Let's be perfectly honest...

Do you really think you can give humans the power of free will

And not expect this to happen?

I mean, look...

You made me, right?

How...in the name of you

Could this not be your fault?

If I build a car, and the car breaks down after the first mile

Is it the car's fault?

I made the damn thing!

You made me, SPECIFICALLY with the fatal flaw of imperfection

PLUS free will.

Honestly I'd say that's criminal negligence

It's almost as if you planned this to happen

You're almost as bad as those mothers who keep their children sick to get attention.

Is that what I am to you?

Did you make us just so you can play the victim card to all your friends like..

"Oh poor me...look, the humans have committed another genocide!"

Man...honestly just pay me now

We can settle this between us

How much cash do you have on you?

I'm not sure actually.

Really, I have an interesting perspective on this.

Most of my family are Democrats, Feminists, the whole nine yards.

I was raised the same way.

Went to a liberal college, made liberal friends.

But when I got out of the bubble of fantasy that is the American University

I had a bit of an awakening.

There's an old saying, that goes something like...

A Republican is a Democrat who got mugged by reality.

So I got woke, from the dream of leftism.

It wasn't so much that I preferred Republicans

It was that I suddenly saw....everywhere

How the Democrat mindset was ruining

Everything.

As a result, I now see the majority of my family as lost and brainwashed

Immature children

Who live in a fantasy

Yet they seem to see me in the same way.

Which, for obvious reasons can make it hard to relate to one another.

So....really

They would be the ones to not invite me to Thanksgiving

Though they still do

Really it is I, who declines

I'm the one who doesn't "invite" them

Instead I visit my extended family,

Who aren't constantly virtue-signaling, or calling things racist and sexist.

People who understand the pain of life, and don't shy away from it.

They are unpretentious, honest...

And they live here and now.

Not in some apocalyptic future

Or some shameful past.

I'm thankful for that.

Happy Thanksgiving

The soul and the mind are fighting

right now...

Can the soul forgive the governing mind?

The soul requires justice and retaliation

But the mind can see the future

The mind can see beyond momentary catharsis

It's as if the soul acts like a bouncing ball

It takes in energy

And it must be released

Immediately

Where the soul is tickled

It must laugh

Where it is yelled at

It may cry

Or yell back

Where the soul is injured

It seeks vengeance

But a good mind will chime in

Tut-tut little one

If you strike

His soul will be inclined to strike you back

And you do not know his mind

His mind may not be quite as sharp

Or keen on control, as I

The people of Israel are the soul

They require justice

They deserve justice

And they know it

But the governing mind of Israel

It’s military, it’s politicians

Cannot act as the soul would want

Surely if they did

Gaza would be driven into the sea

Who’s decision was it?

To allow the people of Gaza

To be governed by terrorists?

Terrorists who desire the death of the Jewish people

When the innocent go to bed with the guilty

Who shall be punished?

The answer of the Christians

Is to turn the other cheek

To end the cycle of suffering

But when that is not enough

When your neighbor will only be satisfied with your death

Because of who you are

What then?

If the mind acts as it should

And the violence ends

And there is peace…for now

The soul will remember that justice is owed

And it has been deprived of said justice

Will the soul forgive the mind?

At the level of the individual

Unlikely

At the level, of a nation, of a people

Perhaps, given time…

Time…

Time is something we don’t have

Life is so short already.

Is it though?

If only we could agree on what life is.

You can’t exactly

Dole out justice and punishment

On animals and souls

If you can’t tell one from the other

That’s a good question

I guess we’ll just have to carry on…

Between tolerance and standards

Between tolerance and decency

Between tolerance and the rules

That mark the rails

Upon which the train of civilization travails

I know all the talking points

I know all the rebukes

I used to fall on the left side

Of the political aisle

I remember what it was like

And now I watch

As they continue to descend into chaos

It’s almost like I…

Jumped off the train

Just as I noticed

The bridge was out

Ahead

We’ve reached a point in our collective dysfunction

A sort of

Critical mass of madness

Where I can point out something happening

In the real world

That 20 years ago, would have been a film

Or a book

Describing some dystopian nightmare

And the response is always

“It’s the right thing to do.”

