Observation

Is it wrong that I want a drink so badly right now that I would walk across a carpet made of newborn babies to get to a bar?

Revelation

There is a strangeness that accompanies revelation; not conclusion, not wonder, not awe, but the obviated sense that it could not be any other way; that it has been this way and will remain so, always. Right and correct in perpetuity. A painful permanence of rightitude; perpetually accurate and absolute unerring finality. That is what separates revelation from truth.

Revelation is the claw hammer to the face, the unwelcome and unforeseen kick in the nuts that reminds us all – everyone – that while one may borrow against truth in day to day dealings, the great cosmic accountant keeps very accurate and very thorough sheets; the kind of accurate book-keeping that hints at the unavoidable, uneasy feeling that that great lender will call in your marker eventually; that there is no real chance of getting lost in the paperwork or avoiding the audit. The cosmic accountant – that sick, twisted mockery of help waiting to pounce on those not carefullly reading the fine print on the karmic conditions of sale – will take from you what is most dear at the most inopportune of times. Without warning or plausible reasoning, the accountant will call in the mortgage and, loan-sharking as they would, take in payment what they want. No discussion of conditions, no discount, no right of first refusal. Business. That is what it would they would say; it’s just business.

And that is where the bargaining starts. Not with the accountant, the caller of the loan. No, the bargaining starts with everything left out of the transaction. The bargaining starts with what is not borrowed against. The accountant calls the tune, demands payment, punitive and deep. Valued far above what was borrowed, far beyond what is reasonable. Bargaining on parts the borrower thought held safely in the coffee can, stuffed in the sock drawer, tucked in the mattress; that nest egg for the rainy day everyone is sure will come (because the accountant for rainy days is no more above the board than the accountant for truth, and will come calling, you can be sure), bargaining on things not for sale.

And so the bargaining continues; bargains with other people, bargaining with other peoples’ things, bargaining with other people (second meaning, not a typo). And in the end, the accountant gets the farm, the house, the car, the dog. And the borrower (can we call them that? it seems more voluntary than it likely should) gets...what? What they deserve? What is coming to them? A staid reminder that there is no free lunch? A lesson in the fine art of borrowing? Life experience? (what, dare I say?) a revelation?

Revelation is what happens when the accountant, that great lender of dreams, catches up to the borrower. And the mystical and transformational revelation is the sole reward for the borrower. All conclusions, all wonders, any remaining awe; are stripped away, and the borrower is left to ponder this revelation. Dissect the perfect and complete certainty of where they are; analyze how they came to stand on this rocky shore, alone. Evaluate the choices and circumstance that form the edge of this great wall of ocean before them, squinting at the deep, grey-green mass rolling at their feet, wondering how to make it back home.

confessions of the righteous

I have taken to reading books in the bathroom at work. Yes, I am a bathroom reader, the lowliest of creatures. Why not? I enjoy books, I use bathrooms; is it not my prerogative to combine preferred activities? I read in the bathroom at home – should not minor creature comforts be allowed in my place of business? I have witnessed the residue of food-stuff in the bathroom – am I not at least more hygienic than they? Surely a book, with washed hands fore and after, represents less concern for cross contamination than ingestible goods? We wear our clothing into the bathroom with little concern; ladies and gentlemen of public opinion, how is a book then not in the realm of what is sound?

Yes. I see the quizzical looks of coworkers as I emerge from the bathroom with my literature in tow. And fix them with the steely gaze of accusation: I may be reading, friend, but you are performing untold evils in that tiled asylum, and I will not have you judging me.

