ENDLESSLY WAITING: A MACHINE OF GHOSTS & GRAVITY

It’s possible, some say, that not so far in the future, we will upload our entirety to a device. In such, some will continue to live on, forever, flashing and speeding upon the face of a microchip; humanity paused, then lost, somewhere within the magnetic gravity of a machines binary certainty.

Man in the machine: the desperate final attempt, a last gasp in tepid futility. prescient in, and above, immortality. The future speeds towards a select few, those worthy enough we’ll somehow judge, to remember forever.

What sort of demented chaos could erupt from the madness of this intranet of ignoble thought? Will the ephemeral be replaced by the digital? Will the past remain in record or will it become of no consequence for the whirling minds of material thought?

Imagine if you might, uploading every craven thought, every glorious memory, every moving picture onto a machine, -modern as it might be- the mass of a Tahoe Snowflake in May. Imagine being one stuck, flowing within the circuits of a server, connected to trillions of snowflakes, a current falling into the undertow. A trillion trillion rivers of formerly existing material thoughts.

Imagine losing the very human ability to move, to dance in space. All while gaining the silicon tools to speed across and into many billions of lifelong memories. Moving upon this ultimate collection of structured memory, you get lost in the branches of a seemingly endless maze of intellect; your body once a gangly hinderance, it now remains of scattered ash and electric dust.

I try imagining you in this machine, my dear. Poured into the machine, but a database, your mind and memories available any moment I’d like? Your voice calming, you relate to me, across the immense gulf of shared memories. Our shared experiences a language of base two.

Just the thought of such madness truly frightens me on this cold night. If this is the future, our memories synapsing forever, our lives now terminally paused; I sit and ponder the thought of a forever, forever, and would rather not wander that internet alone.

Why would anyone want to go on inside a machine?  To live without a life forever? It’s no life. There is no forever.

Universe’s end in an absolute dance of frozen death. 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Giving Thanks & Missing the Grey Shores

You were the star of my dream just now. We were in Maine again. The holiday at the shores of the grey ocean, behind the granite wall of great boulders that appear to have been placed by Zeus himself; placed one by one to shield his people from the crashing thunder of the hunter’s moon. You tasted of salt and aloe that morning, the yellow sun falling up at our backs, waging its glorious war with the last evenings mist, turned to mornings fog; Like the runaway mist, your hand in mine would burn the demons from my aether.

We were there again if only for the briefest of space. Dancing like fools subject to sin.

I remember what you said, as the sweet drift of the grill lifted my senses to give permanent thanks: “we deserve this lobster, right? Just not on such a perfect evening alone.” I disagree, and your green eyes flash; picture a shutter capturing an entire story of unrequited love.

If I ever believed anything at all, it was that I’d never lose the memory of those eyes. Now I seem to have nothing left to believe in, my darling, my paramour.

Dreams are uncovered through the absence of a sense of smell. The moment I realize, it seems, is the moment I shed a single tear. In this way dreams are like films, home movies that star a litany of ghosts. They only relieve my sorrow for that moment before I awake. Then begins this conscience nightmare projecting a future that’s upside down and abridged of bliss.

You’re never coming back. I know that is the absolute truth. Even if you wanted to, the ship of destiny has sailed and I could never catch up. I wish that wishes could come true. I wish and I wish and I wish, three times or maybe seven, but it only reveals me as the ignorant fool. But I wish again. I sometimes wonder if the opposite was true…would you wish too?

Is it already the holiday in your new space? Are you thinking of me, those crashing shores, the smells, and that salty food? If you are, my dear, then I am too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Silhouette’s & Perfect Views

There’s this picture I have posted in the near reaches of my mind.

It’s a silhouette of your face and body set before a hundred mile view.

The distant mountains and full harvest moon.

It’s so sharp in the low-light, cool, arctic air, and so unmistakably you.

The lasting, personally striking images are captured from beyond your conscience view.

As you studied the warm sky that stretched out so far, across a sea.

Do you remember what you said that night?

That you would finish setting the tent so I could go check out the glorious view.

What I didn’t say, but thought; was it’s far more striking silhouetted by you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Maybe Love IS a Battlefield

Who did that song from the 1980’s, Love Is a Battlefield? Something my ever cool sister would have been listening to I’m sure. Duran Duran, Bon Jovi, Tori Amos maybe? The hook crossed my mind this morning as I waited in line to vote. All this time and effort I’ve put in trying to put the experiences and disappointment of war on paper in a way that makes sense and the most salient truth’s been all but completely avoided: That my period in the Army has utterly destroyed my desire to be loved. How can a man go on with life in any meaningful way without that most basic human desire?

