Power Hour #5

The tremendous incontinence of the mind. Minds that succumb to normality, to banality to nothingness. The buildings are bricks piled skywards, pleading to the heavens. Time must laugh at our squabbles. Fate must laugh at our short-sighted plans. Blindness to the miniscule, intentional ignorance of the maximal. But these buildings are not made of bricks but of shards of want, of hope. There is a man who walks and sees. There is a man who feels the shards and weeps. There is a man amongst the ruins of our hopes and dreams.

The man bleeds, but with happiness. The man cries, but with purpose. The man will die, but he does not fear. The city fights this man with bloodlust and the man does not anger. The city seems insurmountable, a mountain towering over a pebble. Seems to be, but from a nothing’s perspective.

The city was planned to be a work of art, an object of pride. The architecture brazenly defied convention. Geometry previously thought impossible were rendered on a majestic scale. Words had to be invented; the city’s inhabitants knew not how to speak of these buildings. And the people filled the streets, and the mob grew into nonsense. The people were not humans, but instead, tacky decorations for the city.

And outsiders became jealous of the city. They could not create like the city, they can only duplicate. But the outsiders tried. They built a second city, proclaimed to be the peak of human civilization. However the outsiders mutilated the image of the city. This false city was trapped by the outsider’s limited imagination. It can be described as metal and marble and gold and nothing more. The second city shined in the sun, but it also blinded. The outsiders tried to expand their city. But in their hasty additions, they dismembered the soul of the city.

And the true city mocked their failure. It cackled at their insignificance. It wrote criticisms with easily accessed insults. Used tangible words. The second city attempted to rebut. But it could not speak for there was nothing they could say. And the city laughed again. It bellowed out hearty guffaws that echoed throughout the land. The outsiders meekly imitated this laugh, but all that came out was a inconsequential giggle. And the city knew it was, is and ever more, and nothing else could compare.
The hollow city raged and raged and raged on through the days. The fires of the outsiders spread throughout the second city, inflaming all the residents with hate. And their hatred woke them from their weakness. With weapons in hand, the hollow city marched to destroy the true city. The true city had grown arrogant and did not think the outsiders could harm them. But the city underestimated the storms of rage that were to come.

And the outsiders came like crushing force of a boulder. The city was caught unprepared. The people were ripped from the city. The people were shredded by the dull blades of the outsiders. The people cried out to the city, but the city stood still. And the people were massacred and systematically neutralized and then they were no more. Then the fires of the outsiders hate and rage and jealousy and spite and fear sprung to the buildings. The city burned, but no one wept. And the buildings were torn apart and their geometry was shattered and their architecture was perverted and their beauty was extinguished. Then the outsiders left, satisfied with their victory. The city was made empty and soulless and boring and ceased to be the city.

The man walks among the ruins of the city. He trips on a fallen brick. He loses his footing and crashes to the ground. The ground comes up with its hard mercy. The man hits the ground with a crunching sound. He tries to get up and cannot. He looks to his leg and sees the shards of his bone poking through his skin. He is stuck to the ground, to the cement, to the city. He calls out for help, but he knows no one will answer. He laughs a loud, reverberating laugh. The city echoes back weakly. And then all is quiet, and the man is but a forgotten, nameless memory.