chance meetings in histroy

 University hid it well; the rigour of formal education all but erasing the last discernable parts. Like a stone left to the elements, erosion – constant wear, the ever so soft and perfect disassembly – would reduce the weight, but more slowly and less carefully than before. Always there would be the remains, the corpse in the desert factually pointing with unerring accuracy to the guilty.
White gold earrings – hoops nonetheless, large and round as tea saucers – dangled from ears punctured by a single, perfect, centred, hygienic piercing. Nails painted surgeon clear.  Perfectly smooth, without crack or chip. The gleaming white ends accentuating long and sculpted keratin-art. Dark mascara professionally applied in symmetrical arches across large, round eyes.
Her clothing addressed the role perfectly. Slimming, knee length pants in a non-khaki khaki colour looked of fashion forward thought and late blooming spring. An off-white blouse, two buttons down, revealed pimento coloured skin. Her posture was impeccable, hers legs crossed in confident elegance. Youthful streaking of brassy blonde in the black rows of hair cut in arrow straight bangs whose diligent maintenance is a necessity. And she spoke.
It was almost too subtle to catch clearly. It would not be unreasonable to attribute it to incorrect hearing or an unfortunate physical malady; too late a night the night before, or a small and temporary excess of saliva at the back of the throat. There it was though, too minor to be a disability, too regular to be temporary – the slightest lisp on esss’, a barely detectable tonal drop on the aiches. It was her voice that told you where she was from, what her background was.
She was native; well spoken, intelligent, and professional. And she hid the reservation, the baggage, the stereotype so well one might have thought her asian. But her voice, that immovable lisp and dragging h, pulling at the seams of her designer clothes and creasing the parchment of her papers of conviction. The ever-so-slight and almost-controlled tone in her speech, that indelible ink forever labelling her indian, drunkard, underprivileged, spoiled, needy, abused, lazy, overcompensated, a taker of handouts and government programs, pagan.
I sat close enough to hear every imperfection. And a tinge of sympathy filled the void left by her voice when the mask became the model and a history the burden.

The violinist

i

I am a sham. I am a fraud. I dispense mistruths. Tricks are played before my audience. Masquerades and illusion are the means through which I unfold the proscenium of honesty while the fly tower behind goes about its drop - drop of deceit. Recognition eludes me.

ii

You feed on the instrument delicate in your touch. Suckle at its vibratory tone, draw fire from the wood that forms its perfect shape. Tap-tapping at eternity in amber silken glossiness, reining spittle and sweat from the horse hair bow – maker of sound, channel of divinity. I fear your talent. I admire your strength. I long for your touch. I am conquered.
You are a terrifying sight, violinist.  You are contrast and contradiction come corporeal.  You are passion and control, wild eyed and demure. You shake with delight and tremble with anticipation.  Coax sound from an instrument so dead to my hand.

iii 

I do not know your music.  I am illiterate in your tongue. I do not feel the strings vibrating - there is no tactile connection to your fingers. No visible purpose to the twitch and strain, correction and position to make the note. Sweet and rich, I cannot see where your music comes from. It flows; relentless, seamless, and formless. It is without source – no fountain or glacier to trace its roots, no spring bubbling out of the rocky earth to point at and say ‘Ah ha! here is the spot from where it emerges! the place it rises from the dead, stony ground. This is the font, the source, the point at which the journey begins! There is the start!’ It is mystery and awe.
Your language is foreign to me – a seven letter alphabet all form and no substance. I see your craft – abundant and clear in the sound and fury you pleasure us with. Your talents create envy and desire in my heart. You are master. You command the machine that rends my heart. Without you the violin is dead – a polished husk devoid of life, empty of sound.
I hate you for your skill. I despise the shuffling groan of the crowd rising to greet your music, the silent shroud enveloping audiences as you perform, the sighs and tears of the crescendo. I hate the passion you command, the sweet release at your fingers. I revile the pale blue satin dresses and black silk ties rustling in ovation. I hate the glowing admiration, the unfettered applause, the bouquet of yellow roses and baby’s breath they present you with when you have left us spent and bewildered.
But I love your music.

iv

It is light as a feather, delicate as the wings of a bird. The violinist has not been kind.  The surface bears scars of frustration and temper. The strings and pegs wear the mark of play. The velvet lining of the case beckons it home. It is lost without the guiding hand. The slave is bequeathed the estate, only to stare at the ruins after the master is gone.

v

The stage is empty but for a case, a violin, and a magician. The magician smiles - a smile illuminating the darkened theatre with ecstasy and perfect, complete understanding. 

