A Soul Story (excerpt from "Primordial Chaos")

I’m angry. Angry and upset and confused. I know that, in reality, I am probably feeling none of these emotions… but aren’t these the emotions people associate with the desire to transfix one’s fist through a wall? Or is it more apt to say: I am feeling nothing at all?

The stones between bones are broken and interwoven. They rattle like none other when, at night, the demons I battle become less imaginary and more actuality. The likelihood that I could verbalize this to anybody who would listen and not bat a weary, judgmentally concerning eye is fewer than the seconds between blinks. It’s not like anyone would understand. Doesn’t one have to be at the edge of their life—on the verge of destruction—to be on the brink of a terrible omen fornicating with the fragility of life; ejaculating inside its small frame and destroying any trace of innocence… of clarity? For isn’t it the sex-driven world that blinds us to ourselves? The bodies and cultures preying on our weaknesses to make us weaker and more complacent and “never enough” for him or them or her anyone else for that matter. Personally, I have found that I can only extend my body so far beyond this brink of need before I lose sight of me. The clarity meets depravity when an unwanted cock—or a nipple of a nonlover—meets lips that speak only of pleasure; and not of truth.

Now, what is that to say? Have I lost my mind by diving too deep within it? Does one lose the sea once they swim too far beneath? Surely, some lose their life when they take too quick a flight—but the mind is no sea, you see. It’s more of a portal. You know that hole you always dreamed of digging to the other side of the world? That rapture of wonderland? One’s mind, you see, can only go so deep… before all that is known is lost to their own and into a different world—perspective, dialectic—they unfurl. My mind must be a cavern unlike any other. When I dive deeper, I am solely met with a turn of the kaleidoscope. I lose all sense of where I began—what is real or beyond—and diminish my ability to function and exist, down to a child’s toy that you twist with a wrist.

My horizons appear as infantile as that of a new moon on a cloudy night. On this very same night: paths, did I cross, with a nomad and their handbag and a smile that cut deeper than a pocketknife does a wrist. Wondering what anchors a person to a place, they asked why I have been so caught up in the race. With a puzzled look and disgruntled face, I asked of them to explain this charade. The race to the end of all the days, that is. Not to be first—no, it’s not that sort of race—but to be best. The race to social superiority. As if a god complex conception wasn’t troubling enough, I reached in my pocket for the cigarette butt that held its tobacco as feebly as I did my understanding. Well, I said, I’ve learned early on that the world stops for no one. And if this is to be the case, then I best get in place and hope to succeed before the angel of death comes to erase me. I’m anchored in a life that I have no business living; for the life that I wish is too unrealistic. There’s no room for me there, no need for me here; so aren’t I better off eclipsing the noun? To embrace the idea that I’m a thing untamed—a person and place—all the same? The nomad shifted as the breeze lifted their eyes like birds in flight. With a slanted gaze they penetrated my skin, infiltrated my veins, and asked what more would I be willing to die for. I conflated the ideas of both body and soul, and the patriarchy which attempts to rule them both. I stuttered a response and pardoned a repose. That’s the thing about death: nobody knows. Nobody knows how or when it will be. If the life they are living ends them in glory; or if their mistakes deem them unworthy. As I attempted a drag of the dud in my lips, the nomad spat a dutiful fit. If death is so much of the unknown—then can one suppose life, too, is unknown? And if this is so—believe me by all that goes—then why would one anchor themselves, limit themselves, to an idling life? Not achieving, but pining? With a flick of a wrist, their arms were airborne. A twist of their hips, and with a kick I was scorned. Once they eased back into place as the world does under night, they looked me in the face and said: you can change your life. Another twist and I lose sense. My hearing gone, I start to spin; and as I do, the dark concludes that I, too, am dark through and through. I wish to rush up but I know that I mustn’t, as the pressure around will turn inside. As I gleam upwards to what could be life, I wonder how to change when I’m held down, in place.

I’ve been on this brink for some time now. And while the cliché burns through, sometimes it rings true: it’s all about perspective, if only I knew. Is the world I see now the world where I am? Or is it a twisted adaptation of my origin? As I comb through the memories, tear apart my diaries, I begin to connect the plotted dots on a page in a book of the Universe. In infinity, it turns—chapters anew—but I am one page and with words, I have few. Stringing along some semblance of the truth that is buried too deep for me to ever know, I realize how battered and abused I was. From the time of conception, til my time is done—I’ve been told I don’t matter, it’s only what I do. And not what I do for this world or for me—but the mere conceit of what I can do for you. In this recognition, I start to break. What if this world I know abound, isn’t as so but instead what is told? Profound inklings of my inner darling begin to awaken and, to them, it’s alarming. To accept and embrace myself beyond farce… and to breach the chasmic understandings that we, as a species, are part of cosmic dealings; is for me to be enlightened by all that I am; and renounce all that I am not.

Think of it in this light, if you, too, have become senseless: the process of fertilization that occurs in most species happens from nothing but the movement of atoms. As these atoms collide, so does a life form; from a zygote to embryo to a scapegoat borne. And as the process evolves, the transporters do too, until the new creatures obtrude their refuge and intrude onto truth. Soon after this moment—severed are the ties that held us to this figure and anchored us further to the thoughts of themselves. What we don’t see, however, is the sparing of our soul. For that, my friend, is eternally infertile. We were erected from the universe and, in bodies, resurrected. Give thanks to those that hosted these journeys to return to the land of the souls still living. But too often I find individuals pluralized as extended versions of those mutilated in their bloodline. Let us keep in mind: we are divine!!!! Blood is nothing but the body breathing. And death is nothing but our soul keeping. Keeping the promise it made in, to, and of eternity: these souls will stay but are forever masqueraded. And in this shifting of appearances, it’s hard to be reminded: you are not your body, you are not your mind… you are divine.

As I return to my existence sprawled out on the couch, I reach a disquietude about my identity. In these anxious moments, I look around the room. Love 1 is elevated, Love 2 higher still, and Love 3 is around the corner, and this is my thrill: to experience life as never before. I can be conscious and bruised—fighting and sober. I can be unaware of multi-dimensional traumas and seize preservation for my self. I can open myself to all the possibilities that I have been, am, and will be. And decisively discern my cognizance as my own. With this power of self, I surrender the race. The anchor, the scopes—twisting out of place. I step into my autonomy, as I have before this state, and journey further into a world unknown. With my body a foreigner and my soul intrinsically reborn.

I suppose with that logic, I shouldn’t give a shit of what happens to my extremities. But, I will admit, the stones between my bones are as affluential as the weight of my soul. And while this existence, at large, is in fact interchangeable—this device which carries me through today’s tribulations cannot endure as beguiling a beating. As emotions sift through me like ghosts do a wall, I return to the feeling of nothing at all. The pit in my stomach, wider than ever, I am reminded of such earthly endeavors. To care for my body is to sustain my soul; and to care for my soul is to protect my body. While brick and mortar is a charming rival, my fists would do better by not tempting the tiger. Instead, I ponder what it would be like to accept myself beyond the mortal, and beget my celestial. My soul resides on this earth today because the cells of my body yet remain. Is it possible to love this path I’m on? Embrace the sun for its light and pain? The suggestion remains: we are all one and the same. Each of us a breed of cosmic fuckery. While I don’t know much but these stories and such—I know through and through that I love you. And, perhaps… I can love me too.