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All warfare is based on deception.
Sun Tzu :The Art of War

I had a dream once. It was a beautiful dream. Of golden eyes and hair the color of molten sunshine. Of a radiant smile and a beauty that was too great to be held within any mortal form. Of high towers, and jeweled halls. She belonged there, amongst the flowers and gems. Blessings fell from her fingers and out of all that courted her, she chose me.

Even knowing what I am, and that in the end I would betray her in someway.

Such a beautiful dream, wrapped in gold and pseudo-memories. I live it over and over again, pretending that had I the chance to re-do it all, I would choose love and emerge a changed being as a result of the adoration showered on me.

Deception is not only for others, you see.

The phone was ringing incessantly. Strident in a way that used to sound friendly. He had thought he liked that ring tone at once. Now it nagged and nudged, demanding attention. It bounced off the walls and the items like shattering glass.
The form in the room ignored it. Instead, he hunched further in the chair, hand knitted blanket thrown around him. There was a steaming pot of green tea left as ignored as the phone that puffed cheerfully on a table to the side. He had made that tea almost in a daze, only realizing it was there after he had put the too warm liquid to his lips.
And then he had choked on it, spraying it in a wide semicircle that vanished as vapor in the air. The droplets fell to the wooden floor at his feet, and dried there in the roaring heat of the fireplace.
The phone finally stopped as the answering machine picked up. Hey all, it's Wil! You know what to do at the beep. They did know, but the tape was out of room. So no message was left. He assumed it was just the same variation that had plagued the rest of the tape. So it did not unduly bother him.

He had left the phone ringing, because somewhere in his feverish soul, he craved the feeling of being summoned, being needed and missed. That craving had not extended to actually listening to the messages. Now it was all just unwelcome noise. But perversely, he inflicted these petty annoyances on himself. As if they were minor scourges that would cleanse him of this malaise.

Are you still not speaking with me, beloved?

The imaginary voice, all of it concerned and dripping affection tickled in his mind. That had been another one of those minor grievances. Phantom coaxing and hidden words. He said nothing, forced his mind to think nothing. There was no one in the room with him. He had searched frantically the first few times. He was convinced now... he was alone. And like all the other times, after a time of not acknowledging the voice, it fell silent.

He was quite sure he was going mad.

A small

tiny, infinitely miniscule

white lie...

And it starts a much Bigger lie...

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B A M

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It

rolls

downhill

Such beautiful dreams. As if sent from the eternal Dreamer... . Beautiful and horrible both. A terrible beauty. Wonderous and treacherous and filled in malice and love. So many memories to sieve in dreams. A web of things that were and are twisted with things that can be. Limitless possibilities, ultimate freedom. And only sometimes plagued with regret.

I've come to the realization that this is all dreaming now. When not swept away in the lulling rapture of it all. Mere moments of a more calculating thought that these are merely breathtaking tapestries that are mine, but have somehow trapped me. I am not sure how I come to be here, or yet how to emerge. Perhaps neither is important.

These idle fantasies have recently been plagued by a sound unfamiliar to me. A jangling and harsh sound that does not fall pleasingly into the scape that I roam. A discordant harpsichord sound with none of the melody therein. Badly played music that speaks to no soul. This noise bothers me, but I cannot banish it. And it grows louder as time passes, although intermittant. I reach to silence it, but something does not seem right by this. And by that fact I am remided once more that I appear a prisoner to something.

And this time, it has become of some urgency that I escape. These mazes cannot be trod with any fascination when at any moment they shatter around me. I find myself becoming discontent, the ephemeral becoming tedious. If one cannot enjoy where they are, why remain? And so I move to waken.

If only to shut down that damned noise.

July 11th – The week of Envy
Surrounded by filth, those few shining things left are now something to covet. If the end is coming, everyone wants to spend the last days with the small comforts of the last treasures, whatever they may be. Fights may be brewing.

lassitude fades like foam lapping on the seashore as the ocean pulls back her tides. The foam lingers a short time and then dissipates. All that is left is the stain of water on the sand. A darkening and pasty mud that is the color of flesh. But still the Ocean glimmers in its majesty, always aloof and unreachable. Beautiful and lovely above all. Even the shadows become hers as she hides them in her bosom, her cerulean depths underneath a shimmering facade.

How easy she has it...the ocean. In all her waxing and waning, she is untroubled. Storms may rile her, but she will eventual return to her path. The moon may touch her too closely, and still she trembles but briefly. Always singular in purpose and poise. She consumes all that stand before her in irrevocable blue and white, claiming them into her depths indifferent to their whims.

I was once as she is. Implacable and wily. But I wane, and stay waning as she continues on her way. It is not meet that I do not share her fate. I will, someday be the depths that she covers...and she will not cover me then.

As the ocean fades from dim view provided by mind and memory, the labyrinth re-emerges. I did not delight in her before and even though will and movement return to me, I look askance at her in distrust and resentment. As I lay sleeping, what was it that she had done ? Gathered more light to her? she shone so already more than light itself. Did she pluck to herself more rubies and sapphires that wept from the sky? She was encrusted and crowned greater than a queen. Perhaps she drew precious silks and cloth to line her serpentine walls, or marble and granite and all manner of exotics to adorn herself within those depths where I have not yet trod.

Perhaps like the ocean she has colluded with the discordant noise to shake from me her pleasures. To keep them to herself.

A gnawing suspicion for all her many accoutrements rise within me. These were things I myself once had...and will one day again. And she bedecks herself before me and around me in them in mockery. And I feel anger towards her accomplishments. Almost as if they were at my own expense. Someday...like the ocean...she too will no longer be able to entomb me.