There was a road

There was the road. And the sun shining on it. And viscous air caressing hair and skin. And the people that stood on the line of the road - stood single file; looking east, backs to the sun. A sky empty before them, the horizon empty behind.

There was the wind. And the grass that rolled and swam in the fields, the living sea rising and falling to the pulsing air. And the voice of protest in the rustle of waxy stalks; whispering tongues in attentive ears. And the crowd waited; breathless, noiseless. Eyes and wind scouring the road, looking for her lost children.  Looking for life in the beating heart of the land; raging life in the hearts of the crowd standing on the road, trembling life among the grass swaying in the wind, beckoning with the warmth of the soil and the sun. And life flowed through feet, and through roots. Into the soil, down to the earth. Black earth floating road and grass.
There was the sex of animal and plant. And the timeless soil and sky. And the fading light and restless wind. And breath of life and sound; inhalation of want and need, expulsion of regret and apology.    
There was the heat. And the heat pushed life and scent and wind upward; to faces - faces silently drying tears on cheeks and lips. And the crowd wept - wept together. And in solitude. And in unison lifted their arms to the dome of blue arching above. Slowly (slowly) and delicately (delicately) they turned their open hands upward, lifting the sky, overhead. Pressing downward, they let their bodies fall. Backward they went. Drawn to the road, pushed to the ground, succumbing to the pull of the earth (heat, sex, noise, wind, life, matter, creation) alive beneath their feet.

A Return to Arms

A confession. My absence has been my own. I did not post because, quite frankly and rightly so, I presumed no one read this drivel. The chain of thought was this; there are enough opinions out there and enough mediocrity in print to sustain a voracious reader through a multitude of lifetimes. I can add to the pile. I did. I have done my part.

Yesterday, a co-worker asked me, quite out of the blue - why I hadn't worked on this for a while. An unsolicited query - my interest grew. He continued. He said that he enjoyed reading this, that it was good and interesting. At this point I am likely adding fiction to fact to make this seem more meaningful, but if you want the news, go to CNN. Regardless, the chord was struck, and an internal pledge made: get on this again.

So here is the public portion of my private shame - I will start posting again. I will actually complete the 'to be continued' entries. And I will try to maintain some regularity.

The Devil Rides the Bus or Blood on the Highway: A Journey to the Soul of Man

As a Bus Route 305 rider, I will share with you a tale of high drama, rarely seen. Frightened by the prospect of bad weather, I have forsaken my usual bicycle transportation and rode the BRT yesterday and today. Much to my amazement, last night I bore witness to an altercation between poverty stricken, expired-ticket-passenger and ill-tempered, monolith bus-driver. To aid the uninitiated, expired bus tickets serve considerably different purpose depending on whether you are the issuer or the reciever of such an item - any percieved commonality or agreed upon worth declining rapidly after the allotted usage time is exeeded. It was such a misunderstanding that led to the altercation I describe. Trapped between the devil and the deep blue sea (or, more correctly, between the disheveled and the big blue bus driver), I was subject to the whims and flow of the discourse as it proceeded.

Conflict ensued; punctuated by the bus driver implying that the man (now swearing profusely and directing a series of derisive words and hand-gestures at said bus driver) should remit and be subject to a physical beating he would not soon forget. I became an unwilling human buffer in the ensuing confrontation, with opposing forces astride either side of me. The tension was palpable as the combatants sought to out-do their foe; one with his distinctive brand of verbal attacks, the other with implied recourse to physical violence. Civility was, however, soon restored and the ride continued most uneventful after that. I will state with unequivocal certainty that at no time was I in physical harm, nor did I perceive my person, or the persons of my fellow passengers, to be in danger. I credit this to the fine training and physical bulk of the bus driver.

