When I pulled up to the house, I heard the snow crunch under the wheels and watched the light from atop the lamppost illuminate the ground around it covered in white. All lights were off in the house, as usual. And also as usual, I returned home lonely, a bit chilled inside and memories reeling through my mind of which I'd experienced in and around the house. I looked up at their window, trying to completely understand that what was once my whole world lies in slumber just beyond that wall of glass and low blinds. One thing I will never be able to fully understand is how entirely circumstances can change within one life and how forcefully it affects that life.
It was then that I realized if I were to have more moments such as these, I would wish less for a way to warp time so as to go back and savor what I later realize I was given, perhaps I could take in that priceless gift and spend it more wisely, or not even so much as that, but if I were to pay closer attention to it's demise, I would have more closure and be more prepared for life's one promise to serve me yet another ration of its bitter sweet essence; change.
It's at night when you catch time lagging and you can then spend stolen moments understanding, respecting, loving and departing from what you've so hurriedly rushed through in a futile attempt to live as 'life'. I'm finding that those stolen moments sometimes come with a price. Sometimes that time sneaks in a handful of seconds for each minute to throw at you memories that seep down into your spirit and drive out tears, leaving you with the knowledge that as you sit satisfied in the night, those of whom you cast your thoughts and care upon age as they sleep, they will wake up older, further from what you wish and closer, if even only a few breaths, to their final sleep.
When it's black out, save this night and a few others where the light from the snow shines back to you impressing an ounce of hope upon your dimly lit soul, you can exist purely as a wondering ghost, looking over those you love, sending re-enforcements to the battle that claims their soul, wondering why so little choice has been granted to each of us, but hoping and minorly expecting good things for the family that has shaped your memory, your beliefs, your life and most importantly, postponed a death so premature to think upon it blows the winds of loss through the soul of any who dare carry such a thought. There are dark places in this life and it seems to me the darkest of all are nestled deep within our own minds. It is the mind that gives the heart a rival, but in the case that they act together, there is no stronger force. If that could be achieved in keeping sacred what is meant to be so, there would be a pieceof heaven here; a homunculous of eternal peace, if you will, resting forever within ourselves to share with those who are part of it
The Tale Of A Violet Mind
Part IV- Dawning Of A Greater Thing
When I awoke, I could hear someone knocking on my door frantically, with each bout of knocking there seemed to be less and less time between attempts at knocking down my door. I hadn’t the slightest idea of who would be calling on me on a Tuesday morning. As I neared the door to exit my bed quarters, I was met with a crippling pain in my stomach; it was as if I hadn’t eaten in days! I know I had an exhausting night coupled with an exhausting nightmare, but why do I feel as though I’ve been starved? Not to mention the persistent pain on my leg, perhaps in my plunge onto that shrubbery I had sustained a minor injury; maybe a branch had cut me. As I stumbled to the door, the knocking got louder, quicker and I became more irritated, after all I was in a very deep sleep. When I swung the door open I filled my lungs with air so that I could relay most definitely my utter dismay to whoever would dare disturb me at such a random, nonsensical time.
Ms. Vanderbreght! Dear god, what do I have to endure now? Why could it not have been some traveling salesman? It had to be this dreaded woman.”Yes Ms. Vanderbreght?”
“I’m hear for yer weekly cleanin’ ya know”
“But isn’t it a little early in the week for you to be cleaning? I understood our agreement to be that I would pay you after each cleaning which would be undertaken each Thursday from nine A.M. until noon, is that not what we agreed on?"
“Why, I believe you’re correct by sayin’ such and I believe I’m correct by showin’ up on yer doorstep at just such a time, now if it ain’t gonna be too much of an imposition, I’ll just be keeping my part of the agreement, that is if you’ll be lettin’ me in.”
A pushy old hag she was, one of those individuals just a bit to far into their own realm to see the danger just outside of it. I both pitied and despised this old woman for being such an individual. Annoying it was, annoying indeed. She would have been such a sweet old lady had she only kept her annoying, big, ignorant mouth shut! Wait! Why was she so insistent on being here if it weren’t Thursday morning at the hour of nine? Nine A.M., perhaps, but on Thursday, impossible!
