Chapter 104 - The Stillness Before Time (Compendium)


CIV

Before … after … during …
What’s the difference, really?

* * * *
The deep mortal insecurity
That perhaps all creation feels.

* * * *
Pride blinds us all.

* * * *
Nothing much.

* * * *
We were all children once upon a before time.

* * * *
What bullshit must you endure today?

* * * *
God forbid god is a Christian version.

* * * *
Beneath all the guises, just hamburger.

* * * *
Is there such a thing as an intelligent racist?

* * * *
New is not new, nor is old, old.

* * * *
So many blind to what others see so clearly.

* * * *
Why spend your life thinking anything permanent?
Even god exists only as long as those who create it.

* * * *
To achieve fearlessness, travel beyond yourself.

* * * *
Any demon is merely a piece of godness
In the delusive denial of unicity.

* * * *
The universe springs anew each moment.

* * * *
Where consciousness cannot tread,
The eternal reigns alone.

* * * *
The fact that you’re here is proof enough.

* * * *
Will this spring of words ever run dry?

* * * *
Nationalism is nothing more than barking dogs.

* * * *
A critique of the human drama.

* * * *
Blood is an interesting thing to believe in.

* * * *
Moderate your passion.

* * * *
We all like seeing our heroes kick a little ass.

* * * *
The human hive.

* * * *
Maybe I’m supposed to be impressed.

* * * *
It’s an amazing thing what people will do for money.

* * * *
Feeling clever today, eh?

* * * *
Not too many people expect their children to become mystics.

* * * *
Total honesty?  Are you sure you’re really ready?

* * * *
If it’s not already been done,
Somebody’s going to try.

* * * *
There ain’t no antidote to good drugs.

* * * *
A lot of us have seen through nationalism,
And only wonder what’s next.

* * * *
Ahhh, back to centerlessness.

* * * *
Slaughtering is easy.
It’s creation and preservation
That are tough sports.

* * * *
It’s not always fun to climb the same mountain.

* * * *
Face it, something’s going to kill you.

* * * *
Enjoy your delusion of courage.

* * * *
Looking good as far as the numbers go.

* * * *
Now you’re scaring me.

* * * *
Time is so weird anymore.

* * * *
You’re just another mask.

* * * *
The mystery births you,
Preserves you, and eats you.

* * * *
Keep your money, Mister.
This soul is not for sale.

* * * *
This world owes no body nothing.

* * * *
What’s the meaning of life?
Silly questions and ridiculous answers.

* * * *
These words just keep flowing.
All this scribe does is open to the zone
And the spring runs on and on.

* * * *
Silly, eh what?

* * * *
Meditation is simply putting the persona on pause.

* * * *
Never put yourself between mother and child.

* * * *
Deny not the river within.

* * * *
A drop falls into the river and calls it birth,
Flows into the ocean and calls it death.

* * * *
Reduced to tears, she awaits your surrender.

* * * *
Confused predictability.

* * * *
Death is the quickest route to simplicity.

* * * *
How enslaved we are by our bills.

* * * *
What is wisdom
But seeing possible permutations
Of any given action.

* * * *
What a bother to have to think
About this world so much of the time.

* * * *
Think where you might be now
If you had only started back when.

* * * *
So what’s the big deal?

* * * *
How many ways shit flies.

* * * *
The past is a pool of value-laden perceptions.

* * * *
History paints so many colors.

* * * *
At least when you are at the bottom,
You know which way the shit’s falling.

* * * *
Gee, you are you.

* * * *
The beauty of revenge is its timelessness.

* * * *
Scorn runs shallow.

* * * *
A few less won’t hurt.

* * * *
What’s your story, Pilgrim?

* * * *
If you have self-respect, what in god’s many names
Does it matter what anyone thinks of you?

* * * *
Why fathom any need for a god outside yourself?

* * * *
Play it like you’re an alien anthropologist,
A spy left here for a lifetime of study.

* * * *
Who’s in charge?

* * * *
In every realm
There will always be genius
Setting the standard.

* * * *
Look at all those words and images in your head.
Why are you so attached to them?

* * * *
You are an unscripted script,
Just like everyone and everything else.

* * * *
You create your friends,
You create your acquaintances.
You create your enemies.

* * * *
What an interesting process futility.

* * * *
Let god praise itself if it is so vain.

* * * *
Guerrilla warfare and terrorism
Are the aspirin of poor odds.

* * * *
When false gold waylays the heart,
Mind rules, and worlds fall into ruin.

* * * *
Whose I am is any different?

* * * *
Deftly the mind transcends imagination.

* * * *
Bubbles sink into the surface.

* * * *
Sages merely appear less confused about their confusion.

* * * *
Piss on it, Mate.

* * * *
For every drama there is a curtain.

* * * *
The ground is without any difference.

* * * *
Confusion is as confusion does.

* * * *
You cannot see the mind
Through a screen of thoughts,
Only through the silence of its origin.

* * * *
What really happened is going be long gone
Before you even know what you experienced.

* * * *
To believe this real is akin to a balloon
Thinking itself more than a pop.

* * * *
Sometimes the wind reminds you.

* * * *
How do you contemplate totality?

* * * *
What is your role in all the hoopla?

* * * *
The world is full of beauty, full of ugliness,
Yet it is prior to all appearances
In which truth rests.

* * * *
Respect even your opponents
And hardness will soften into confusion.

* * * *
A shot from nowhere hits its mark.

* * * *
You cannot pause or rush that which is unwavering.

* * * *
When to do, when to not do,
Is attention to the moment’s reckoning.

* * * *
Discern the folly of pretense.

* * * *
What tension is created by knowing so much ignorance.

* * * *
Watch the wind blow, the waves crash,
The fire flicker, the earth shift, and realize it is all
Nothing more than your mind moving.

* * * *
Be uncertain about certainty
Without being certain about uncertainty.

* * * *
Soften up.

* * * *
The lungs are the shores of the ocean.
Hear the song within each breath.

* * * *
How much life perishes to fill those meat cases?

* * * *
Some things are more futile than others.

* * * *
How big is the universe?
How small is your mind?

* * * *
Back into the world, and its web of false intrigue.

* * * *
You attempt to pick and choose
The more pleasurable experiences,
But alas, the reality of all the lesser ones
Rises again and again in duality’s wandering.
What born of  time can ever attain any permanence?

* * * *
You crack me up.

* * * *
What makes you think it’s my problem?

* * * *
Vanity is the ultimate enticement.

* * * *
Just more pop spirituality.

* * * *
Whatever’s happening is the purpose.

* * * *
Full of the ignorance called knowledge.

* * * *
Would you have believed it in a million years?

* * * *
Without action, words mean squat.

* * * *
You may want to lead, but do we want to follow?

* * * *
Corruption creates its own just rewards.

* * * *
One often wonders what sort of movie or book
Any given critic could ever direct or write.
Parasites come in many guises.

* * * *
Fantasy is often much
More stimulating than reality.
Obviously, else we would not parley
So adroitly with the imaginary game master,
The best friend no one has ever seen.

* * * *
Why is it the people who want to lead you
Are so often the ones you least want to follow?

* * * *
The real question is why the problem even concerns you.

* * * *
Recognizing these thoughts make them yours.

* * * *
What we call terrorism is merely a matter of scale.
What difference, really, between a small alliance of rebels
Or a large group patriotically called a nation state?
All act upon one vain collusion or another.
The issue, as it has always been,
Is might makes right.
But it is ever the innocent
In harms way who abide the suffering.


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Stillness Before Time (Compendium)
© Michael J. Holshouser 2009
World Rights Reserved