The storms

Storms are gathering in the distance; they always are. At the edge of the sky, there’s always a storm, swirling and growing, chasing the sun, as the sun is chasing the storm back, in their never-ending circular dance. They are constant as night and day, and unpredictable as an enraged lioness; we know they will come, but when and how fierce will they be?

Once we thought that the sun is fighting darkness, but it is fighting the storms. As are we; we fight our own storms, not our darkness. And as we fight, we know that each battle will bring eventual peace and change and calm. Sometimes we can’t take it, sometimes we fight not only the storms, but the change as well and by doing so, we fight ourselves. But change will come; brought by the distant storms that carry it like the clouds carry the rain and the lightning. And change will come crashing on us just like the rain and lightning and it will carry away the old ways, the memories and the dust that covered something we once had, but was then lost.

Welcome the storms and the change they bring from distant places they’ve visited. As they pass, the sun will follow and with it, new times.

Will they?

Beginnings and endings are difficult, but what’s between them makes it worth while to endure them.

We crawled out of the darkness, and looked upon the sky. But the sky was also dark, only illuminated by the distant fading lights. And our quest to understand them began. Our quest of hundreds and thousands of years. It seems like it will never end, although we are closer with every new step we take. But where do our steps take us? Towards the darkness we came from, or towards the light, or towards the grey mists we will never be able to navigate through? Each question only begs us to go forward, to see and feel, to touch and smell, to hear the pulsing beat of the heart of the universe. And what awaits there, at the far edge of the world? Will we reach it before we fall? Will it be worth it as our path between the beginning and the end? Will it matter? Will we matter?

We began in chaos.
Shall we end in peace?
And will anyone even know about our end?
Will they mourn?

Rain

It rained for days. Or was it months? Maybe it never stopped raining, since the Earth was formed.

The world was drowning, and yet people walked. It poured on their lives, and they did not look up, only down, to shield their eyes. The world was filled to the rim, but it never spilled, not even a drop.

Although it was hard to breathe and think, people walked on, through the rain that engulfed them. They walked when it was cold like the cutting ice, and they walked while it burned as well.

It was difficult to look up; the rain pierced the eyes of man, so he bowed down. He walked in what he knew would hurt forever, but what he knew how it hurt. He dared not to try the new pain, the one he hasn’t felt.

But some looked up. The rain hurt them, pouring right into their eyes for a moment, and then, the rain was no more. It was not there, it never was. The illuminating light of the sun showed them the world, and all that belonged in it. The blur and the illusions were all gone and they could see clearly, see all that the world had stored for them.

There is wonder in the unknown, but no wonder can match the wonder of the known.

Faces of the Earth

There is so many of us, and yet so few. Sometimes we look at each other and we see differences, sometimes we see the way we are identical.  The pride we feel to our uniqueness  sometimes forces us to separation, to hatred, to fear, to war. But how can one fear their brothers and sisters? How can one hate the beasts that roar in the night? How can one justify the wars, justify the destruction and the fires?

What made us hate each other? Fear should unite us, not separate us. Hate should be pushed aside by love. Differences should bring us closer together, and inspire learning and passion.

We breathe the same air, drink the same water, live under the same sky. And despite what we see in front of our faces, the Earth only sees one face; the same, and yet different for each of us. We are all one and the same, yet unique and special in the eyes of the mother that holds us. All that we fight for, all that we are proud of as a unique part of us; all that will come to pass. It exists in one moment only, so why should we fear and hate each other for so long, because of the one moment when we felt distant? All the cultures and creatures that the Earth holds are brothers and sisters, long lost, but brothers and sisters nonetheless. Each with their own interests, loves and passions, but brothers and sisters. And brothers and sisters shake their hands when they finally meet again.

Some walk the same paths, some run through the plains, some root the world. Each human, beast and tree; we are all one.

Ruins

Haunting me, they are. Their deep, but silent whispers. Their stories, secrets and murders; their tales of misery and joy, their past, present and future. I walk among them, as many did before me, and I envy them, those that saw them while they were complete, marvellous, shiny and new, colourful and young. When they weren’t ruins at all.

Now all there is are crumbled histories, ruins of the olden times, ruins of lives and empires, of men and beasts alike. Their fall tells us about the times long gone, but tells us about our fall to come, as well. Our homes will turn to ruins, and so will our lives and our empires. We will also be shallow graves of ancient times, of riches and emptiness. We will tell stories that no one may be able to understand. Our graves will scream things that people will not hear and our monuments will yell at the world, and the world will only pass them by.

