Monday, May 30, 2016

extinction - the sonnet


Extermination is not a good thing;
it may well result in our extinction.
For why? so the rich can say it’s their bling?
Are you frightened to make that distinction?

I could see that, but fear more a bad end,
not our puny lives, the end of our line-
our future, our past; learning how they blend,
or how we found so much fear without trying.

It matters not in the end, we’ll be dead.
What matters is how we lived; how we died?
I have lived love - to exist without dread
hoping peace would come knowing how I tried.

.  . . and if not - oh well, that was not to be,
happy though, to die living to be free.

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved · 03/14/2020

http://josephtstevens.blogspot.com
http://stoanartst.blogspot.com
http://theextinctionchronicles.blogspot.com

Sunday, May 29, 2016

survival



Why would I expend an ounce of energy to continue life in this digital miasma currently passing itself off as life? Certainly an odd question, perhaps because on its face there is no real good answer. I am aged, alone and in ceaseless pain; partly by choice, partly by circumstance. My family is everyone I meet, except for the blood constellation I was born into; my presence feels like detriment to their collective well-being, or they mine. However inflammatory or deluded this self-concept may sound, there is foundation which is mostly rooted in self-care rather than any real conviction of right or wrong - more a determination to enjoy those moments left to my mortal existence. Nor are my circumstances unique in today’s world, with brothers in my country shooting each other over hamburgers or seats in the house of worship. I am blessed with more good fortune than I’ll ever comprehend, regardless of how I meditate my existence, and it is not truly possible to be solitary. In my travels, I’ve wandered alongside far more isolated spirits possessing mute courage, the dimensions for which I can barely conceive while facing much harsher realities than mine. Still in all the individual will not exist without the survival of the collective - one of those unfortunate absolutes to which our current philosophical cul-de-sac turns an horrified blind eye, or it is possible the anarcho-capitalists at Bohemian Grove got too drunk on Ayn Randian Kool-aid Cocktails and gouged lady culture’s eyeballs out to serve as Hors D’Oeuvres at the opening ceremonies for Bilderburg this year - truly the blind leading the blind.

Pop, as kind as he was, would laugh when our conversation meandered into such cul-de-sacs remarking, “man I’m glad I’m old.” I, not mean as he, only repeat myself with this impertinent anecdote mostly because I’m old. Therefore the second thread of this discussion must needs be relate to the collective survival of our kind and not necessarily any individual death. People being what they are however, that is not gonna happen - just yet. Like any kind of good fire, the small sticks have got to begin burning first. So while you may not be entirely on board about any anti-collectivism; anti Ayn Rand screed just yet, toward the end of this spiel, I’m inclined to believe your affiliation may be more aligned with “us”, than “them” - the former being the “we” in negotiations, and the latter representing the “I” in negotiations. I’ve been diagnosed by a family member as suffering from NPD (Narcissistic Personality Disorder) or GAD (Generalized Anxiety Disorder) depending on who's telling the story; as with most convictions the truth depends on what you believe - go figure. Truth is I think about others; not enough it’s true, but as much as I can spare from the tasks that I’ve assigned myself for justifying the air, water and food I consume. Oddly amongst those tasks is this exercise in sharing, not from any belief that what I’ve learned or believe is worthy of embrace, but more that by modeling “honest” expression as close as I am able given my mangled emotions as filtered through this post-industrialized-media-experiment/internet-gone-awry. In a perfect world, and with some luck this file will be opened and read by future unknowns wanting to survive. My ambition would be to give courage to another spirit to pursue the impossible task of being understood. However, my experience has been that people would rather be believed than understood, and so will say anything to feel the affirmative reinforcement we are subject to by our morbid fascination with “like key” of any kind, flavor, idea or any other metric we obey to activate the +/- 5v pulse register on the corporate servers our handlers understand as the golden nod from Mammon indicating their virtual control and our absolute obedience.

I say virtual only because from where I stand, if there is any entity grubbing to feel warmth from my meager keystroke participation, my heart opens in pity to the barrenness of such an internal landscape. The equivalent would be my opening any one of the social network platforms available today looking to feel happiness based on how many URLs acknowledged my existence - thanks no. (excuse me for a second, I’m going to check my email) a full hour and a half of self-indulgent tripe later I’m listening to “Tempest” by Bob Dylan. I am well into my day’s ration of red wine, still alone, in pain, aged, and away from family. I am surviving as best I know how, if that bothers you, or if you have no interest, I cannot help you. My marijuana connection in a small South American nation full with decency has fallen through, my hostel “friends” are in open revolt and gravitating toward haters of my own concept and design due in large part to my own retarded social skills manifesting in non-participation of social rituals which other more savvy citizens inculcate early .  .  . 1 month later . . . red wine is parked for the moment, resiny buds have materialized out of the ether - still in pain, not as great; friends of old are back in touch and long-term plans are as hazy as ever. This I feel is a much better place to be in times of such upheaval - to not know of what course to take; to feel more compassion for the isolation and pain of others and to accept fully the impermanence of existence against the fragile beauty of our species’ momentary sparkle.

Dear Mystery Reader, If you have found these 5 paragraphs expecting instructions on how to build a civilization or perpetuate a species - stay close to the ground away from the exalted; treasure: simplicity, patience and compassion. Have fun where you are with whom you are with whenever possible; resist empire, be it flags, alters, colors or lines in the sand; love is wise, hatred is foolish. fuck fear. . have more fun. Reading some disembodied voice advocating you to have fun may not be easy; especially if you are surrounded by lakes of fire, or stormtroopers armed with your exact location from the url implant in your hipbone; or your genetically modified metabolism is rejecting nutrition from the fresh food you foraged from old growth cacti; I feel your pain, and there is hope; you must be audacious though, not the fake bravery that comes from hooking up with bullies and haters, but the outrageous courage one gets from loving another without demanding anything in return. For example, what if you experience the next spirit you encounter in your search for understanding, or believability, as being one molecule finer than you found them because you gave them one half of your last kernel of rice? What if because of that added nutrition, she was able to give birth to one child with a normalized digestive tract which enabled that child to live on food that was not out of the corporate food vault? What if you found a library that did not require an oath of allegiance to read more about Lao Tzu, Muhammed, or Alfred E. Newman?


I know that what I suggest may be impossible when you have another 8 hours of entertainment you must login and enjoy before you are rewarded with a food voucher for the 12,000 calories necessary to maintain a lawful 130 kilos of bodyweight. It is also clear you are taking a huge risk by reading when the clerics have ordered that all worthy human knowledge must be gained at the alter of Youtube. Remember there is a reason that you have fought for the ability to read; and by locating the file with these barely decipherable words in chaotic sentences rather than scrolling through the oder of holy images of cats and dogs used to clarify spiritual lessons so important to the salvation of your immortal soul - that reason is doubt. The universe has rewarded your efforts to learn how to read with more things to read, more things to doubt. You might try reading the bible to learn the meaning of doubt and to better understand how something so good, could become something so bad, sort of like how the haters made food and water things to bargain with instead of something with which to make clear the love in your heart. I would share anything I have to help you find a reason to survive, I don’t have anything tangible. The world in which this was written is expiring like a campfire made of bad wood, we are choking in the smoke of things, items of little value which are hoarded at great cost to human dignity, a dignity which you have retrieved by learning how to read. May the words you read be worth that risk: the less value you place on surviving, and the more value you place on helping others find a reason to survive, the happier and healthier you will become; I hope.