Just like the characters in those books

The actors in those films

Who believe with religious zeal

That this is the just and only way

To save the world

I hope the author of this story

Has thought of a better ending

Do you know what love is?

Is it a...

Chemical reaction

An animalistic

Infatuation?

There is no such thing as love at first sight

There is lust at first sight

Love comes with time

You love when you sacrifice

Your time

Your patience

Your body

Your blood

You love when you forgive

Every time you reunite, after a fight

Kiss once more, at first light

You love when you let them go

Because you know…

They’ll come back

Footsteps in the snow…

Eh…I don’t know

Maybe love is selfish

We only give love because we need love

Right?

Love at first sight?

Yeah right…I don’t bite

I’ve felt that a dozen times

But I’m still cold at night

I walk out of my grotto

Feet slapping upon the cool smooth stone

Pebbles, sand and grit

A single thorny bush

Little survivor

My little witness

Waves in the breeze, as if to greet me

The smell of salt, wet on the air

I taste you

Memory

The ocean on this night

The terrifying black unknown

Mirror to my darkest fears

Primeval maw of the predator

The wolf in Eden…

Livyatan

I summon thee

So faint…

I could have imagined it

The sound of drums

I’m sure of it…

A cool breeze

Comforting and sweet

Whispers of something

Like an old lover who speaks sweet nothings

Tickles the ear

Suddenly, with a shudder

It becomes the whispers of a serpent

Conspiring demons…

Whispers of death

It becomes a great wind, a howling wind

Kicking up sand and dust that stings the eyes

Silent flashes in the distance

Thunder that rolls

Like the footfalls of a million soldiers…

One drop of rain, falls in the dust

Like a pebble thrown by a teasing friend

This is no friend of mine…

A second drop...then a third then a fourth

In moments the army arrives at my door

Curtains of rain begin to fall

These are not rain drops, but water stones.

A barrage of water that pummels and assaults

Suffocating, drowning.

Scream to the heavens

Garbled gargled Gargamel

Bring me, Livyatan!

A shriek, a scream, that answers in reply

Did it come from the sea?

Did it come from the sky?

I feel it through the earth

As if mother earth herself, recoils in horror

At what I have summoned

A monstrous bellow

Cuts through the roar of the rain and the sea

But this time, there is no mistake

It is the beast

Is it my imagination?

My G-d it must be

The borders of the sea

They are rising, expanding

As if the ocean itself is attempting to escape

To flee before the abomination that rises

In brief flashes

I see something

Something that curdles the blood

Involuntary shivers

As witness to that which should not be

Cloven from the immortal

Light bringer

Cursed by his sin

Little dancing shapes to the east and west

Frolicking tendrils

Dancing to the tune of some, unholy music

The cacophonous, chthonic…chaotic

Shrill laughter

Of death

The brush beside my cave

Water flowing in…now swirling about their roots

The sound of the surf begins to rise up in my ears

Growing to a deafening roar that overcomes the pounding rain

I can hear waves crashing upon the shore…

I am far from the shore

To my left and right, waves crest upon the hills

Again it bellows…it moans…out of sync somehow

Reverberating, hauntingly

Like a soul not quite connected to the flesh

I peer through the darkness

My eyes attempting to pierce through the sheets of rain

The wind

The impenetrable blackness

A flash illuminates…what is this?

A second horizon? A mountain?

I crane my neck

I had been looking straight ahead

When I should have been looking…up

My G-d

What have I done?

Hope is a four letter word

A curse I wouldn't wish upon my most hated enemies

What sort of G-d

Would lead a man to believe

His life could one day be better

Life is a soup of shit

That you are compelled to walk through

A sea…a fetid lake

Of putrefaction

Whipped and coerced onwards

Trudging deeper and deeper

Until you drown

All the while

Your friends and relatives

Smiling and clapping and cheering you on

If you’re not smiling

It must be your fault

What a joke

I love this idea, and i'll tell you why

My G-d am I disturbed

All my colleagues know it.

