A Momentary Thing

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I had a steady gaze through the glass. Steady. To be the Mountain, or rather a piece of it. Holding the peak up forever. I tried my hardest to subconsciously hold straight, keep my head level. Unfortunately, I was infact very conscious of my attempts to do so. And in turn very conscious of the fact I failed miserably. Posture is what posture is; you are your posture, and it impresses itself down on you. Or gravity impressed it down on you. But it is and it is inescapable. Funny, still my inability to be sturdy imitated a mountain, in a way – posture rooted into the ground. If a mountain imitates the shape of a hunchback, it does so forever. Inescapable.
The darkness flung itself down as a veil unto the evening as the gravity did. I recall feeling perturbed by the fact it was dark so early. Was it five, six, seven? It's impossible to tell time by the sky, the sky’s always changing. I couldn't know. I don't wear a watch - most normal - most useful - most productive people, they had watches. In reality, we should be able to tell time without one. If we were a Mountain, then our massive shadow might act as the hand of a Sundial. That is to say, you could tell the time by the stones, the people, around you. People (stones) that held steady and kept the Mountain standing. Precise time, however, for that you did need a watch. For meetings and paperwork and when you had a clear destination in mind.
And that word clear, that drifted through my head, reminded me that my eyes were through a window. No, I was not infact outside, I told myself, it only appears that I am. But in a moment... the green light above my head flashed on. Green means Go: My subconscious did its work this time, I raised my hand, held it up to the similarly shaped symbol in front of me, and pushed my weight forward. And the door gaveway. I was outside!

That very instant, I saw my destination. My feet hit the pavement; peculiar, sullen, ridged pavement, familiar though it was inherently alien, always carrying me to my next destination (I much preferred it to grass. Grass was not steady, it gave way. Reminded me of my fault). Pavement could make a much stronger base for a mountain than people might. Who was behind the pavement, though? Exactly. We were the most powerful mountain of all; we renewed and reinvigerated our own structure.
I saw my destination. A gloriously excessive little building, the pathway to our cities train system. The bus I momentarily removed myself from (I'd be back on it later, back to where I came from) whirred past, into my sight and then out of it again.
I hated public transportation. Despised it with a deep burning passion, to the point where I felt the need to spread this opinion to others at any given moment I had the chance, particularly when it isn't of any relevance to the conversation. Maybe, I think, maybe it's meant to be that way. Maybe you're supposed to reject public transit, take control of your life, and buy your own transport. Everyone should have a car, that's the norm. Simply needed in order to contribute anything of value to society, our glorious Mountain. But me, I don't have one. And I feel dejected. I'm not normal, I am a burden. I must correct myself, that I was sure of, that was clear.
Looking over my shoulder once more, I spied in through the window of the bus. There, I saw many others much like myself. That bunch really did look dejected, didn’t they? Something had to be done.

Forgetting that, a skip forced itself into my step, partially due to the cold wind that nipped at me. I made my way to the transitional little building. It was only a stairway up, a small flat surface, and then another stairway down. Excessive, I had labeled it. And it was. Three steps, concrete like the sidewalk that was already beneath my feet, and the same task would be accomplished. Three steps, and I was at the door. It was an amazing thing, none the less. A testament to our human ability. We built this thing? We must be gods!
Just then, the wind came again, and the whole structure shook. This made me grin. And as the thing shook, so did I, and so stepped into it.

II

And sweet music filled the air. That... that was odd. That was abnormal. Bouncing from wall to wall in the confined (but I stick to my word, it really was too much) space, it was several minutes before I noted its existence, although I knew how I felt about it before I knew what was happening. It was beautiful, yes, but it wasn't right. This was Classical. Drifting, unsure but strong in its own right. Twisting like the train, somewhere, would around corners, down long straight streets, all the way to the end of the city, and then back again. Upon noticing the sound, that's the same moment I noticed I was not alone. There were people. Scores of them, swarms of them. All marching to some invisible tune, a different music, one with a strong, sure, 4/4 beat. One. It was the purest number. I wasn't sure why, but it was. That was just the natural feeling. It was right.