In conclusion, I went on to read my book - grateful to be alive and thankful that fortune found me on the plus side that day.

Today's ride: strangely disappointing in its un-eventfulness.

The Unconventional Qualities of Bad

I went walking with a friend today. Delightful. Thin winter air, the yellow sun, and a warm breeze blowing from the west; the combination of blue sky and white snow made for a truly blessed setting. He said:
-I would like to take up quilting. Making quilts – that seems like a wholesome activity, a wonderful way to past the time. I think I would enjoy that.

I replied:
-Perhaps you would also enjoy inserting a man’s penis into your ass. That seems like an activity you would like as well, as it is only slightly less gay than your last statement.
My response is not what a good person would say. I am not a good person. Good people do not say to other good people that they should insert objects into their anus. Good people smile and agree and pretend to care. A good person would have said:
-You are right. Quilting is a fine and productive hobby. I would suggest you make a quilt for your children as a keepsake of the love their obviously heterosexual father has for them.
That would have been good. That is what a good person would have said. But I am a bad person. That is why I said something bad. If I were a good person, I would have said something good. If I were a regular person – a person who says both good things and bad things, or who say good things while thinking bad things, or who say bad things only when good people are not in the room – I would have said something good even if I wanted to say something bad. But, as clearly intoned, I am a bad person. So I say bad things
I could have said something worse. That is why I am bad. If I said something worse, I would be evil. I am only bad. I am remorseful. I demonstrate empathy.  I remeber and reconsider what has been said and remonstrate myself for not saying something good. I think to myself 'that this is not a good thing to say'. That is why I am not evil. Evil people say the worst kinds of things.  I am not evil. I am only bad.

riverlifemother

Over the drumming traffic, in the in-between spaces of cloistered colonnades, hands are brought together, palms to the sky - a sanctuary for butterflies. Feather wings gently stroke burning hearts, fanning the embers. Destiny, solitude and crowds. I want to see India someday.

Brown-black eyes and black-brown skin watch white shirts and tan trousers from shadowed coolness. Blinding sunlight filters down to the hot platform through the roof and vents. The trains are running again. Crowds gather, overwhelming the machine. Hundreds. Thousands. Space is made, baggage forgotten. Happy tunes and unsmiling faces – they are location dependent. Whistles sound, and movement resumes. Remorseless diesels push polished steel forward in distance and time, metallic snakes driven across the land. Infinitely small as they race away from the onrushing noise, the gleaming steel is a note from Europe in a foreign land.

The golden river sheds its banks. Aimless and methodical, it plays through the fields and forests. The olive dye of tranquility is drowned in the slow press of the river. Detritus of growth and progress are floated, displaced, waterlog, submerge, are revealed. Slowly petrifying as it goes, the movement of the river marks time without the language of man. Ganges, Indus, life, mother - the river slowly wears at the land, the land tumbles and falls to the river. Water is the record keeper of the land, and land the warden of the prodigal river. Maa Ganga. An inverted sky stares up from the silken surface. Harnessed to the stars, the river looks back under the watchful gaze of the sister as it slips toward fate.

Gleaming serpents slide below the surface. Breeching periodically, the contour of the land is drawn from below. The flatness of the water is deceiving. The river is always in change, but eternal in form. It plays along the polished perfection of the tracks, changing everything and nothing – the rails will be here for a very long time - the river, longer still. Where steel meets water, debris gathers. Drawn by magnet, molecule or fate – who knows? believers are hard to convince in any event. The train grinds to a halt, confronted by the river. Gravity’s game – the winner already decided.

to be continued

Hallways

Who’s that now? beauty lies in the doorway. Murdered? slumped in the passageway, I fear to ask. Cold and mute, time and place transcended – she is still and peaceful at rest. Who has done this? If convicts and felons were about, I would better understand. Corruptible minds and broken spirits come near. She is master, I am slave. The minstrel should sing - songs of glory and loss and remeberance.  Where is the cenotaph, who lays the wreath that commemorates the loss?  He is too late; the deed is done. Old men stare at her ruins; old women grin at her demise. They have done this. Conspirators circle in the gloom - contemptuous eyes and nimble fingers steal the fragments of dignity. Even in death she is magnificent. The curious and the victorious living wait in silence.

