Dear diary,
Is it not half-true to say that we live on balls? And by balls I mean planets; because they’re generally round.
I just woke up (way too early pitch-black middle of the night) and looked out the window: there was the Moon—a thin crescent; and this made me think of how the Earth casts its shadow, or gets in the way of the Sun’s rays, which leaves us with this view: a curved luster in the sky. All because the Moon is ovoid, the Earth is ovoid, and the Sun is a giant ovoid fiery terror.
Moon people; Sun people. We all live on balls.
So it’s weird that we make our apartments boxy shaped, oblong or predominantly rectangular. Isn’t that unnatural, seeing as nature tends toward curviness? I’m allured by how contrary the human instinct is: for shelter, in a realm of spheres, we build a cube.
We want to distinguish ourselves from our environment.
Ah, you’re right. — I, too, just now realized that my entry here is a lower-than-fourth-rate mock of Emerson’s “Circles”. Now I feel like, while wandering thru the woods, I suddenly found myself on private property, whose owner is aiming a shotgun at my head. So I’ll try to change the subject… move to a place of the mind that has more free land.
MORAL: don’t plop your hut on top of the emperor’s fortress.
Emerson begins his essay with a short poem, and that short poem begins itself with this line: “Nature centres into balls”; so the start of my diary entry this morning might constitute an example of subconscious plagiarism.
I say “might (etc.)” because I can’t know for sure: My subconscious and I are not on speaking terms. It’s like we’re two fools in one motorcar, and Sub-C. is driving, and I’m just a passenger; so Sub-C. gets to decide where we are going, and I have no idea why we’re stopping here or turning there, but I must explain our actions to the surrounding vehicles on the road, because I’m the only one who has access to the intercom (we’re in a police car).
& yet, if we’re all one mind (by we, I mean all of us humans; in this case, Emerson and I; not my conscious mind and its underparts: they’re obviously alien to each other), I say, if we’re all one mind, then no one can own a thot. Theft is an aspect of ownership.
When you want to move your arm, you don’t ask its permission—it simply goes where you desire, because you’re both dues-paying members of the same body.
But humans seem to be able to turn this function on or off, with regard to each other. I mean, a group of humans can act in harmony, and, when they do this, it’s like they’re individual parts of an encompassing being. But humans can also isolate themselves, and act out of selfishness and ignorance; then it’s every man for himself and God against all. (Jeder für sich und Gott gegen alle is the title of Werner Herzog’s 1974 film, which was released here in the U.S. as The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser.) Or mankind can split into groups and engage in war. Each warring group is like a vast individual.
I think that’s why humankind enjoys sports so much; especially team sports. The formation of teams allows players (and fans) to become one super-being, just like in the God Age. Moreover, sports are a way to have war without consequence. Or the stakes are drastically reduced. It’s make-believe war; pretend war; play war. Like so-called safe sex, team sports are safe war. We call sex safe when it is tamed, caged: the feral beast whose sole desire is to spread disease and incite overpopulation is barred from committing these atrocities.
Civility has a lot to do with quieting down. Sports are a gentler way to have war. Art is a blanker way to have sex.
So the surefire way to distinguish a rich person from a poor person is to engage in a conversation with each: You’ll notice that the poor person speaks loudly and then heeds your responses; whereas the rich person’s voice is finely modulated, yet he ignores your side of the discussion. This is why God is reduced to a “still small voice” (in 1 Kings 19:11-12), for there’s nothing richer than divinity. And, like a true man of wealth, God attends to no prayer that is addressed to him.
Behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire a still small voice.
Lord of the land: landlord: possessor of the landscape’s title deed. God owns everything: all the balls floating in space, and the life that inhabits them. But God does not deign to live in the riches he owns; there’s not a substance refined enough for his highness. Only the human voice fits him (still and small), because speech is the air making love to the harp of the throat. Air: wind: breath: spirit. And I’ve heard that outer space is noiseless, cuz there are few atoms: it’s mostly a vacuum. Not even the stillest, smallest voice can exist. No God. Space is an atheist. That’s why heaven must be one with earth; either on or at least near earth. If you fly beyond earth’s atmosphere, past its sky and into the outer darkness, you’ve gone too far. It’s kinda like the city mouse vs. the country mouse. We’ve got a city God. He don’t like the vast expanses of emptiness, which is this universe’s equivalent of country farmland. Interminable cornfields. God wants to be near people! But God is shy, so he cowers above the populace, in his airy castle...
She owns the fine house by the rise of the bank,
She hides handsome and richly drest aft the blinds of
the window.[—from “Song of Myself” §11]
And God’s always angry about something. He doesn’t vote, he never participates in the electoral process; but then he wants to complain about the results. All you sinners made the wrong choice; I need to punish you now. You should’ve listened to my quiet advice that I whispered to you from here on high, instead of kneeling down and whispering to ME all the time. Thankless beggars. I wasn’t paying attention, anyway. But don’t follow my example: Don’t tune out and give up on trying to change the world for the better. And how come you didn’t check out my books!? I wrote a number of scriptures, via holy ghostwriters, and collected them into one or two anthologies. You should have read them. Or if you did indeed read them, then you should have read them differently, with an alternate attitude. You got the wrong interpretation. You never understand what I want; you never get what I mean. I’m not even sure that you truly love me.
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