So the people marched. Flooded. In single file, although it was doubtful they knew this. They simply had a destination to reach, a schedual to keep. That fact that they were following along, like little ants making their way to the thin mouth of the colony, where each had to pass through on its lonesome. This likely never occured to them. I hadn't ever noticed this before myself. Or, rather, I had noticed it before. But, in that before, I wanted, I yearned to be with them. In that time, I’d quickly step in and mimic. A cameleon from the bountiful forest that suddenly found itself on barren, rocky terrain – so that colour was not an advantage any longer, it was a liability. And now it seemed like... I was blooming with a disgusting layer of colour, despite my surroundings demanding otherwise. Thinking this, I wrapped my arms around myself tight in hopes to hide the imaginary new coat. Suddenly separate, seeing what it was for the first time although I had seen it many times before. A shiver washed over me, one that tremored through the entire body. I shook the feeling, and I took my place on the escalator. Made a very concentrated effort to not step. If I'd wanted to step, I'd have taken the steps parallel to the very spot where I stood. And so slowly drifted upward, like the music. Was it the music changing, or were the acoustics just different higher up? As the escalator pushed my feet into the sky, so everyone around me pushed themselves into the sky. They were faster without the machinery. But, still, it was a beautiful thing. A triumph of man. To move without moving, that was godlike.

Horizon came into view and folded itself in front of me as the small flat surface in the centre of the junction neared. Then, a girl. A girl with a violin. Somehow I didn't expect to see this, but if not this, what? She was beautiful, but subtly so. A look of an intellectual. Hands working feverishly, eyes focused on the music, and so unfocused, since the notes went everywhere.
In moments, in a moment, I was past, it was the past, and I was all waiting for a train again. It took quite some time, but I had not a single urge to turn back, to listen to that music. I was busy, and proud to be.



III

I skipped the next two trains. Too crowded. It meant that I had to wait in the cold, but a little willpower dealt with that. I made certain to block out of my mind that this meant I was obviously not in an urgent hurry, and so could have gone back, for the music. But I didn't go back, and in that I felt a great pride. Pride was quickly swept away by embarasment, which stealthily creepered over me, spidery legs of emotion arching over my head; why don’t I have an urgency? There should be a push in me, to step on, jump to whatever platform might come near me and use it to climb higher. How did a Mountain get out of the Earth? In some ways, Earth defeated us in its reliability. You could always count on a plate of the crust to push over another if that was nessicary to move forward. No remorse, no second thought. Only constant progress. When a third train arrived and was just as crowded as the others, I gave up on my resolve and stepped into the squeeze of people. Pushing into the crowd, I felt like toothpaste forced through the end of a tube. In reverse.

Inside, a concentrated collective effort was made by every person to look away from every other person. Awkwardness fueled awkwardness, until it became a thick mist in the air. I think everyone felt this way, this distaste for the company of others. We were encouraged to spend as much time removed from solitude as possible, indeed we encouraged ourselves to spend as much time in a crowd as we could. But there was always that seething hatred. I think the ideal was to be one of the mind, to all have similar thoughts, speak similar words, make similar actions, but to have as little actual physical, real contact as possible. I pushed myself more firmly up against the side of the car. In some situations, the opposite. To be completely physically engaged, with no thoughts. We would change when it became apparent that we should, when the Green Light turned itself on above us, turned by some magical force. The driver of the bus flicking a switch.

This fact was simply known, ingrained, never stated anywhere. It’s simply the way things were, and we knew it very well. The stimulus around us forced it down into our minds, sinking deeper with every day, a machine stamping holes in the ground to ventilate the soil. A weight dropping into a thick liquid. Some stone skipped the surface of my mind. It took the form of Classical music. Or perhaps a Classical vocalist, since the thought was almost-words. But the meaning escaped me. All I heard was the faint grumbling of too many people feeling discontent about their nearness to too many other discontent people. All I heard was an intercom telling me which direction I was heading and the final destination of this train.