“Ms. Vanderbreght, I must insist, come back Thursday, this house needs no attention of yours, besides I’m sure you’ve plenty of cleanings to tend to, I’ll see you bright and early on Thursday, good day Ms. Vanderbreght”
“Hold your tongue young man, I don’t know what manner of joke you believe to be pullin’ on me but I haven’t time fer it this mornin, I’ve lots to get done today”
No! It was Thursday after all! As she negotiated her hobbling mass of a body through the doorway she handed me the paper that she always agreed to bring so that I was at least sure to know of the happenings in the town ONE day of the week. An unnerving sensation chiseled it’s way through my entire being as I read the date of the day’s paper; I had been asleep for over two days! No wonder I am famished, and what about this curious pain on my leg?
I escaped to my quarters where she was forbid by me to ever enter to inspect my leg while the old buxom hag scuffled her way through my home. As I shed my trousers and sat on my bed I laid my eyes on a deep flesh wound that was very recent, but around the wound was the sight of burned flesh. This, make no mistake, was a mark of hell’s fire! The guide had left his mark upon me as well, that was no nightmare conjured up by a guilty conscious nor was it some dark fantasy realized by a man slipping away into madness! That was a real place and a real visitation. I had escaped the linear pace of time to discover my fretting of the manifestation of my hatred toward Amelia was all in vein.
No, this simply could not be! Surely that was a rather haunting dream, indeed, but so many things could have caused this flesh wound the night of my action, I was so fueled by a passion constructed of revenge through hate that my natural feelings of reality, skewed as they were could have easily left this gash undetected. No, this was simply a mistake on my part, a painful one, but not one that could deduce completely that I was the culprit of the happenings of the evening.
I changed my clothes and headed back out to prepare my breakfast. I now had to pretend that I had nothing to do with Andrea’s demise, that I have been buried in my work and that I was NOT running from the scene as Ms. Vanderbreght let out that blood-curdling scream of shock.
“Well, Ms. Vanderbreght, it seems I owe you an apology, I’ve been so overcome with work I had lost track of the day.”
“I see then young man, so it may not be so far fetched a thing that you have not heard of the poor girl being murdered in her own house?”
“My dear, ma’am whoever do you mean? Murdered, in this town?"
“Oh yes, it was that young beauty Andrea, the girl whom you used to call on, I just hate to be the bearer of bad news, but…”
“Oh don’t you blame yourself Ms. Vanderbreght” I exclaimed over her voice as she began to choke up. “That’s a most terrible thing to happen, terrible indeed, but you mustn’t be concerned with my feelings, that girl and I had come to a mutual understanding and have long since parted ways, and as It is with any existence, as precious as they may be people will come and go, out of both your life and theirs, at one point. Do know, I whole-heartedly agree, that is quite the tragedy though! This town? Such a young woman! Beautiful she was, inside and out, I must say through my experience."
“Young man you DO speak the truth, it is just as well, I have to be cleanin now. It’s just, just that, well…”
“Yes Mrs. Vanderbreght?"
“Well, I found her layin’ there, musta been not long at all after the evil deed. Found her layin’ with throat slit and face all cut open and her hair wasn’t even golden anymore. You would probably think me of Ill mind but she was, she…"
Mrs. Vanderbreght began to choke up even more and studder as she bowed her head as to hide the embarrassed, pudgy face, almost as if she were ashamed of some thought she’d had.
“Mrs. Vanderbreght, you must confess, what is it you mean to say, I shall not judge you if it is odd.”
The first four words were whispered softly and drawn out with an end as the last three began, loudly and as haunting as the whole experience until now had been-
… still beautiful layin’ there, in bloody repose!”
As she uttered those last two words, still in shock and fear,she looked at the ground for a long spell, I assume to escape the physical confines of my home by looking on once more in her mind to the mental images that had most assuredly been seared into her mind before returning to her work.
In my usual taciturn manner, at least, as it is with the old woman, I left her without words and retired to my library to process the past few days’ happenings.