I wish to fall asleep among the ruins, and to wake up to find them whole.

Birds

To fly. It is to live.
To see the world above the clouds. It is to breathe.
To have wings. It is to exist.
To let the wind carry you. It is to feel.

And why was it granted only to birds? Do they feel when the winds rush into their feathers, do they breathe as we never will? Are the birds free, eternal? Do they watch us from above and pass judgement like we do when we put ourselves on pedestals and thrones? Birds have never judged. It is in their nature to soar above us all, but never to judge, never to complain, never to kill out of prejudice.

Owls, the messengers of death and the mediators of wisdom. Eagles, the predators with mercy, the all-seeing ones. Hawks, of the Sun. Vultures, the devourers of decay. Before the gods were men, they were birds. And in all their glory, they still soared, unchanging, never judging. Instead of learning from them, we plucked their feathers and cut off their wings and attached it to our crowns and thrones. But the birds still fly, thus still living. They still see the worlds above the clouds; thus still breathing. They still grow wings; thus still existing. They still let the wind carry them; thus still feeling. Feeling what we’ve traded for machines.

It will never be granted to us. We forgot how to soar.

To All of Them

We have always loved the worlds that laid beyond our reach, beyond our grasp. And since the dawn of time, we have travelled to reach them; those worlds so far away, so unknown, so dangerous and mysterious. Something pushed us forward, towards the unknown and it pulled us just as much as we pushed. Brave travellers left their settlements and set their foot into the worlds never seen. Fear that they felt must have been extinguished by the burning fire of courage, by the clearing mist on the horizon.

Since the first man became a traveller, much time has passed. He moved through the freezing snowstorms, slowly, yet surely; he saw the moving shadows of monstrosities that hurled towards the plains of grass and he followed them. The sparkling snow creeped into him, but he walked on, following the steps of herds. And he emerged from darkness and cold and saw the lands before him; so green, so empty and yet so full of life. He ran with the horses until they became his friends, he followed the bulls until they became his gods. There was everything around him, but he needed more; he knew that the world is bigger and that there are much more lands to see and feel. He caged his friends to chariots and let them guide him towards the unknown. And the horses rushed across the plains and deserts and other people looked at the traveller, amazed. He conquered the land behind him and made beasts his friends. His chariot was like the sun and he was the creator of myths. Every man followed the traveller, for he knew what was there to see in the future. And they reached the roaring waters; rivers that could drown mountains, lakes that engulfed worlds and then, the sea. The sea he saw was the universe. It roared like nothing that ever graced the Earth. The waves he met told him they came from afar, where they met others just like him, the ones who stood on the brink of the universe, looking at the endless mass of creation. And the traveller looked at his chariot and wished it could carry him across the seas. The sea laughed and began to dance and the traveller decided to build a chariot that will dance with it. And they danced. His chariot turned into a ship, lead not by horses, but by the winds. He let the winds guide his dance with the sea and his journey across the waters began. The traveller saw beasts of the water, the ones who needed no ships to dance with the sea and he saw the mountains rising from it, defying the cruel sea. No matter how long the sea tried to beat them, the mountains stood there, as guardians of men. But the traveller knew that the sea is not their enemy; it is their most valued friend, the one who connects all the travellers. So he travelled with it, and not against it. And the sea loved the traveller for it, and the winds graced him like the horses before them.

The traveller connected the world and soon, knew how to move along the lands. He paved the grass with roads and he conquered the sea with routes where the winds always blew in his favour. And when he was good, they carried him, and when he was bad, the storms drowned him. But the traveller did not give up. He knew that there are more lands to conquer, more lands to see, more lands to own and travel across. So he stood before the biggest sea yet, the one without an end, and dared to cross it. Exactly because he dared, the sea was not angry and storms did not stop him. The traveller was graced with the new land, the one he dreamed about in the days long past, when he followed the monsters out of the snow. He always knew that there is more.