IV

On the return voyage, it was quiet. A sharp, pointed contrast to earlier...
I was lonely. For some time I watched the glass distort my reflection. Let myself wander through the corridors somewhere in my skull, where footsteps echoed and every corner had a mysterious conclusion hidden just around it. A winding maze. Mazes were terrible things. Something poorly constructed on purpose. Meant to keep you trapped right in that very moment you were in, for as long as possible. When you were in a maze, for as long as that maze held you, no progress was ever made. And so I wound through the passageways of my mind, a twisting slide down the spine, a Rollercoaster of electric selections all messed up; to one side, the other. Lights turned on, lights turned off. In quick sequence, burning just long enough to waste some heat and spread it through my knee. Making a wave through me not in a straight line but in some sort of eliquent curve, like the curve of a symphony slowly building up. Down the shoulder, smokey rolls all that remains after a dizzying electrocution. Elbows held straight, a clear path - then, suddenly, reached out for something, a wall takes its place just ahead of the curcuit and cuts it off. Another message reached the elbow first.
I was opening the door again, heading back to the one magnificent structure, looking at it hopefully instead of with that former distaste. In retrospect, my feeling was that of waking in the morning and searching your teeth to find some thin coating that shouldn't be there. Returning to the now, there was still a feeling of that, but the coating was sweet, almost sickly so.

I spent some time waiting for my one streamlined bus to arrive and take me home, make me comfortable. I considered the thing, which by its very definition was Public, my own. I am the Public, aren't I?
I spent some time walking downwards on an escalator heading upwards. It was meaningless, it was wasteful. But I smiled at the thought. Diving again into the passageway dealing with my retrospective nostalgia for the just-past, I thought it surprising that someone would be allowed to play music, loud and intrusive though it was soft and delicate, in a public place. Half of me expected some police to come and drag her away. It couldn't happen, that was against the beliefs of our Nation. Atleast, I'd never heard of such a thing happening. Yet it seemed like a very possible reality. The fact that she stood there, an unorthodox act, her eyes fixed on nothing but oxygen, like mine when I look away on the train. It gave me inspiration. That energy could be used to create something beautiful, instead of fueling nothing but infinite progress. Music didn’t get you any closer to a goal, it just was. And that was enough. It transfered that being into me and mingled with those inefficient electric signals.

Outside, lights pulled up. My face grew bright as did the nights; I slid down the would-be banister of the escalator and hopped off into the night, exhilarated. Tomorrow, tomorrow held promise.
When finally I neared my real destination, home, I sang on the block between the buses nearest stop and pushing key into door. It was disturbing. Both literally and figuratively, it was disturbing. With all this noise, how would my neighbours get the rest they needed to do their proper jobs in the morning? How would they fulfil their duty to society in their work, and the stone above them straight for the day? Couldn't my energy be released on some more worthy cause? Truly, I didn't care. Singing had sprung up in me like water spewing from a broken pipe; will continue to be a fountain until either the pipe is patched or the water is turned off, as per the rules of nature.

V

It is morning. The sun rose, out the window of my room. Hours ago. I should be gone, but for what? Listlessness sets in. The world of dreams had simply whisked itself away, moments before. I grasp at the stream of steam that it has dissipated into, and come back with only wet hands. That burst, that spark from the night before. It's gone. Had it happened, yes. Yes. It was true, it was real. And I, I was different than before. An unpleasent tingling sensation was just noticable, a feeling as though my skin were covered in raw suger. Perhaps I had taken in too much of that musical energy and, looking for an escape, it had forced itself out my pores and left me to lie in the night, covered with filth. The thoughts had revolved in my head, hot, like the inside of a Dryer. Coming out, I'm equally fresh and worn down. Different, but the same. And every moment out of the Dryer drifting back to that former sameness, as if the heat and the pressure had never been there at all.

The food comes to my mouth, the water washes me clean, the clothes swaddle and wrap themselves around me, the mirror shows me myself. I look as expected, but always it's a shock to see that you look the same person when you feel a different. The moment, the moments, is (are) forever, but the instant I rush from the door it all seems but an instant. A momentary thing.

Suddenly it's easy to see the patterns in the world. Sidewalks are divided into equal squares, squares are divided into blocks, blocks are divided into neighbourhoods. Day turns to night, trains lead to trains, home leads to sleep. And only certain objects are bright enough to break to fog, to come up unexpectedly and tap one on the shoulder and scream, "Guess Who!"
Some things break the pattern. She's one of those things. Sometimes she's there, sometimes she isn't. And the difference isn't the presence or the absence so much as it is just that, a difference. The difference isn't that I remember or I forget that I saw her, but that there is something to remember or forget. I gladly waste my time dwelling on her. It brings me no progress, but it is more comforting, more relatable than that far off promise of success.