I felt a compelling force bring to my attention one instance of my vision that I’d failed to recount. It wasn’t just that I had not recounted the experience, but that I could only vaguely recall its occurrence. This vexed me to an extreme degree. It was as if the underlying motive of some seemingly irrational but extravagant display of madness was lost in the translation from subconscious to the conscious state of mind, therefore losing significance, which was associated to all of those imperative details that I so lacked.
After breakfast, I ventured back to the quiet recesses of my bedroom. I thumbed around aimlessly in my journal, which was always kept at bedside. I discovered an entry that I had written several months before and had I not been disconcerted from the week, I may have not been of the mind to fiddle through my things in so random a fashion.
“I must concede, the longer I dwell on the recent happenings of my life and my life in general, the more it has become clear to me that my dabbling in dark things has taken over my life and also my will for what I seek to become an avatar of my existence, never more than now have I desired my life to serve as admonishment to mankind in regard to the manner in which one would treat another as well as something more, [that ‘something’ more, I cannot name at this time, for it is but an elusive entity lurking within me that has yet to reveal its full self and this, since childhood, has left me in torment.]
I admit, it has been far more than a dabbling and also, at times, I feel regret approaching the mind and the only way to stave off its force is to revisit such crude memories as Amelia, or perhaps other sad events in my life that invoke similar feelings. I would not be entirely accurate in saying I have reached a point where I peer backward through time and crave the ignorance I once had for this practice, likely because I cannot ignore my adeptness in this art. Although I do wish to proceed, perhaps this notion will not be so casual a one in days to come.
When I reflect upon my childhood, I am able still to recall those nefarious visions from below, is it so that every child sees these things and dreams in such morbid detail and so becomes infatuated with the dark corridor of a life made by the curiosity of death and all that abound? Surely not, but just as surely as I had made light of these facts of myself as a boy, I would have been stricken with shame; left with a stigma; condemned by the very same man that I, myself am; sentenced to a life, or subordinate form of existence by the very same curious, self-righteous heathen of which I walk alongside the earth each day.
This quandary leaves me in wonder for what I may achieve while following this path and also what destruction may lie ahead. Alas, as permanent as I would wish this comfortable life to be, I also cannot help but give mind to the possibility that there are worlds beyond that cause one to do things for a reason, regardless of whether they are right or wrong in this world.
So the question is, which is of more importance and is that importance to contend with a present happiness?”
I sat back and sunk deep into my reading chair, it was as if pieces of a puzzle began to come together in revealing the purpose for my existence. Many fulfill their purpose or purposes in this life, some I believe, do not. Where does that leave me?
I am finding that there are few things able to be experienced in this life more powerful than a pure faith in knowing for what purpose one exists. I, obviously had written this passage, and read it to myself before, although this time it carried some inexplicable form of authority; a message that I had not intended upon writing it to convey, rather it was more of a verse of mental illiteracy vomited uncoordinatedly onto paper. Now though, now this had proved to be a piece of my mind that struck a light illuminating a whole world I’d been treading upon since my birth, but only now have I realized the fullness of such an existence.
Through the course of my pondering, it had become clear to me that most, if not all of those whom I dwelt with on this earth were in fact not sitting, contemplating what mental tools to use in an order to fully grasp what I presently was and most likely had not and would not do so. Perhaps my vanity had afforded me a full fairy ride into a hallowed land of madness, or perhaps I was more right than ever I could have been in life.
It seems more clear as the days, no, as the hours pass, that I carry some divine task on my shoulders but still I cannot see my way to understand in full faculty what it is. And what of that curious dream I dreamt?
At that, I scurried into my study to jot down some of the thoughts already becoming tangled in my mind.
When I turned the corner to the left from the short hallway dividing several rooms of my house, I entered the study to find a white candle melted into a puddle of wax on my writing desk, alongside the candle lay a journal of mine, opened many pages deep with pen still drawn from quill, holding the place of the last entry. As I crept upon the sight, a since of delirium and fright cradled me as I was now looking upon the very spectacle which I had left just before waking from my dream! It was no dream! it was not a dream?
“No you imbecile, it was not a dream!”
“Who said that!?”
“I did!”
“Who!?”