Travellers met and created the new world. And after the wars amongst the dead, the traveller realized that the land and sea are no longer enough. He looked up to the sky and saw the smiling clouds. If the wind carried him across the sea, it could carry him across the sky. And the traveller turned his chariots and his ships into machines that defied the land and the sea. He could finally fly. From the air, his lands and his seas looked so tiny, so small and insignificant. So he decided to leave them. And the first traveller pushed the Earth hard and left the world. Once, he feared that the edge of the world is at the first mist, at the first mountain, river and the sea. And now there were no more edges but the one in the sky and he learned that is was not the edge at all. The traveller saw the Earth beneath him, so small and he was surrounded by the darkness again. He always believed that the sky will be bright and not like the darkness from which he first came. But then he understood that his tiny little world is only one amongst the many out there and that he has not met all the travellers. There are travellers all around him, the ones just like him, looking at the distant sparkling lights and thinking about the worlds far away, worlds that we may never be able to travel to. The traveller, however, smiled. He knew what he thought when he saw the sea. The universe is nothing but another sea, so vast, dangerous and mysterious, but ultimately, the sea that connects rather than the one that separates. The traveller waved at the distant stars, knowing that other travellers cannot see him, but also knowing that they too are waving. Maybe with their hands, maybe with their weapons, but they are waving, because every traveller can feel others like him and their common longing to meet, longing to be carried by the horses and the winds.

This is for all of them, the travellers, who ventured into the unknown and brought the world together.

Words

Sometimes, the silence comes when sadness engulfs us. Words escape and do not form, for the mind is taken over by things that fall heavy on our shoulders and even heavier on our hearts.

But words will form again. They always do.

Days of Rage

There has always been something poetic about destruction. We were always drawn to stories about ends, about consuming flames, drowning streams of water, ravaging winds and shaking earth. The immense destructive power is always attractive, as humans strived to see how it works, to explain it and, ultimately, learn to harness it. We have certainly learned how to use it, to some extent, but we were not satisfied, not until we found our own power, our own means of destruction. And while we excused its usage with stories of peace and order, the only reason to use it was the inexplicable love and burning passion that we have for chaos. It is only us, humans, that adore stories of destruction; but even more, we love to be a part of it, in the centre of chaos, at the place from which we can rule over our empires of ruins. And we sit on the backs of warhorses, force them to run for us, to carry our chaos and our burden, to be our tools so we can enjoy the view of distant ends. And we listen to the cries and speak of future of peace and order, as if there is no contradiction of peace born from annihilation.

The eye of the storm is only a pause, and so is peace. Will we ever get to see the calm seas after the storm? Will humanity ever see the poetic beauty of peace; of perfect silence, beating sun at the centre of the sky? Will we ever wake up after dreams of death and see the true beauty of the ends of worlds; rebirth of our conscience?

We shall pass through many more days of rage until we reach the point when we’ll be tired of waking up to hate, but when we do one day, we will know the most beautiful part of the end of the world; birth of the new one.

Sol Invictus

The unconquered Sun is the first and the last; the only and the many; here and nowhere. It is here even when it’s gone and it shines even on the darkest of days. It emits such awe that none dare to look at its face, such warmth, always wearing the most beautiful of crowns. Is it possible to conquer the Sun, to touch its magnificence, to gaze into the heat, to give the Sun at least one hug, to feel the blazing warmth? Are we going to conquer it only to do that?

I saw when they launched the rockets to the sky; roaring thunders weren’t much of a sound compared to the rockets that created a deafening noise, silencing all who stood near to cry for the Sun. The rockets were so big; bigger than the crying mass, louder than the mourning. And they carried death, right up to the sky. The dust and the smoke clouded the world and the rockets left Earth, storming towards the Sun. The universe tried to hold them back, but the rockets, the power of greed, was stronger; they defied the laws of physics only to run faster than the light, to reach the Sun before anybody could stop them and before the universe itself could intervene. We had less than minutes to congratulate on our success and only minutes to cry for the Sun; the rockets reached it and stood in front of it without the feel of awe. The rockets glared at the face of the Sun, coldly, without shame, and launched the missiles of death; without sound, without the cries, without remorse. We wanted to grasp the golden dust, to grab the riches that lied stored in the Sun for billions of years, and in only a few seconds, instead of that, we shut down the great star. As the missiles collided with the Sun, it broke, burst into millions of colours, erupted and vomited all the gold dust which flew into the universe and disappeared. No humans, nor the rockets managed to grab it; it disappeared along with the Sun which slowly withered away, like a poor flower in winter. We were able to look at its face, its dying face, and we saw nothing at all. No awe, no glory, no pride and no life. The Sun died and we fell into the darkness, freezing darkness of endless pain. That’s when the humans mourned from the deepest corner of their hearts for the first time.

It is estimated that there are 1,200,000,000,000,000,000,000 kilograms of gold in the Sun.

Will we kill the Sun for it?