If the war had somehow changed me into a sociopath, the question might be moot? But as much as I’d like to erase my desire, -I have tried to do as much- the fact is, life is vacant absent the wanting of a beautiful woman who could have anyone else. Maybe if I hadn’t known of such wanting, hadn’t tasted the fruit, I could continue peddling onward in ignorant bliss? That kind of passion is like a narcotic. Once you’re dependent on its product, the chase is compulsive and autonomic. Picture an oak leaf, brittle and superannuated, with nothing to lose.

If love is a battlefield, then war is a drug. Killing is ecstasy and true love a crime. There is only two things that matter in a world so filled with the stench and the aroma of dying and desire. That you kill the man who is plotting to kill you. And a lover that’s been desperately waiting with a singular passion for the warrior you are and the lover she desires. It’s a paradox, a lie that is also true. In order to kill another man in battle, the sane man must give up his humanity, and therefore, his passion and empathy are lost, ever fading from view.

All this may seem or sound more complicated than it really is? There is the spiritual, the ethereal nature of things and then there is the practical. How can you share life with another when the act of sleeping itself is fraught with danger? The terrifying dreams that play out in the dark, when I finally do step across into the darkness often grip so tightly that my physical self responds violently. More than once I’ve destroyed a clock, or a phone, whatever’s within reach. To wake-up with a severe pain in my knee from the thrashing that can occur while asleep is unpleasant sure, but how would that affect an innocent partner? The sudden burst of rage that rises up from the depths over a matter previously unnoticed, like someone too close in line, or the screeching of a chair moving over a tiled floor? I’ve avoided action till now, but will that last?

Most importantly, how could I ever love another if I only am able to hate myself? Still today I avoid and shut out those in my life who truly care for me without expectation or need of remittance. Where do you even begin in such a turbulent atmosphere?

Truth is, I miss you. I do. I say I’m trying, yet the truth is I don’t even know where to start? If I had it to do all over again would my destination find me any different? It’s in the code. I’m on my own. No use in wishing for an angel to fall and cast my soul back upon that previous shore. The die is cast. The future is already written and these words are part of the stone. No need to reminisce and dream of what could have been. If we were meant to be together, we would have been.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TINY LITTLE DREAMS OF YOU MY LOVE

It’s so cold here I’m numb, in this yellow sun splashed memory of us, once, alone, close, together. Do you still smile and giggle when the powdery fresh snow makes that sound as it crushes in between the rubber soles of your boots and the sidewalk? Do you still think of that night with glee, as we traced ancient patterns upon the pristine pond ice, with the steel edges of our modern era skates? Can you remember those words once spoken…”I don’t even seem to really know you anymore?” That impression from you, my exposed ego, so painful, so uncomfortably wise, it still echoes within the walls of my irredeemable mind. True moments, like those [these] are rare elements indeed.

There’s this dream that precedes the terror. You’re all alone, walking away from the Central Avenue telephone, wind in your hair, my shadow falling upon your gaze. I’m barely even there, no hope to spare, but you; you’re a part of everywhere. It’s a tiny little dream, this clip that never makes noise. I listen so hard for the human sounds, until it returns to dark extensions of moving. This film stars the ghosts and it escapes so quickly, like a rainbow on the horizon, or an unrequited sigh. It’s the one thing left that I can still call my own. I believe in you still. Does that make me a fool?

If there’s time, I’d love to share my thoughts on infinity. Picture us napping on that couch from the world war. You’re sleeping so soundly as I travel the virgin trails of that temporal mind. It’s a special trust to rest like this. I value your surrender, in the deepest sleep, yet still so close. You’d wake and ask, “what time is it,” as if you’re surprised I’m still here? It’s quantum entanglement, our atoms became one upon this galaxy, together forever, the trillion, trillion, trillion connections in all dimensions. The matter that binds our dreams no matter. You’d say something like; “God you are so dumb.” It is haunting how simple the best of our lives truly are. No drugs, no liquor, the chemical intercourse is organic, and brilliant. I yearn for that pleasure so high up it floats. Not true love, but true nature.

