was answered - and not for the better. The loneliness and isolation sapped his remaining spirit until on his deathbed he knew he must confess before facing finality.

"I killed father. I put Clozure in the second bag of blood. I hated him. I hated my whole life. Ya'll never knew how I felt or what I was going through, I know. But I couldn't help myself. Please forgive me!"

"You idiot!" laughed his brother. "I threw away that second bag of blood. Your feelings for Dad were never a secret. It hit me later I never saw you draw up that bag and I suspected there could be something wrong with it. Besides, by that time the hospital was able to make up the difference. Dad died from nothing you did. You should have confessed years ago."

"I wanted to confess! I really did. I wanted to with every bone in my body! You're telling I lived my life in hiding for nothing??"

"Yup."

"See, God? I told you I can never do what I want!"

The Streets Are My Home

It's tough, ya know. Really tough to be on your own, all alone in the world. You never really get both eyes all the way shut when you sleep. There's never that sense of security no matter how many mental tricks you try. My moments of "rest" are elusive and ill timed, like when I'm at the clinic waiting my turn to see the nurse's familiar face with whom I have a good rapport. My eyes cry out to shut feeling a sense of structure at long last.

Rest of the time is hell. More and more upscale developments are moving in around downtown Dallas. Many ill-meaning yuppies are angry at the sight of us and to be approached for money is a fate worse than death for them. They've mounted social media campaigns to stomp us out like cockroaches. They don't want to know us. They certainly don't want to know we even exist. Deep down inside, you see, they know our fate will one day be their fate. Ouch!

Most homeless at the shelter aren't homeless. Or rather, they are people in need of temporary assistance. After a few scary weeks they are back on their feet hopefully back to whatever place they had before. Those are the houseless. I am the homeless. I have no place. I can't even imagine of having a place. (I wrote about this in one of my very first posts)

Head north passed the $2,500 a month apartments and you find Preston Hollow and University Park with a whole host of dazzling houses. As I drive by them I first am interested in the architecture then ask myself could I ever picture myself living there. Part of me thinks to live there would be a dream beyond all dreams. I could fill it with themes and designs to suit me and live happily ever after.

But that just doesn't ring true.

I've always felt very temporary about myself

I picture me in a place more temporary than a full blown house. I could see me on a weekday morn on my third floor patio sipping my coffee looking over uptown as workers scramble to their daily rut. But that would feel like a cage. I've had a lifetime of apartments and management's rules and regulations. I want my own space and nothing less can do. So that doesn't ring true, either.

I've thought about a house in the country breathing those wonderful smells and dreaming the world as I wish it to be. But can you imagine a grungy, bearded homeless man wandering over 60 acres trying to call that home? That also doesn't fit. Every scenario I see looking out the window as I ride around is wrong for me. That's a tad disconcerting.

It's only the streets that say "me". The streets are dirty and broken. They ask nothing of you nor give nothing. Your business is your own. No one can knock on your door to check alarms or whatever. No one can tax your real estate. No strings whatsoever. You have nothing to lose so there's less to fear. I see that man popping out of his Aston Martin Vantage heading into the W hotel and part of me screams with envy. But then I ask myself would I want to be the puppet to my possessions he is and the free air in my lungs cries out "No!"

I dearly would love to sleep. I know I could sleep for a year or two straight through if I ever got to stop running as this frying pan scalds my feet if I stay in one place too long. I won't be the first to die from that, I know. We're all looking for home. And yes, the streets are home to me because I most certainly cannot live with me.

Hans, Boobie, I'm Your White Knight!

"When you steal 600 dollars you can just disappear.

"When you steal 600 million, they will find you."

Poor Hans. Imagine using stupid ol' guns to steal! You don't have to be an outlaw to be an "exceptional" thief. One can do it and be perfectly legitimate in the eyes of the law (man's law, anyway). The art of the steal has long been a tradition of American business. As it has become normalized, the gall of the thievery is given little thought and, frankly, is expected. If one can legally socialize money, one does. Sort of a reverse Robin Hood, taking from the poor and giving to the rich.

Experts at the Public Utility Commission of Texas are urging its three commissioners to reject plans by a Dallas oilman and real estate tycoon to take over the state’s largest electric transmission company, a recommendation that could loom large for Texas' ratepayers and electric grid.

“The proposed transaction is not in the public interest and I recommend that the Commission reject the Applicants' application,” Darryl Tietjen, who oversees rate regulation for the agency, wrote in public testimony submitted Wednesday.

Tietjen was weighing in on a proposal from Ray L. Hunt and other investors to buy Oncor, whose 119,000 miles of transmission and distribution lines deliver power to more than three million homes and businesses in North and West Texas.

Like many billionaires who are bored, Ray L. Hunt has nothing productive to do with his life but as every life must have a direction his is to acquire more and more useless paper wealth. When in doubt, plunder! This evil comes under the benign (to our twisted ears) designation of "business" and anything with that label is given a free pass no matter how heinous the effect on human lives. The savagery of this proposal flies under the radar of our corrupt society but there will come a time we are forever deemed as a barbaric age.

To avoid paying federal income taxes, Hunt wants to transform Oncor into a real estate investment trust, a nearly unprecedented structure for a utility that has worried consumer advocates.

