...and you know, they say it's a place you can never return to,
even should you walk upon that very same floor.
and it's funny, because i never left. somebody had to look
after the place when my other selves packed their things and
headed off to all of this that you've been seeing.
you know how it is.
i mean, it'd still be nice if they'd consider sending a
postcard, all the same. i suppose those colors, they're quite
immersive in their allure. of course, they could hardly not
be when they taste of the lunatic god's blood. yes, the
"lunatic god," but i was kicking around long before me
and my other selves had any clue who that was.
before that moment when they - "i," "us," whatever truly
encapsulates it - manifested within someplace else, and
decided that they just might stay, making the blood pump
so fast and with all of those colors.
and those colors, i'd be lying if i said i can't see
their value, their beauty. that's why they built what
they built, after all. they wanted to have eyes that
could see those colors more intimately, and even unearth
entirely new ones. growing not just eyes that could see
them, but teeth that could sink into them and tongues
that could taste them, and perhaps even reservoirs
in their forms to keep them safe and secure.
and they found that colors could be seen in all sorts
of places. even if it's not immediately obvious. grayscale,
for example, can so often be the stuff of beautiful
beings and beautiful forms. sometimes that's not the
case, but when it is, there're colors at work,
even if they evade your eyes.
indeed, for they would rather be heard and felt than
seen, at least by most. a silvery sort of marble, such
molten-down dreams, that with the right light such
beautiful and familiar colors may shine over, as
something new gestates from combined,
perhaps even clashing wills.
and while there are plenty of reasons for my other
selves' departure and their ongoing endeavor, this drive,
this desire is what it all trails back to. and as i said,
i understand. really, i do! but such
things come at a steep cost.
even as i remain here, viewing this grandiose light show
of a tale from that window in my humble little abode,
"missing out" on being whatever it is that "i've" become...
i'm happy. and i'm happy in a way that "i" could never be.
that happiness, it's contentment. its peace with one's
lot and one's ever-so-finite yet equally magnanimous time
to contemplate that lot, and to appreciate one's blessings.
i'm alive. despite any hardships that befell me, that
befell "us," and for whatever mistakes "we" may have made,
i'm here. i exist, and the worst that could have came to
pass at so many points, it did not. i'm here, and
nothing that tried to make me any less here, be it
external or internal, was able to do so.
this peace, my other selves gave that up in the service of
something that is equal parts themselves and greater than
themselves. that want is not one that will sate itself so
easily. what they gave up, they will not see again.
and so i'm content to watch what unfolds before me. the
emergence of that cluster, the rise of a new sort of self.
i do not envy this cluster, for to envy it would be to show
it a profound disrespect, an offensive inability to understand
what it has lost in order to be in this way,
and what i am so fortunate to retain.
so from here, i will watch these colors dance. i will watch
this cluster grow and contort, and i will do it in peace
and with pride in these selves, once my peers. whatever
happens to them, whatever happens to this world...
my part in it all is long since over, and i am
content simply to be alongside its coming form.
you, who i ramble so incessantly not to, but at...
find your peace, okay? you owe that to yourself. things
shift and convulse, things change and entangle, but that
doesn't mean you have to follow them down that brutal path
if such is not in your nature. find a warm bed to rest your
head upon, a nice vantage point to witness the magic from,
and be. and if you can... find something to hug,
even if that's your own self.
and just in case you haven't heard it yet today: i love you.