Only scratches and footprints mark the spot where she lay. Alone in the hallway - she is gone. Trespassers and spectators have moved on. No headstone will mark where she lies. Passed - the world grows poorer. But the reckoning is not yet completed, losses not yet tallied and accounts remain unclaimed. Whose loss? she is gone and the absence is ours.

I sit in the gathering darkness. Vermin, blackness, and dust erase the last traces of beauty. Time has won and we are the unfortunate witness to her demise. Knees to chest, I crouch in the corridor and wait for release. Staring blankly at the spot where she lay, I cry softly and mouth the words of the song. Tears drop to the dust at my feet. Outside, the sounds of the city slowly permeate the solitude. I can hear the children playing in the park nearby. Giddy and fresh, they do not know yet that beauty is gone.

Oh...canada

I have waited the requisite eight day cool-off period – now the storming of parliament may begin. I am both sickened and dismayed by the actions of our politicians – coalition and conservative, ruling and would would-be ruling parties – during this fabricated fray. To obscure personal agendas and juvenile wantonness to hold and dispense power behind the mask of saving the nation is disturbing on a moral level, but insults us all on an intellectual one as well. We bear witness to puerile party politics today; a mad grab for power, or maintaining power, at the expense of the citizenry, the economy, and the environment.

And the populace in question deserves no more than it receives. Our political figure-heads, so concerned with forwarding their own agendas, have sold us a bag of goods that includes a coalition option. This coalition is alternately vilified and praised as a ‘democratic’ solution. To be fair, a coalition system possibly offers the finest form of government, with plurality and concession being the norm rather than the exception. Many successful nations (Denmark, Germany and New Zealand come to mind) consistently elect coalition governments as matter of course. But Canada, perhaps reeling from the partisanship of the U.S. federal elections, is not one of them. Simply put, Canada (the politicians, the population, or the system) is not mature or intelligent enough to make collaborative government work.

Debate in this country, far removed from notions of co-operation and collaboration, is neither conducive nor supportive of coalition government. We are rapidly becoming victims of our own design, where the country is fragmented not along policy lines, but party nomenclature and geographical boundaries. A hangover from the Bush era and the polarizing cast of characters that acted this political drama, Canada has unwittingly and unapologetically embraced the notion of the two solitudes – now east and west, right wing and left wing, liberal and conservative - resulting in campaigns as myopic as ‘anything but conservative’ and the fear-mongering, natio-patriotico diatribes fuelling conservative attacks on the coalition. A sampling of political views in Canada today offers even the casual listener a range of simplistic, partisan banter proposing no constructive alternatives, but much rhetoric and vitriol. We will, at the behest of the privileged few with vested interests in a given political party and a media whipped into a confrontational paradigm by the lure of public spectacle, be led into a bastardized two-party system less productive and more fragile than even that of the United States; a system ripe with back-room dealings and secret power-sharing agreements that ensure the public is ever more detached from the workings of government. In reality, it is not the creation or refusal of a coalition government in Canada that serves as a barometer to democracy. Our democratic virtues left us when we collectively opted for partisanship over the common weal, and the reclamation of these loftier goals of common government are a very long way off.

Elevisits

In the fashion of today, the frizzy haired woman (portly) joined me on the elevator. Mounds of tight, red curls cascaded down her bulbous neck to a ribbed green sweater exhibiting the distorted pattern of exerted containment - mute testimony of protracted battle. An assortment of interleaved gold chains and accompanying dangling-medallion offspring draped in every direction, flaunting the conventions of gravity as they were alternately pinched and released by mounds of sweater. The aroma of inexpensive perfume displaced the already stale air within. Vertigo arrived as the elevator began its downward acceleration.