The Texas agency set a hearing for January, where its three commissioners must decide whether the plan fits the interests of everyday Texans.

On Wednesday, agency experts offered their view: No.

Tietjen wrote that Hunt’s plan to avoid paying income taxes would amount to a “substantial transfer of wealth from ratepayers to shareholders” totaling nearly $250 million each year.

So Hunt's greedy hands want to reach into the wallet of every hard-working or hard up Texan in the state and heist a chunk of their cash giving nothing in return. Some just call that good business! What's a quarter of a billion dollars between friends? It's fun screwing grandma on her fixed income while you're vacationing on the Riviera. At some point this whole greed thing is going to collapse (as we all knew it would) so better get yours while you can. Snatch that cookie from the neighbor's hand!

"Trust me with your light bill."

With the monopoly utility paying virtually no federal income taxes under the proposed structure, Tietjen wrote, Oncor’s shareholders would earn a rate of return of so high that it “could not be considered acceptable under any reasonable application of economic and regulatory standards.”

A consultant analyzing the plan for the agency also recommended that the commissioners reject it.

“While there is general benefit to resolving the [Energy Future] bankruptcy, the resolution simply cannot come at the expense of ratepayers as it does with the applicants’ proposal,” he wrote.

When Energy Future was formed eight years ago, the state Public Utility Commission insisted on a financial "ring fence" around Oncor to keep Energy Future’s debt from dragging it down. It worked, keeping the power line company financially healthy even as its parent sank into a $42 billion bankruptcy.

Among other concerns, Roach suggested Hunt’s proposal would leave Oncor unprotected.

Where did the roots of this corruption begin? The notorious Enron. Our elected prostitutes were more than eager with the prospect of "deregulation", i.e. taking a regulated consumer staple into the wild west in a massive betrayal of public trust. If we started hanging some of these whores we wouldn't have to live in fear of our electric bills tripling (as happened before).

Seeing an opportunity of a massive long-term public raping for decades to come, Texas' largest utility was sold with a heavily indebted LBO, the thieves wild-eyed with glee. What they didn't count on was the massive depression of natural gas prices not to return in the near future (but not to say never to return). That crippled their strategy of rape and plunder pushing TXU into bankruptcy, a once unheard of thought for a longstanding public utility.

Hunt owns the only other U.S. utility organized in such a trust: Sharyland Utilities, which serves just 50,000 customers in small patches of rural West and North Texas. It charges the highest rates in the state following a recent spike that sparked a flood of complaints from customers.

This leaves the door open for wolves in businessmen's clothing to hijack the situation to their benefit from a trusting (or just as corrupt) public. Things don't have to be like this. We don't have to be at each other's throats as a matter of course. But when lives are empty and hungry, the vampires rush in to feed on both the unsuspecting and the willing fools. We'll find out in January if this treachery is left to pass in yet another of a long string of burglaries and burglary attempts in Texas history.

Black Rain (Photo/Video Essay)

After the Bomb, after Hiroshima, after the flashing light, came Black Rain. A survivor termed it "greasy", covering them head to toe. Within the rain - within the blackness - more horror. Horror to be realized for years and decades to come. Infested with radiation, the black droplets seeped through the skin, penetrating into the deepest core of the body to wait, to destroy, to kill.

My dearest Japans, what have you done to bring this on yourself?







In her history, Japan equally embraced the beautiful and the profane, never choosing. And in not choosing, became criminal. She never hid her lust for power, a ruthless meritocracy deeming only those who master power can be master. The only rule was to win, none caring how. For centuries she lay as a sleeping tiger after settling her internal wars. And when the world finally poked her, she came out roaring.

The tiger yearned to feel its strength. It clawed its way into the world, ripping flesh from bone. For a time, its hunger could not be stopped. It gloried in the thought of ultimate triumph, rulers of the world. But this was a journey into darkness and lifelessness for the Japans. The tears she hid turned toxic and opaque. Amid her treasured colors ran black veins to feed them; disaster looming.

Many were those who believed her sorrow was her weakness, that it betrayed their cause, undermined their power, and would write their final doom. But that was her secret savior, the chrysanthemum breaking the sword. Many were those who said there's no hope outside of the sword, to fear what lay hidden in the darkness behind the bamboo; have faith in the black limbs holding them together. Then, when the repressed tears came forth as Black Rain, everyone's worst fears were realized.

After the droplets of death, is there a future? Have the sins of the past erased her hope? If so, she would not be the first to have been so foolish. This was a new kind of fear: not of death, but of life. Without the beauty of her colors life going forward would be trapped in eternal bleakness. The tears falling from the sky had come to save them, to purify and refresh. In the aftermath, that was easy to see. But by having declared their tears their enemy - with relentless fanaticism - they had laced them with as an unspeakable a death as the Japans had handed out.

Gradually, painfully, the colors returned. The journey from darkness to light is never ending. The flower within having sustained her in the end. Now I too must ask myself: am I doomed by the sins of my past. Did I crush too cruelly the flower of life? Will I walk upon pathways of love or die of thirst in a dry riverbed? I know this, this fear of life in the aftermath of Black Rain. One is never the same.