The Predicament

What a predicament we find ourselves in.

The story goes that a thin veneer of electric pulses unites us all, interconnectedness they call it.

Yet, there is another force that has been within and around us for millennia.

Once, in a distant time, a distant land, information passed its way tongue to tongue.

Tête-à-tête.

Whispers in the ear under the moonlit sky, speech exchanged with attentive eyes, around a fire with all its warmth, animals conspired.

Sounds put together, strung along for an eternal ride, gave way to stories waiting to be heard.

Enchantments.

Legends were born.

Myths were started.

The eternal hero’s saga continued.

A vibrational pulse made its way through land and sea, be it on horseback or by the way of a thousand steps the message found its way.

“One last I love you.

One final goodbye.

A heartfelt salute.

Another sky that passed us by.”

An approaching figure, a shadow in the horizon, nears with withering news.

From saddle to ground, the rider encroaches, “I bring in my hands, the possibility to dispel much pain or much happiness; for you to endure depends on the power within this prose.” An everlasting spell he read:

“Sweet remembrance.

Gentle approaches

My heart this tells you,

My love for you is dead,

Do not reproach me!”

Breath, air escaping arid lips, those pronouncements sacred and not meant to be wasted. Oh! How we exhaust this precious resource more valuable than gold.

The enchantment of the captivating zephyr, casting away into an apparent emptiness, to be received, ingested, and cast away once again into nothingness.

From whispers to digital imprints, this energy has shaped worlds, known and unknown.

The murmur of a gentle wind,

casting sounds into the air.

In all its might, no stronger charm can be heaved, no stronger energy released.

We are strung along with this wonderful jinx.

A fluttering sail is seen on the horizon,

Making approach to the rocky tides.

Snowy lands.

Misty trees.

Creatures await amongst shadows not seen.

A wooden skiff nears the turbulent shore, a stranger disembarks, heavy hemp bag over his shoulder, looking ‘round he sees not a soul yet feels wandering eyes on him. He screams into the air:

"From an ancient land I come,

gifts in hand,

do not let me succumb!"

His shriek rattles through the smoky mist, unseen feathery creatures awake from their slumber.

Wings fluttering in the wind,

Eyes turned to face the harrowing howl,

as if his statement carried magic within,

a sparkle of light emerges from above,

the fog gently lifts. A voice pronounces:

“You cry is heard,

Your intentions have been seen,

Yet we cannot help thee”

A sentence is set forth, condemning a lonely sailor. These uttered noises more powerful than a thousand swords.

With a final mournful breath, the sailor is no longer true. His judgment condemning him to the place in time where all is forgotten, swallowed whole into a beast so majestic the universe itself seems downtrodden.

That is the power of the force expelled through our breath.

We are magicians, molding reality, sculpting the unimaginable, exercising millions of neurons that run amok in our brains.

Letters formed, put together they became simple prose, with the years all these sounds a new magician’s trick was born.

A magical apparatus lights up, its electrical discharges similar to a majestic and frightful animal’s brain.

The Animal.

Homo-Sapiens.

The ape that knows that he knows.

The passing of the years have been endured, knowledge and wisdom conveyed with astonishing speed and superficially matured.

Augmented growth.

Progress made by leaps and bounds.

Exponentially.

Into the dark void in between the empty space of our souls. A long, fruitful journey, not without mistakes or aberrations. Not without confusion and fault.

An enchanted reader mesmerized by a mythical glow, discerning the letters to understand it’s flow. A few simple seconds to read these lines:

“News has come, to you my son,

The awaited day has come,

Once, these bars held me in place,

My years withering away,

With might and a spark of luck,

I gladly tell you, I’m free from all this muck”

Oh! The time has come, to endure a feeling much eluded but always sought, happiness is here but not to trust. The power behind those lines, releasing the mind from the catacombs of nightmares, finally he was no longer stuck.

The same magical screen lights up faces, smiling and frowning, lit up by the millions, all ‘round the world, in this dimension and dimensions unknown.

What was once scandalous, is now under the influence of propagandists.

What was once marvelous, is now under the influence of activists.

And through inspiration of the long, lost muse, another cast spell to enthrall us all, a power so strong even the gods felt its pull.

Soon realization comes to me, I am writing out into oblivion, casting out sounds for what they were meant to be:

eternal spells.

We are in the grips of an eternally subconscious incantation:

the spell of Words.

Words.

So it ends, or it begins, of that journey only the readers eyes can discern, an eternal struggle to set forth intention and thought, that, my dear friends, is the predicament we find ourselves in.