“Don’t forget to live,” you say, the last time we walked along the path beneath the birch and birds singing their songs. What did you mean? Was it something so obvious that it’s hidden from my view? If our souls are of the same matter, does writing, or crying, or laughing and dancing even matter at all? You gave me everything, and still? It’s more than nothing at all.

There is an epic full moon coming they say, only 9 days away. It will shine 30 percent brighter than moons for a hundred years to follow. Look up my dear, on that satellite that glows so bright on that windy night. It’s the closest we can get to together, watching the orbit in suspended perfection, all four eyes consuming its arc, and its inevitable fall. They say it shatters into a billion pieces called stars, but I swear it’s all infinite, we’re little more than each other’s consequence, less one another’s faults.

As I work at this novel, somehow your spirit underscores the pain? Picturing and considering the horrendous image of combat and the hidden scars of war..so cliche, I know, I wanted to share my pain, shake the pain, mark the loss, cull my insight into the meaning of these merciless, forever wars that do shatter families, and tribes, and children and honor, and my self-respect, therapeutically analyzing the soul, begging for relief from the guilt and shame. Instead, I wander around the imagination, justifying our separation, which occurred beneath this thundering cloud of harried, inexcusable guilt, questioning my full sanity and pretending to not really care about you today.

It’s all connected, I suppose. First love, first war. Last exit, final atonement. You asked me not to go, yet I did. You begged me to come home and I lost my way. It’s all part of the cosmic shift; no past, no future, just right now. Was any of it ever real for you as it was for me love? If you could wake-up again on that couch, safe, secure, cherished, would you want to return? Me? I’m still there, in a way, like I’m still on that dusty street half a world away. The snapping stench of a murderous city pounding my fists, trying to break this terror, this mirror, escape this other dream.

It’s that place that will forever delineate the truth of that soft afternoon watching you sleep. I try not to go there too often. There are only so many tears I can shed at once.

I miss you. I always do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PRETEND NOT TO SEE; YOU LOVE

It wasn’t a first love, but it was a love a first sight. You lit up that evening with those bright eyes shimmering, as you lifted the glass of sparkling liquid reflecting this life. I noticed it all at once, once and for all, like a Monet on the concrete Palace’s Wall. Everything about you triggered feelings unknown in me up to that particular point. That deep honest laugh, genuine, an organic expression that revealed enough, for any sane man to want a little, or a lot more. Those freckles painting your cheekbones and slim little nose, how could anyone be self-conscience of the remarkable beauty your features comprised? That motion you did with your fingers. Hoping to hide your assumed vulnerabilities? It left me afraid to ask, but curious to know: How could any creature so beautiful not look in a mirror and smile? How could you see anything but the perfection of -if there is one- a God’s master work?

 

But that’s the paradox of humanity, right? Our inability to accept simple truths. It was those first few moments, consuming your essence, that derailed any further notions or plans I had made. A thought crossed my mind -a thunderous whisper- at some point in those first few minutes: “If this perfect creature were to ever fall for an ugly fool like me, I’d never ever want for love, or beauty again.” It was an open question that night, for her open nature hid a cunning feature tucked within all beautiful human beings: The art of the non-tell. I was smitten, I was enchanted, I was certain to act like a damn fool. Like the child at heart that I was, so foolish and immature.

 

It was by the slightest chance we ever even met that night, 20 years ago today. My work was beyond the city, I was there by strange coincidence or random chance. After an hour at that bar, across from you patiently, a friend suggested a bonfire to celebrate, what else, but the Hunter’s Moon? It was a short drive to his cabin. Did she come too? With the question still out there, she stepped off the porch like a goddess and took my hand. Only a few times in an entire life can the touch of another’s simple affection release so much power. Her hand in mine struck like a lightening bolt, pleasurable chemical intercourse striking my open mind. She liked me, I knew that much was true.

 

We talked for hours that night as the fire grew higher, then slowly died. We spoke of the universe and music, mathematics and Miller, family and dreams until the exact moment I had to go. This was before Facebook and personal cell phones to connect us all without a pause. We made a plan though, and I promised to keep it. The plans became action, I took her rock climbing and she escorted me to a foreign film. Each time I saw her, my heart skipped in a chill I can only describe as pleasure that’ll one day become pain. And I remember so well that evening, when you leaned in to kiss me, saying, “we needed to get that out-of-the-way.” Indeed.

