Dear diary,
Why did plants ever decide to become humankind? Why couldn’t they remain content with their planthood? I imagine that being a tree is like perpetually sleeping; and a healthy tree is like a good dream; whereas a diseased tree just thinks it’s having a nightmare, until it expires. And who doesn’t like sleep? I say, trees have it perfect: they shouldn’t have striven for ultra-perfection; they got the punishment they deserved. What I mean by that is: Be careful what you grope for. Now that we’re humans, we all wanna become the LORD OF ALL WORLDS; but we should remember the tragedy of plant-life: perhaps Godhood sux. And when you’re a monotheistic divinity, you can’t even solace your regretful agitation by journaling your thots & saying “Why did humans ever decide to become me?” cuz no one’s around to read your blog.
I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me. (Isaiah, 45:5)
I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God. Is there a God beside me? yea, there is no God; I know not any. (Isaiah, 44:6-8)
Thus saith the LORD, that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it: I am the LORD; and there is none else; there is no God else beside me, a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside me. Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else. (Isaiah, 45:14-22)
What I tell you three times is true. (The Hunting of the Snark, 1:8)
Now, because plants are eternally asleep, and God is always awake & in extreme agitation, I say that the drug called heroin must be the best invention ever. I’ve never tried heroin myself, and I hope I never do (I’m a masochist by trade) so it’s safe for me to praise it.
A highly addictive analgesic drug derived from morphine, often used as a narcotic to produce euphoria.
That’s heroin’s definition. Morphine stems from the deity Morpheus who was the God of Sleep; so we’re on the right track. (By the way, someone should coin a word combining morphine with euphoria: they sound like they would make a decent couple.) Ecstatic slumber; that must be what rocks feel: for, if we follow our Scale of Opposites; which places immortal spirits like Jehovah on one extremity, and vegetation near the other; it seems right to say that stones are even further left than plants. I’m using “left” and “right” to mean “sleepy” and “fascist” respectively. Yes, stones have it made; I conjecture that their sleep is dreamless. (I’m thinking of Hamlet’s famous anti-dream speech: “To sleep — perchance to dream! Ay, there’s the rub.”) Also the notion that rocks are the original heroin junkies reminds me of those scenes in the film Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007) where Andy, played by Philip Seymour Hoffman, visits his dealer and takes a (seemingly planned) drugged nap in the bedroom. That always struck me as equally terrifying and enviable: to rest so soundly upon the bed of an illicit pharmacist. That’s something only a rock or God could do.
But this brings us to that age-old question: Active or passive? Cuz it’s seductive to contemplate sleeping one’s life away; but it seems better, on 2nd thot, not to “waste” oneself in this fashion — instead, one should act! Expend the energies thou wast born with. I like this way better: I’d rather be engaged in some useful project, I’d rather WORK than just sit around. You’ll have plenty of time to laze about on your drug dealer’s waterbed, once you’re deceased.
However, even better than a useful activity would be one that is useless; cuz, for something to be considered “useful”, it must have been tried before & found beneficial in some way; thus it’s inherently repetitious; and I favor the unprecedented. So to expend energy upon experimental endeavors appeals to me most. That’s why, instead of sleeping, I wake early in the night to jot nonsense here on these scrolls. It’s the same thing that every mad scientist does in his basement laboratory, except I don’t have to fork out a fortune on beakers and potions.
I was walking among the fires of hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius; which to Angels look like torment and insanity...
(as you know, cuz I quote it all the time, that’s one of my favorite lines from Blake’s Marriage of Heaven and Hell.)
But what annoys me is that people who have very little imagination can only find pleasure in exploiting the physical world. So that’s where ideas like ownership and wealth and rent and wage-labor come from. All the bad stuff — warfare, violence, theft, poverty, rape — it’s all due to the machinations of the unimaginative: People who can derive no pleasure from MERE BEING; who cannot lean & loafe at their ease and engender wisdom from observing a leaf of grass; people who who cannot graft and increase upon themselves the pleasures of heaven, or translate into a new tongue the pains of hell. The world does not unmask itself & writhe before them in raptures, because these people lack the patience to sit completely quiet and alone. So they go out and throw their weight around, and snatch up all resources for themselves; then, as they have nothing better to do with their mind, they spend it finagling arguments to persuade the rest of us to remain impoverished rather than to take back our common goods.
It’s like back in the day when we all had phones, there were these creatures known as telemarketers. (The word is a hybrid of “telephone” plus “marketing”.) They’re basically adversaries who try to gently steal from you. They’re so rude that they demand rudeness from others: for they are determined never to accept “no” for an answer; thus, when you say “I’m not interested in falling for your scam,” they answer “O please let me try even harder to take your money” — my point is, if you follow the rules of politeness, you lose; for they themselves abandon the rules of politeness: either they win when you purchase what they’re selling, or they drive you to terminate the call in a way that is rude; so your rudeness now equals their rudeness: & thus rudeness has borne rudeness into the world: it has become fruitful and multiplied and replenished the earth and subdued it: it has inundated the world like a flood, as if it were a seed bearing likenesses after its own image or something.
In the same way, rich fux use war to increase their wealth, and they break all the commandments of Morpheus — they murder, they rob, they covet; they sell contraband substances and traffic in humans; they even kidnap children into sex slavery — long story short, they live a life of sheer violence: seizing control of governments by way of their multinational corporations. And, like the old telemarketers, they say: If you wanna stop us you’ve gotta engage in our brand of evil, so that it can bear fruit after its kind, and achieve dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that creepeth upon this wasteland. Dog eat dog; kill or be killed — live by the sword & die by the sword. Whenever possible, they lure the multitudes into violence. But look how Jesus reacted to their game: he just let them slay him. He was like, “Forget this: it’s too hard to kick against these pricks. You only die once. I’m outta here.” And then he left us to deal with the banksters ourselves. And now we’re in this dilemma: What should we do—allow them to blot us like Jesus, or sink to their level? And I seriously don’t know what to tell you. I’m stumped. Most of my clients come into my office with solvable problems; but this scenario that you’ve outlined sounds like a textbook example of a Catch-22. And, sadly, I’m still gonna need you to pay for this hour of counselling; cuz I got bills of my own. You surely don’t expect me to take up arms against an ocean of creditors, and, by opposing, end them!
Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth… (Deuteronomy 32:1)
Just think of everyone’s kompromat.
No comments:
Post a Comment