This cumulative assault on my senses rendered me defenceless to counter the next bold and unexpected manoeuvre of the woman. Despite my profound disinterest in communicating, her sincere and deep-rooted obligation to speak shattered the near silent hum of the elevator traction cables. “Eating fruit.” It was a punctual if ill considered statement, as it clearly drew my eyes away from her attire to the peach (two bites missing) that was slowly bleeding down her arm. Armed with a deepening sense of claustrophobia, I smiled, walked off the elevator at the next available floor, and shook my head with disbelief at the slow erosion of social progress.

Stars

Oh, hellacious feeling - where do I begin???? Idiots massed at the doorstep, foolery on the run. How can this be? Why is this day so full of mongoloids and mountebanks....Aye, screw them blue and paint me silly. On a moment like this, silliness spins the top – the top spins the globe; the globe bumps the planet, the planet tilts the world. The world rotates.

Will it rotate for everyone? Who will grease the wheels? Where is the man to check the machinery, keep the ghosts at bay? Gremlins wait in the darkness. They foul the wheels, and the bearings run dry. But run they do. Onward and upward, light after dark after light. Rolling through the darkness, spinning into light. Celestial samba - too much movement in the hips. I get dizzy quite easily…

And fear falling down. I am caught at the brink, nervous of tipping. My shoes have good traction – I am not afraid. My soles are in the firmament. Looking into the blackness, waves of calm break at my toes. Crouching down, I place my palm on the skin of the planet. I feel the world spin softly and slowly beneath my hand. Stars turn lazy circles overhead. I am struck by the beauty of it all.

On Happiness

A touch. Clever jokes. A childs' eyes. Shoelaces. Strength in conviction. Passion. Old books. Travel. Cookies. A good pen. Coffee. Sunlight. Shallow water. The smell of gasoline. Haircuts. Youthful exhuberance. History. The feeling you have after precisely three drinks. Popcorn. Late night TV. Profound ideas. Dreaming. New socks. Trees. Plain white paper. Leaves. Autumn grass. Cool summer evenings. Creation. Astronomy. Knowing I am small. Motion.

reconsidering remembering

Grieving lost loved ones, bearing mute testimony to the power of celebration, and seeing young mothers weep for missing sons; hope of solace is forgotten. The dead hold the living in their grip, and not separation of the grave or passage of time releases their ferocious hold on the hearts who love them; obligation, rest, duty, remorse - only words to ponder the pull the next life has on this one.

Unrelenting observers of life, the dead - harsh judges all - call with the silent song of memory. Bound to the present by a past we cannot relinquish, the dead guile us into believing we live for the now; hiding contentment, punishing the future. Promising nothing, they hold us to our conscience and committment. We beg for release that does not come. Pray for peace that is unattainable. Cry tears that hold nothing save salt and regret.

I want to walk away - leave the past buried in sand and watch the rising tide erase the marks. But I cannot. I am bound to the dead as I am bound in life. We try in vain; alleviate suffering by commemorating a world that has moved on, remember times past with smells and thoughts, prolong agony as penance for the corporeal. But the dead - the numerous, unresting, clever dead - push the stone of this world back into light. With firm steps and unwavering resolve, the dead drag yesterday across time and space. Daily, hourly, they march forward to our future. When will the dead release their hold on the living? When will the buried lie in rest and remit their wanton jealousy of life? When will the future come, leaving the world in its true and fixed place?

Revolutionarian?

I pose to you a question: Is the occupation of Revolutionist/Revolutionary still a viable and applicable career path in today’s competitive job market?