 

It’s been 20 years since that autumn of entrancement and I haven’t seen you in at least 10. But tonight, my dear, there you were right in front of me, smiling, talking into your cell phone. You looked so great, like the years haven’t mattered and my brain skipped a million beats, as I walked past and behind you, craving that touch, you couldn’t have noticed me. So I disappeared once again.

 

It may sound stupid, but you smelled the same. You still had that sugar southern drawl I made fun of, your old voicemail, memories so small. And all of those memories are popping in my brain. I’m writing it all down as best as I can, knowing you’ll never read this, but wishing you could. I wanted to grab you and take you straight to a mirror. But I’m not that strong. 

 

You were perfect this evening like before. The incomplete theory of romance, from the mind of that 20 something fool, is all the thought really was, even if tonight would’ve been so different?.That love in reverse, isn’t it a mystery, eternal and always churning within a ring of flames. What we see in the mirror reveals all of our mistakes. What we see is so different from what a lover can taste.

 

I miss you, I saw you; somehow, we’re still both the same? I pretend not to see, and you….

 

 

 

 

 

Waiting For You, My Love

It’s been so long, so much has happened, and fear of the unknown prevents me from picking up this phone tonight. It’s been two years today without any information. Two years and two months since we actually spoke. What are you doing? Are you well? Are you happy? Do you think about me, curse me, or even worry? The last thing you’d be is surprised with my absence; that’s true. I know you’d be glad to hear something from me, even if that something was not very much at all. This contempt for my happier self is tearing out of me from the darkness within. And yet I refuse to change.

You always said we’d be together one day, even if that day is decades away. You’d say, “most friends are adrift; screaming into my life, then slowly fading out. But us, we fade together. The screams are the beacons that will never lose the connection.” You’re such a beautiful thinker, a dreamer and a skeptical believer. You could be correct, or was it all a delusion, set forth upon a fourth wish?

This entire commitment rests in your arms. I’ll never be strong enough, courageous, bold, honest or alive. So I hope that you find me and beg me to just listen, to be still. My paradox of ego will crumble the moment I hear your voice.

Yes, things are terrible right now. You’re the only who understands me. Shit is terrible, I know, but shit is worse than it seems.

Waiting in the forest for you, my love.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BOTH WAYS

Nothing seems to make me feel worse than when I reflect on my earlier life and what would have become of it had I resisted the urge to enlist in the Army after September 11th. Would things have turned out worse? Instead of the towering shame and sense of betrayal that overwhelms me today, would I have just found replacement feelings of ignominy and victim-hood? Either way I lie awake at night hoping to erase the shame and wake up with the fear born of my nightmarish anger. So I do my best to occupy my brain with the drone of the never ending internet or the fiction within the screen; anything to dam the current that flows from another life and the future impossible to replace. Death comes, it seems, the moment that barrier gives way, opening up the closure our fiction has hidden.

There is no justice for the self-righteous among us. I say that in the context of modern day truth tellers, those who do what they believe to be honorable only to be treated like the villain. The story is familiar. I can relate. The idiom, I believe, is: “no good deed goes unpunished.” My entire concept of right and wrong was challenged, and defeated the day I was discharged from Army service administratively, essentially, for doing “the next right thing.” “The war is bigger than this young man,” I was lectured just days before I was unceremoniously shipped home with two fellow “troublemakers.” “We are in the middle of a war, son.” “Why are you doing this to yourself?” My answer, in the moment was as honest as it was naive and simple. My answer, paraphrased, was something like “I signed up to fight for the good guys. I enlisted….” The meeting was over.

Even in my initial shock, there was an ember of dignity deep within. That I could somehow hang my hat on that simple truth. That my war was over, yet my humanity carried on. In a rational mind, this could have been logical. Instead what settled under my atmosphere were the competing forces of embarrassment and shame. Embarrassed that I came home physically unharmed, yet profoundly hurt by what felt like being abandoned and shameful for trusting the forces of power to begin with. My self-righteousness encumbered my ability to prosecute the immorality of war. I should have known as much. I did this to myself and that’s ultimately what today hurts the most.

You might be wondering: “what could have been so terrible that it forced me/us to press the issue to the “event horizon,” if you will? In not so many words, I am ready to let it go. The only person outside of my unit and command that I told was my now deceased Grandfather; a Veteran of WWII, Korea and Vietnam Wars. It was unexpected that he expressed his lack of shock. In fact, he thought it lucky to have an honorable discharge in the face of such deliberate malfeasance.

