Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Ash Tuesday

the succinct simplicity of sentient sentiments...sends sounds of a serpeant sea soaring skyward...
into moons unborn laughing, softly into the night. 

(Oh, what it means to have clarity of emotion in your heart/body/spirit! See it expand and breathe like a jellyfish lung, its burden yet unseen. Pity for you, Seer/Feeler, pity for such pittances preyed upon you...and the paradoxical weight of ash you have to carry.)


Ash Tuesday
With every tear I shed, with every worry worn, and with every scorn ...I am getting older. With every dissappoint, with a lost glance where I never stood a chance...I am getting older.

Whereas "growing" older be a positive, horizontally defined expansion of Self, the "getting" is a cruelly vertical unidirectional arrow of irredemption. Here moments are lost forever.

I see Her in a mirror with foreign frowns, once-delicate features hardening, tiny roads and thorns and stars for eyes undulating over dark crescents. I do not know Her at first. This sad little Stranger.

With every stress, with every pain, with every heartbreak, big, small, a minor stumble or a major fall...where a heart might grow to bruise so ripe, where scrapes might turn crimson, where the pussing of protection might churn so thickly it can grow its own vine - from such machinations, I get older still.

The cells that compose of my being are scorching up, drying quickly, flawlessly, like tiny timbers, curling and burning away, ashes from a fire. Cells cried out until empty and dying, flying then dissipating into air, whispering themselves away. They leave me forever and I become smaller.

Endless bits of me dissipate, die then fly with each soul-wounded cry.

(I fear sometimes, that I am made of snowflakes.)

Monday, November 14, 2011

This Melancholia

feels like a dead weight...
"girl, you're gonna carry that weight, carry that wait, a long time..."
push push. nothing.

you push again. from the last great heave, your push ricochets you to a fall. suddenly a jolt, perspective sharpens with the force of an arrow and you realize, sitting there, that falling on your ass, smarting as it is, is actually...a bit of progress. you feel pain.


then the bad news hit like a cannon: you will have to try to stand again.

I cannot drink because of Jesus

Sunday evening. I'm off after a long 7 day work week. Sunday is now my Friday! I drive to a nearby Liquidation Store thinking of how nice it will be to soon sit and soak, or sip, perhaps sit and read & sip, hell, even just Netflix (now a *verb*) and sip. The point is there is sipping involved.

But I cannot enter liquor store. Alas, it is closed. Chalk it up to worker bees having a good union that doesn't keep anybody behind bars after 5pm. I drive along another 10 mins, to approach Store #2. Then it hits me like an errant frisbee to the head.

                       I can't purchase to sip on a Sunday because of Jesus. (oh, Jesus..).

Because Jesus died for my sins (Disclamer: I never asked him to. That was a little bit presumptious. I don't know who DID ask that of Jesus, but they are kinda pissing me off now). Also, JC's dad God rested on the 7th Day, and because he worked so damn long (with very little benefits, and non-existent coffee breaks) what with creating Adam, Eve, setting up the Ark scenario, and mandating altars for sacrifices and castigating the evil*("working girls" or women who just plain confused innocent men, willfully casting them into Evil by way of distraction [wanton harlots, all!]). Anyhoo, the big G was busier than a farmer in a hen house.

And because His pronoun is Capitalized unlike mine (note the lower case), all us lowercase mortals have to abide by His commands* (NOTE: alleged Commands. "Your Honour, let the records show that no concrete evidence exists to prove under what conditions said Commands were set and involving whom, exactly."), anyhoo...to abide by His commands, agenda and general whimsy, without a question, rebuttal or retort from us. Nary a peep. Just like in church.

But...ok...I will play Judas, or devil's advocate for a moment and pose, well...didn't G's own son imbibe red liquid fermentations whilst breaking flatbread with his peeps (and Judas too)? Wine was imbided because it symbolized the blood of Christ. We worship this Holy entity symbolically when called upon to do so, then why do we not get access to the good stuff on Sunday - Big Daddy's special day off, kind of a two-for-one deal? This seems terribly counterintuitive.

If the Good Lord (GL) needed a rest on Sunday, surely those who support Him (and the Kid) should acknowledge His handy work by taking a day off when He takes a day off. Take a day off to chill together if you will, at least in spirit (and, possibly with spirits).

While I don't naturally feel moved to raise a glass to toast an entity I have never met (indeed, he was chronically tardy, or altogether absent the many times I summoned him in desperation...but to be fair, he had a full plate of problems to contend with), it also does it not feel justifiable to raise a glass to someone else's idea of a holy prophet, or conversely, someone else's idea of a mythologized now archetypal figure that has been bastardized (read=used and abused) to become a poster boy for various religious and / or institutional agendas (burning women, I mean 'witches' comes to mind). 
This Holy figure having been grossly misappropriated from what was once a symbol for what was holy and Good. JC's story may have started there, but the road became wayward indeed. Now many cry for Him as much as curse Him, and are willing to wage battle and even death in support of or in opposition to Him. He has "been a piper, a poet, a pauper, a pawn and a king..." like Old Blue Eyes would croon. A much politicized pawn indeed. As a wise person and do-gooder, the man got good reviews, and was probably a decent human being. But, aren't we (well, most of us) decent human beings too? Maybe most of us hail from the tepid waters of the mediocre, but still...