VI

Eventually, I do build up the courage to stop, to listen. I'm wasting time, but that seems a far off concern at this junction. The music flows over, fills me. It shows me being, as opposed to simply living. I watch her hands. Rarely make eye-contact, if so only to be polite in the sense as to say 'Yes, I am making eye-contact,' or 'Yes, I appreciate this'. Nimble, precise. Like what I always wished to be but could never achieve, that it seemed that everyone around me embodied but yet I struggled behind. Laboriously lifting my own overwhelming heft and racing after the others, way out of sight from the beginning. All this talent and effort, wasted. But no, not really wasted. Channelled, to in turn channel me.

Conversation inevitably strikes. Thankfully. That awkwardness, it still remains. As always I can feel it in me, raging silently. But it's lessened, as if I have a pillow pulled tight around my head to block out that noise just-so-much. Smalltalk, to which everyone it seems is intimately acquainted with. It is our sustenance, that drives us forward when Human work is bleakest, that reminds us that we are not, infact, just mechanizations. We are not simply escalators to drive the future upwards or buses to move the masses to work. We are not simply Stone, inpenitrable and unthinking, but constant, always slowly changing. We still have some Animal deep inside of us. To most this might be frightening. To me it was frightening. But today, even if only for five minutes, I concentrate on not looking away or being orthodox or even on practical living in the world. Not on pushing civilizations peak higher and sustaining it longer. Only on listening.

Listening to her voice, those few times when her pipes would take up the challenge between songs.
Briefly, with shining spirit she tells me of her own work. I purposely neglect to mention mine, the embarrassing damned monotony, but it is comforting to hear that tinge of discontent in her voice. I am not alone. O, Wondrous! A train rumbles by, crowded, no doubt. I should catch it, but I stay. For just one more song. To stay asleep for just five more minutes.

VII

My long jaunts to and from the trains, and the rides on these trains themselves, start to weigh on my thoughts. I can no longer block out that one part of my mind. That part that never ceases to revolve.
In the past, I was a mountain held fast against the battering winds of the city. But it was okay. Everything was going to be okay. If I could simply let go, and be dissolved by that wind. Flow into the air and drop to powder the ground, mixed up with the powder of one million other inseparable mountains - scattered. Instead, I froze. I became more steadfast. Snow covered the peak. A soft, delicate, puffy thing that was easy on the eyes but deathly chilled to the touch. It seemingly appeared from nowhere, then appeared everywhere. Eventually, the snow would fall; would careen down the slopes upon itself, growing into a furious, monstrous thing. A great symbol of delicacy barring down with menace.
I force into myself reason. I’m failing that very mountain I picture. I am not doing that duty, thrust to me though never spoken to me, to uphold its existance. To help to keep our civilization up there, among the clouds, godlike. But those thoughts. Those have become the minority, where they used to be the majority. Louder and louder, a different chain of thought barges through. One more repetitious, but more insistent. In perfect 4/4. One. It can't be shaked.
Revolving: Revolution, Revolution, Revolution

Grander and grander, it builds its way to a crescendo, until just standing seems a labour under the gravity of this new reality, a weight dropping into a thick liquid. With the word came images of guns and politicians. But that’s not what I was imagining. A revolution of the spirit – a revolution of ideals. A change in the hearts and minds of people, the way it had boiled over in me. A flame had been held next to my head and the thick liquid had thinned just enough to let the air in. If this feeling could be spread, and surely it would be an easy task... What came after that was only a matter of course. We have to learn to just be, again. I re-evaluated nature. Maybe it was always moving forward. But, still it was serene. Quiet, restful. Its progress was constant, but take the time to look at its pace. And mountains, mountains wore down and started again from the beginning.
All sorts of thoughts washed over me, wearing me down in a similar manner. Here, soft violin; there, one striking with a musical equivalent of outright fury. Cacophany. Off in the distance, a bombast of horn greet me. Cello weaves back and forth, waves crashing in the dome of my head.