After 8 months deployed to Afghanistan in late 2002 early 2003, our unit was quickly turned around and refitted for the invasion of Iraq in March 2003. During the final 4 weeks prior to the invasion we were stationed outside of the Middle East with several additional coalition forces. It came to my attention that soldiers were visiting a brothel regularly, then sharing video captured during the sexual escapades. It wasn’t the idea of a brothel that bothered me, nor the childish passing around of amateur porn. What seemed quite disturbing then -revolting today even- was the open knowledge that many of these girls were underage and that several of the homemade tapes included violence. My first reaction was disbelief. Just sailor stories, I thought? Pretty sick shit, but almost certainly untrue. The more I heard however, the more it became evident that the rumors were, in fact, true.

The second thing that killed me was few seemed to give a shit? Is this really what we are all about? Supposedly traveling halfway around the world to liberate oppressed peoples only to victimize some along the way? So we took it to the PL. Long story short; four months later, following a capture mission in Iraq and three separate meetings since first reporting the incident, one final chance was given to drop the issue. Six hours later I was extricated from Iraq; ten hours after that, from the Army itself.

About five years ago I stumbled upon an article that caught my attention. Some private contractor for the US Military had been accused of shielding individuals caught up in a scandal involving underage prostitution very near the post I had visited years before. A corporate whistle blower had come forward with evidence of the myriad crimes only to be fired and returned to the States ingloriously. According to the piece, the corporation settled with a moderate fine and no admission of wrongdoing in the matter. The article went on to reveal that the crimes continued for another year at least. No charges or further investigation was ever instigated, according to the piece.

Are we the country we proclaim to be? Am I insensitive to the bigger picture, or, am I simply unwilling to take accountability for my own behavior, projecting my anger to deflect the truth? I remember that flight home so many years ago and the slightest ember of confidence that remained deep within. That someday, if I pressed on, someday my actions would be rewarded. Yet, like so many other high and mighty idiots, that redeemable moment never comes. Instead, we just add to the long list of victims assaulted by the “big picture.”

Why write this today? The truth is, my slow fall from normality has inflicted emotional harm, not only upon the self, but upon those who knew me so long ago. This guilt is yet another scar. I wanted to at least try to explain in a way that’s to not explain away the forces that interrupted my trajectory and shifted its orbit. I am sorry. My stubborn reluctance to talk and my inability to cope is on me, period. Be assured, the end will come despite your genuine concern, not in spite of it. I’m sorry you couldn’t help me. I am gratified. The truth is, it’s unclear if anything will prevent my ceding to the fear and noise?

I wrote this for anyone who cares enough to read it.. It’s the single thing I’m capable of doing. Hopefully these words will offer a modicum of reason and eventual closure. Remember me for the man I once aspired to be, not the coward that ran away.

I’ll post this tonight for good measure. If possible, another time soon, more will follow? It’s impossible to say everything. All life must one day pass through the seasons of creation to be born once more, cleaner somehow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Novel Idea – A Biography in Pieces

Secretly, I’ve spent much of the last two years grinding out, bit by bit, a semi biographical book reflecting on my experiences with the Army and life after. I’d never even considered doing such as thing. Besides the occasional letter, some technical writing at work, and an on again, off again journal, I had no credibility or experience needed to write an actually readable text. The project become more daunting upon losing my early efforts, most applicable art and several notebooks containing memories and rough quotes from my time in the Army, when last February, my cabin went up in flames along with everything inside at the time. I returned from a hike to find the place little more than a pile of smoking rubble, a particularly apt metaphor for my life.

These past months I’ve slowly restarted the process, albeit from an even further deteriorated mind and spirit. I’m considering publishing the work, an unedited chapter at a time, on this page for review and commentary? Even though I find my work entirely unreadable, like the reaction one might have to hearing ones recorded voice for the first time, possibly a little sliver of vulnerability would help me in improving, or worst case, abandoning the project altogether?

I do not expect any response to this post. Writing it down, here, was my first baby step in that direction. So if I don’t chicken out before then, I hope to release the prologue online by tomorrow night. All I ask if for genuine feedback, good or bad, helpful or not. Any sharing of the work would be greatly appreciated as well.

Until the next falling sun. L