"As Above, So Below"stated in The Emerald Tablet, whose beliefs have heavily influenced Western Esoteric Tradition and were considered to be of great importance during the Renaissance and Reformation, periods of great intellectual, cultural and spiritual evolution and of non-denominational critical thinking. This quote depicts that "The universe is the same as God, God is the same as man, man is the same as the cell, the cell is the same as the atom, the atom is the same as...and so on, ad infinitum." Does this not mean that the powers of God may also be borne, or grow to be instilled within us mortals as well? Some spiritual teachings argue that it is our awareness of having the capacity to harness this power that deems us godlike (don't get your Sunday panties in a knot! In our own mortal 'ways', I mean). Hence, this connection to our inner godlike power, can also give us the capacity to create or destroy. By this line of logic, if the Almighty is called upon to impose his Will, that is apply power to exert an energy, or set an intention to manifest a thing, so too it stands to reason that we can also manifest a thing where we set our intentions. God having worked hard for 6 days straight, now ready to collapse from manifesting the creation of the world and whatnot, gets a well-deserved day off. Can the argument not be posited that I, through the divination within Myself, through the exertion of my own Will (as exerted through work, for example) not also be held in as high regard as a god? If the GL is worth a day off without reproach, surely I am too (even if sounds like a hair commercial).


I hope you God-Fearing types aren't going to blast me for blasphemy or put the Curse of the Cat people upon my head to cast me out to crisp in the fires of damnation for such ramblings! Apologies if I offend. Clearly your sensibilities and mine are but ships in the night. Either that, or you don't possess a very sophisticated sense of humour (to be honest, I'm more sorry about THAT). :D

Anyhoo..it behooves one to ask: Why can't I imbide on a Sunday? Why is ok to drink wine sometimes but not other spirits? Do other beverages have to symbolize holy figures to be consumed in as good a standing? Let's be fair, many of them didn't get enough airplay in the Good Book back then. That was one Westernized text (various versions of it, granted!) of a series of moral tales, using the food and beverage of its own fashion, a little one-sided. The point is, hey a little vodka never hurt anybody.

It seems a tad hypocritical that what was once deemed a ritual to revere a beloved figure, a holy prophet, son of THE father of the year, drinking the 'symbolic' blood of JC is now forfeited on ONE specific day as an act of disrespect for the Lord & all things Godly (the Western version, again). It's no longer Friday, Saturday, or even Monday, but as luck my would have it, a Sunday. If I was a god-fearing you-know-what, why do I have to do all my god-fearing, worshipping etc. on every other day BUT Sunday. Selecting to be righteous by a date feels a little like "giving to the poor" on Christmas when it is a neighbourly time to do so. (Author's note: much of the time these same poor or disadvantaged are deemed invisible, if not written off as a nuisance or as a 'waste' of tax dollars. I do not share this sentiment, but I CAN state that it is certainly oft heard and expressed loudly and not-so-loudly in resentful mumblings throughout the land, yessir)! I can hear George Carlin's gavel banging somewhere during one of this brilliant rants,"Be not so pre-Occupied with helping the poor only at CHRISTmas time, why not just plain Occupy the Church the other 364 days?" HEY-OOO! Instead of holding off celebrating reverance to his Holiness, shouldn't we be drinking our asses off on a worshipping Sunday?? I dunna get it.

And it is with a shrug - partly to shake off a mild annoyance at having wasted a bit of gas, a bit of time, scarse resources which these days indeed - I take off out of the parking lot, but nary a wheelie is had. Nay, nay. Wheelies are gauche and cliche. That, and there is a cop car nearby. :D

Once home, this wanton harlot raises a glass of vodka and orange and silently toasts, "Hear ye, Fellow Upstairs, downstairs, below the stairs, ye who ARE the stairs, wherever you are, thank you for your help. Some of it was helpful, some of it horribly misconstrued, but not by your doing. Perhaps under the "Misconstrued" category, someone may want to add a wee Disclaimer, something like: "And Let It Be that any mortal who has worked (or even not worked a day in his life) be given the same freedoms and allowances as I, without condition nor reproach. Whether an Individual ends His or Her work on a Friday or a Sunday, let it be that ANY day can be one's "Friday", and in this spirit of fairness, let us rejoice! Keep liquor stores open 7 days a week as is rational (and good business!) and accommodating to mortals who work at all hrs, at odd days, or hold down a number of jobs these days. I am a loving God, a giving God, and by the very nature of my position must live up to said reputation through my deeds and wishes."

I picture Him resonantly stating in the strong, yet warm baritone of an Omnipotent, All-Denominational, Non-Congregational, Socialist-Leaning, Up-With-The-Times, In-the-Know kind of dude:

"My blood and any fluids that have come to symbolize this holiness, along with an array of other life-giving, party-starting, mortal pleasing beverages shall be made available to all mortals and at all times, no conditions attached! No churches to attend, no sermons to listen to, no fastings to go through, no penance to endure, no Hail Mary's, no confessions, no conditions at all! For in my God Heart no one should be less deserving of pleasantries and niceties, those who subscribe to my Book or those who do not. Working hard, being pious, being modest and gratification-delaying, or being "deserving" are really just relative terms once applied to organize and control an unruly and ignorant populace in days of yore, oh heck! in days of NOW too! These ideas are social constructs my friends! They were once created to weigh and rank a group against that of a supposed Ideal, and to help ideologically instill asymmetrical dynamics of power, leveraging up those who wished to remain in charge, and quashing down the rest, relegating them to redeem themselves through the penance of hard, let's be honest, unreasonably long, arduous hours of work! "Protestant Work Ethic" ring a bell, folks? er, but I digress! (insert chuckle here). Nay, Nay. You are not sinners! You owe me not a thing! You only owe yourselves to meet the better parts of you, should you choose to do so. You owe yourselves to love well and live well as you can, whatever that means to you! So rejoice my friends, and seize this day with a righteous Love. Let this note ring and ring louuudly throughout the land:

"Liquor Stores: NOW OPEN SUNDAYS"  
So mote it be.