“You really are a dense one aren’t you?”
“I’m no such, who Is speaking to me?”
“Tis yourself, perhaps beginning to suffer from ah… amentia.”
“Who dare hurl such an insult, show yourself, I’ll have you arrested, or worse!”
“The face has shown all our life, dear self.”
This inexplicable bemusement sustained itself for some minutes before I claimed focus on the reflection of a distant mirror of which I stood opposite.
No, no no, this isn’t happening, I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart. I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart. I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart. I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart.
Of course it wasn’t a dream, I knew all too well that this was very real, very real indeed. I crept to and sat in my rocking chair next to the fire place full of ashes, revealing many cold nights in the recent past of which I had been up most hours of the night, studying. I stared into the nothingness that the room became, the candle, the pen, the cigar box, of which that ghastly character must have sat just to the left. My sight grew hazy and everything in my sight lost their edges and began to bleed together.
I began to remember random verses of what was spoken to me to write, I remember the flicker of light upon his pale, encroaching face, I remember the stench of his presence while looking past him to the window, wishing for childhood once more. After a brief period of shock, while my mind settled, teetering on the borders of disbelief and defeated logic, I stood up, paced away, turned and then once again approached the desk, sat in my chair and began to read carefully the nervously handwritten chapters of life that were yet to live. I flipped the pages back to the first, and read, as it was written, in chronological order the entries. It was as if each next page was a window boasting drawn curtains, clear for the peering through to a new world of destitute, abrasive, degenerate existence. If there was to be a life impoverished and hidden by prosperity, these entries were of that life.
Of those writings, I was clearly a dweller, but not in the sense that many written of were. This visitation had been something of a blessing to me; it had rid me of that torment I spoke of in my journal entry! It was then that all of those ‘pieces’ of life had come together in a divine coordination to me; I had feasted my eyes upon the very blue prints of a purpose in all ways superior to any I could serve here, now, alive.
*********************************************
So it is, in my cell I sit perched upon my cot reminiscing the last several days, It has caused me to be most attentive as I pertain to the future that I now have made complete sense of the past few years of my life leading up to this event. Many diverge from the conversation of roaming spirits inhabiting this earth bodiless. Many a time, myself have I dismissed the notion as a fantastical delusion dreamed up of those gone mad. I must divulge my intimate most thoughts though upon the fact, now having met more than once with such a profoundly terrifying creature such as did visit me. My visions have employed my mind to establish an ever-definitive purpose that I shall serve, not in this life perhaps, yet in this existence.
The chimes sound when the storm approaches, until then they are only heard faintly carried with the subtle wind measures beyond our means away. Know now, the wind is blowing vehemently! This town is quaint and peculiarly settled, but a storm is rising up to devour the minds of those of purity as was mine and also the spirit whom I have referred to as the messenger. We have fallen pray to endlessly unscrupulous acts of hatred, each in our own time of tangibility to others.
I face death within the hour now, and it is said that our eyes become opened the widest just before we leave this body, this earth. Many would say I was a madman. Few, those who understood the levity of my disposition and the gravity of my hurt, would assert that it was in jealous rage followed by mild lunacy, still yet other critics of my abrasive organ would suggest my rearing was of questionable nature.
I write this now to let it be known, the truth follows no such discrepant notion. For those who hold me yet in reproach, allow me to advocate a free life, here on earth, in this human form you so fervently covet and let your mistakes run rampant and see where your fate falls, then we will speak of right and wrong and who will lay blame. For now my house will belong to the bank, my personal affects burned, Zurich will stray from his home only to be seen prancing about the streets in the early hours of the morning. My family will mourn, friends will become disconnected from the incident in all possible ways and my body will slumber in the cemetery half way down Craven St. in a plot strangely close to that of Amelia’s. But know that I will ever be following my commission from this flaming light that has already begun to consume my being, among you.