I'll play music of the insane while I cut meat

Die Antwoord, Rob Zombie...

I tell them it relaxes me.

It's a half truth

It's because the energy of this music

Matches my internal reality

It synchronizes with the rhythm of my internal madness

And in that way, it is soothing.

I don't know if that's why some art comforts the disturbed

While that same art disturbs the comfortable...

No wait! I do know!

The comfortable are disturbed by art that soothes the disturbed...

Because it reminds them of a piece of themself they have yet to integrate

If you have not integrated your shadow

You may fear it

I mean...I dunno...

Bunch of punk ass bitches, haha.

It's hard for me to imagine art that would disturb me

There is no art more disturbing than life itself

If you don't see that

Then man

You haven't lived.

I heard on the news today

That a young boy of 15, here in France

Had killed himself

Because he was bullied, viciously

Repeatedly

Regularly

His life, apparently made into...

A vision of hell

His parents wrote a letter to the government in Paris

Asking for help for their son

Apparently...

The French government told them to shut up and sit down

To stop annoying them

I don't know the situation

So I honestly can't judge either side of this equation

With a fair hand

Was their son coming home every day

Bloodied

Black eyes

Fresh bruises?

Was it mostly taunting, teasing

Psychological torture?

Good Lord I hate that phrase

It's so dramatic

The idea that their son...killed himself...

I just...

It's hard to fathom

I have wanted to kill myself before

I've pondered long and hard

With a knife in my hand

With my hands on the wheel

With my hand on a bottle

In the end it is a decision of self respect

At least I see it that way

Some religions choose to call it a sin

But frankly I think that's much too impersonal

It's about knowing that you deserve more

Than for your story to end there

Face down in the mud

In a puddle of vomit and shame

It isn't fair to say that I would do things differently

It isn't fair to say that his father failed him

I just...

Find it hard to fathom...

If I had a son

Coming home with bruises every day

I would sit him down

And greet him like a warrior

Come home from the fields of battle

Now you know the evil that exists in the world

This is what it means, to become a man, my son

But see?

You’re here aren’t you?

It doesn’t matter how much they hurt your body

It is your spirit that animates you

Your indominable spirit

That rises up

Every time they strike you down

You rise back up like the undead

And smile back

This is your hero’s story

You will overcome

But back to brass tacks

I remember what it was like to be in the middle of hell

And the biggest…motivator

To end it all

Is this…illusion

A ploy of the devil

That makes you believe

That this pain will last forever

So many kids think like this

Because their lives are so small

In the scheme of their young history

This bully is the final boss

The goliath they cannot conquer

There is no other mountain

How could there be any struggle greater than this?

They have not yet seen the world

You must remind your children

That the world is vast, and they are yet so young

That this too…shall pass

But back to my son

It is not about how hard you hit

But how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forwards

That is what makes you a champion, that is what makes you a warrior

That is what makes you a man

So now…

You shall become the nightmare of these cowards

You shall rise like the undead

And smile and laugh

As you are become death, destroyer of worlds

And in a few years…when all has passed

And you are on to another school

A new world, a new challenge…

You will have already become a hero

Sword in hand...

Ready

For the next dragon

I am certain I have said this before

Somewhere...

Some when...

I believe this place is a training ground for the soul

Specifically

Where one soul, may train its power of will

For the higher worlds are worlds of will

Furthermore

Tis the lack of will

That breeds chaos and disorder

Which effectively is the definition of hell

Therefore

If we are to keep the higher worlds

The higher orders, as such

The only souls that may enter

Are the souls which have perfected their power of will

Who is this magical Will by the way?

I'm sure William or "Bill" is a pleasant fellow

But what did he do that was so important

As to have "the power" attributed to his personage.

Never mind...