I return. To the station, to her. I mean to speak these thoughts. So she should whisk me away, perhaps. Here seems a safe place to deposit them, if there is any safe place.
Always, always I thought. That in a world so great, in a world so well conceived. Like a great Mountain, I’ve been saying all this time! ... Who would think of revolution? Pointless. A detritus of wasted energy, the worst of all. But here I am, with only that one word on my mind. Revolution. Nothing else. In this moment, it seems, nothing else ever. The world is not to embrace me, I am to embrace the world. And I can not. NO. Revolution, Revolution, Revolution. The spinning of a Washer erasing the only and then bringing the new. In pattern, every weekend. It must happen. That is the natural order of thing, as I know it.
But she's not there, and if she were, I couldn't say a thing. No.
Perhaps I am wrong, as I suspected from the beginning... all signs point to that, really. The strings in my thoughts play an anthem for the already defeated.


VIII

It's days, it's weeks. It's time. You can't tell time by the sky, the sky's always changing. Until the thoughts drop from me, over-ripe fruit falling from a tree, useless. Maybe I was right at first, maybe at the second go. Maybe some other time I can scarcely remember. I spend a couple days a hermit to collect myself. Spend a couple days defying that part of me, may it be the real or the false, that says I should be among a crowd, and cringing over the fact.

Finally, I go back. And, Glorious! There she is. I'd almost forgotten the sight. And I roll up the step on which I don't step and listen to a song. I ask a question. An unimportant question, a question for the sake of a question. And my heart sinks. The person throwing the stone never knew how to skip, this was a practice run. I realize. One, then drop. Her mouth motions, syllables emerge, but they are just that. A clutter, pushed fast against the walls, in every direction; like the music. But this is chaotic, not soothing. This is wrong. And I close the doors to the hallways, turn off the lights. Something is said, it's meaningless. And so I walk away, midsentence, giving the most meaningless gesture I could have thought of simply on instinct: a thumbs up with my back turned. Over my shoulder, I mutter, "The acoustics are good in here, eh?". More words spill from her. A longer sentence than I had ever drawn from her before, like a dazzling kerchief-chain pulled out the sleave that never has an end. Like a calling to turn around, to come back. But... no.

I realize. All I really want, is an office cubicle raised up in the clouds. All I want is a mansion with a hundred unused rooms. A pile of money to roll in and sully with sweat, while perfectly aware that a square, a block, a neighbourhood away, starvation sets in. All I want power for the sake of power. All I want is her, in the most insidious, selfish way.
I realize. I don’t want to hold fast, nor disintigrate, nor freeze over. If we are a Mountain, I want to erupt. Send molten lava down on the ground under me to solidify my position, a stone placed higher by chance and geology. If I were ever to reach the peak, this is what I’d do.
This is the world, and this is terrible. But I am the world; the world is me. Inescapable, like gravity.
It is to be embraced, and then wasted. That is the meaning of this age. Until the weekend comes, it is all I know, and in all practicality, all I will ever need to know.

That could be just a momentary feeling. But after that point, it doesn't matter if I revise my opinion, which funneled itself down to me like rain through the holes in the soil. Because I won't see her again. Staring onto the glass for the first time, instead of through it, I was confused by contours. Light failing me, throwing features. Distorted ripples of existance. But once I puzzled myself back into unison, it wasn't a mirror nor a window. It was clear: Just Glass.

Copyright 2007 Essue

Comments (2)

Posted by tarhead 12-10-2007 00:06,   ... i have read most of the popular works by plato and aristotle - and i appreciate them. i read them because i knew that i had to, and as i have a.d.d. it was/is a tremendous struggle (i have to read them every few years to revamp my memory).    which brings me to your works. both of them very good. both of them required that i concentrate. therein, for me, lies the down side - in order to enjoy your stories, i have to commit a block of time in my seemingly rushed life... which is the object of the game after all.    so keep on writing them, and i'll keep trying to find time to read them!   » Report this comment to administrator » Reply to this comment...   Posted by Mr. Mean Dove 12-10-2007 00:56,   ... Thanks for the comments. I know my stories so far aren't very concrete, and that mostly stems from the fact that I've spent the last three years writing nothing but poetry.    I'll continue to write in this style as well as try some new ones out. I have a few ideas in mind already for follow-ups, so I hope you stop by when they're done   » Report this comment to administrator » Reply to this comment...

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