Before the obvious answer (Yes!) is given, let us set some parameters for discussion. First, the context; the post-industrial, post-enlightenment, pre-apocalypse, and pre-dictable ‘developed’ world. It is what I live, it is what I am equipped to discuss. There are clearly locations on this planet that not only offer opportunities for Revolutionaries, but that could indeed serve as their Oxford and Cambridge as well. Central Africa comes to mind. However, unless countless marketers, multinationals and mercenaries are wrong, it is only a matter of time before the darkest parts of the Dark Continent are enlightened and join us in democracy, milkshakes and Barbie dolls. I would personally like to thank Madonna and Brangelina in large part for this, as they have made obvious progress in tearing down many of those cultural walls. A similar argument of manifest-destiny-progress could be constructed for most any other region of the world, so I am comfortable in my terms of reference.

Given this rich tapestry of western civilization, we need to ask three fundamental questions as it pertains to revolting;
1. Can a single person lead a revolution? (Is the Revolutionary the answer?) 2. Is the revolution going to be adopted? (Will society believe the Revolutionary?) 3.Will the revolution be replaced? (Can the Revolutionary be assured of future employment?)
The first two criteria set the foundation for starting a Revolutionist career, the latter arguments for or against job security. If the answer to all three is yes, then I say the role of Revolutionary is safe and small children everywhere can have all the Che Guevara action figures and AK-47’s they can carry. If not, then perhaps we have to re-evaluate the role of Revolutionist and its place in the current cultural context.

To answer these three questions, I propose a simple test: using a hypothetical revolution, critically answer the above questions in the positive or not.

(To be continued….)

Office. Life?

Fortuna has spun downward on me - my solitude and fiefdom shattered by the arrival of an office-mate. Have they no decency? What abomination of conversation must I endure with this upstart moving to my realm? Generalities of weather and sports fare shower upon my ears, blighting them. Can the mental progress of one man go unaltered in this day and age? I should rather be cast asunder than forced to live prostrate beneath the burdensome fetters of social convention. "Good morning, Clay! how are you today, Clay? Is the wife not coming in today? Oh, the dog is sick, you say"?
Mighty Fortuna has struck me down at the height of my powers. A forced retreat will push me farther into the self than men dare survey - a shield of misanthropy my fortress of last defense. The keep of social deprivation will be my Golgotha. Star Eater! Destroyer of Worlds! Marker of Time! Sweet Fortuna, how you have forsaken me. The cubicle will become my spiritual Masada when the inanities of office life can be resisted no longer…

Tokyo

I dreamt of Tokyo last night. I dream what I have seen. Lights. Fear. Automobiles. Sound. Hustle. Soft and beautiful Asian women and jet black hair streaked by light and chemistry. Not pagodas, incense, smooth granite, damp wood of Tokyo past – romantic Tokyo. Tokyo today and Tokyo tomorrow. Visual orgasm Tokyo. I have been there before and long for return. Like a fiction, the future and the past amalgamate in the crowds of Shibuya. I woke to the sound of traffic on the radio. In the terminator between sleep and life, I lay and dream of Tokyo.

I dream in colour. Red. Yellow - strong vibrant colours. Primal blue. I have no clouds in my dreams. Night. Black and wet. Or sunlight, strong and piercing. Both intense to hurt my eyes. Dream colours are more vivid than reality - waking colours. They are deep and alive and saturated. Colours make dream memories more real. I sometimes confuse what has happened in a dream and what has happened in waking life. The illusion unfolds too quickly.

I lay and dream of colourful Tokyo. It is distant and far away, but I am there. I have taken the colours of Tokyo with me. Are they stolen? Is Tokyo less now that I have taken colours away? They are mine. I selfishly hide my colours. In the dark morning, I covet my treasure from Tokyo. The fiction and colours of Tokyo are mine. Memories of Tokyo are forever with me and I will not give them back.

The sun has started to rise. Muted light, grey shapes and black shadows. Without looking outside, I see the sun crest the horizon. I rise from my bed and bury Tokyo.