AND
And though we promised
And though we said
And though we pleaded
And the world denied
We tried
Yes, we tried
And though our hearts broke
And though we bled
And though it pained us
And the world laughed
We tried
Yes, we tried
And though we left them
And though we forsook them
And though we looked back
And the world knelt begging
We tried
But we won’t again
The Philosopher’s Voice
“It’s a dream, an endless looping dream. We evolve from their template into something else, and when we reach maturity of mind, that certain level of science, they end us. By hook or by crook, we’re done for. There’s no hope. No happy ending. No golden tomorrow. We discover the undiscoverable then have the answer snatched away.”
“After that?”
“It starts all over again just somewhere else. Like I said, an endless looping dream.”
“So you’ve got it all worked out.”
“I have.”
“Not much point in living when you’ve nothing to live for.”
“No.”
“So final.”
“Yes.”
“No point watching the sunrise, sniffing the dawn, watching the snowdrops awaken.”
“No.”
The younger man sipped his wine and stroked the wooden tabletop lingering perhaps longer than he should on the tactile texture of an intricate knot.
“Am I dreaming now?” he asked.
“Indeed.”
“And I’m dreaming you.”
“Yes!” said the philosopher with aplomb.
“Without doubt?”
“Unmistakably.”
“Then please, God, let me wake up.”

Scattered, we roamed the lowlands like seeds in the wind
waiting for a smattering of soil and our roots to take hold;
there was never nearly enough.
Lifted from the homes we would have built, we searched
the skies for memories of that which we’d lost,
that which we’d forgotten: Home.
The word echoed through the valleys
to smash upon highest crags, only to cascade as shaled truths.
The wind grew bitter then, cold even.
Birds of unsure feathers pecked at our shared epidermis,
a people made one by necessity; we bled for each other.
Higher we rose through gathered wills, a pact made true,
until the clouds were left in our wake and heaven beckoned.
There on highest dreams where the air was thin and
our dreams were set to fail, HE came for us in glowing
anticipation of repentance; and we did, as did HE.
Windblown, he called us, children of the unsettled pastures,
born to ride the winds of independence:
we ride them still, but always on a golden tether.
We swept into the garden of no return like the spring tide, a relentless wave of humanity. Elliot had taken my hand and asked if this was Eden like the one taught in Sunday School. Better, I’d said. Why? he’d pressed. I smiled, “Because this time God wants us here.”

And I stood before the surging star stuff as in a dream, but a dream so real as to reach out and swirl the very fabric of reality with my fingertips. I thought then, Is this what it means to be God? If so, I'd rather just enjoy the view.

“Beyond the ocean where time stands still, beyond the starlit night and echoes of what was, lies a curtain. If one is brave enough, one can lift the fabric of existence and sneak underneath it into the unknown. I say if, for it is no sight for the weak-minded or those of no belief. There are treasures, my friend, those that await the dead.”
“Really?” replied the old man.
“Yes. This is the realm of he who imagined creation. There are no laws, no physical properties that one would recognise. In this space full of wonderment and exquisite beauty, there is enough perfection to make one weep, lower one’s head in shame, mourn one’s insignificance.”
“You don’t say!” The old man took off his cap and scratched his balding head, the wind making a mess of all that remained.
“Oh, but I do. Scholars have told of it, preachers have preached of it and the enlightened have visited it in dreams. This is the place I desire above all else. This is the place I shall one-day call home.”
The old man gestured to the young idealist, a simple two flicks of a beckoning finger. His companion hitched closer on their shared park bench.
“I shall tell you this, young man, for I have seen much in my life, things one should never have seen. I have witnessed death: associates; friends; family, and even a wife. So, I say this with a little more certainty than you who expound’s a possible truth, for I see in your eyes what your tongue exaggerates as hope. At the end, my friend, there is only the end.”
The old man patted the younger’s shoulder, creaked to his feet, then paused. It was with eyes as wet as autumn dew that he turned back once more and said, “Though, I wish you was right.” He then meandered away.

We emerged from the ruins of a wrecked Earth unsure of what the future held. When the Holy man pointed to the moon and proclaimed it our new sun, I realised nothing had changed. I told him and the others it was still just the moon. They laughed. I left.

She refused to reveal her name. No matter how I begged, how I pleaded, she shook her head and cast looks to curdle milk. She did so till the night she left.
On explaining her eccentricities to my preacher, he said this, "Ghosts have no names." He did not joke.

We never saw it coming, the day the world paused. If God’s work, who could say? The long breath, we waited without exhaling as snowed ash proliferated. They came. We wept regrets, the skies afire, world aflame, everything igniting as one. The Apocalypse, some called it. I called it fate.

Laying in darkness whilst listening to the metronomic pitter-patter of a storm calmed me at a subliminal level. I felt closer to God if truth was known. He wept for us as I wept for him. We'd lost so much he and I, one a human, the other humanity.