When I awoke, I could hear someone knocking on my door frantically, with each bout of knocking there seemed to be less and less time between attempts at knocking down my door. I hadn’t the slightest idea of who would be calling on me on a Tuesday morning. As I neared the door to exit my bed quarters, I was met with a crippling pain in my stomach; it was as if I hadn’t eaten in days! I know I had an exhausting night coupled with an exhausting nightmare, but why do I feel as though I’ve been starved? Not to mention the persistent pain on my leg, perhaps in my plunge onto that shrubbery I had sustained a minor injury; maybe a branch had cut me. As I stumbled to the door, the knocking got louder, quicker and I became more irritated, after all I was in a very deep sleep. When I swung the door open I filled my lungs with air so that I could relay most definitely my utter dismay to whoever would dare disturb me at such a random, nonsensical time.
Ms. Vanderbreght! Dear god, what do I have to endure now? Why could it not have been some traveling salesman? It had to be this dreaded woman.”Yes Ms. Vanderbreght?”
“I’m hear for yer weekly cleanin’ ya know”
“But isn’t it a little early in the week for you to be cleaning? I understood our agreement to be that I would pay you after each cleaning which would be undertaken each Thursday from nine A.M. until noon, is that not what we agreed on?"
“Why, I believe you’re correct by sayin’ such and I believe I’m correct by showin’ up on yer doorstep at just such a time, now if it ain’t gonna be too much of an imposition, I’ll just be keeping my part of the agreement, that is if you’ll be lettin’ me in.”
A pushy old hag she was, one of those individuals just a bit to far into their own realm to see the danger just outside of it. I both pitied and despised this old woman for being such an individual. Annoying it was, annoying indeed. She would have been such a sweet old lady had she only kept her annoying, big, ignorant mouth shut! Wait! Why was she so insistent on being here if it weren’t Thursday morning at the hour of nine? Nine A.M., perhaps, but on Thursday, impossible!
“Ms. Vanderbreght, I must insist, come back Thursday, this house needs no attention of yours, besides I’m sure you’ve plenty of cleanings to tend to, I’ll see you bright and early on Thursday, good day Ms. Vanderbreght”
“Hold your tongue young man, I don’t know what manner of joke you believe to be pullin’ on me but I haven’t time fer it this mornin, I’ve lots to get done today”
No! It was Thursday after all! As she negotiated her hobbling mass of a body through the doorway she handed me the paper that she always agreed to bring so that I was at least sure to know of the happenings in the town ONE day of the week. An unnerving sensation chiseled it’s way through my entire being as I read the date of the day’s paper; I had been asleep for over two days! No wonder I am famished, and what about this curious pain on my leg?
I escaped to my quarters where she was forbid by me to ever enter to inspect my leg while the old buxom hag scuffled her way through my home. As I shed my trousers and sat on my bed I laid my eyes on a deep flesh wound that was very recent, but around the wound was the sight of burned flesh. This, make no mistake, was a mark of hell’s fire! The guide had left his mark upon me as well, that was no nightmare conjured up by a guilty conscious nor was it some dark fantasy realized by a man slipping away into madness! That was a real place and a real visitation. I had escaped the linear pace of time to discover my fretting of the manifestation of my hatred toward Amelia was all in vein.
No, this simply could not be! Surely that was a rather haunting dream, indeed, but so many things could have caused this flesh wound the night of my action, I was so fueled by a passion constructed of revenge through hate that my natural feelings of reality, skewed as they were could have easily left this gash undetected. No, this was simply a mistake on my part, a painful one, but not one that could deduce completely that I was the culprit of the happenings of the evening.
I changed my clothes and headed back out to prepare my breakfast. I now had to pretend that I had nothing to do with Andrea’s demise, that I have been buried in my work and that I was NOT running from the scene as Ms. Vanderbreght let out that blood-curdling scream of shock.
“Well, Ms. Vanderbreght, it seems I owe you an apology, I’ve been so overcome with work I had lost track of the day.”
“I see then young man, so it may not be so far fetched a thing that you have not heard of the poor girl being murdered in her own house?”
“My dear, ma’am whoever do you mean? Murdered, in this town?"
“Oh yes, it was that young beauty Andrea, the girl whom you used to call on, I just hate to be the bearer of bad news, but…”
“Oh don’t you blame yourself Ms. Vanderbreght” I exclaimed over her voice as she began to choke up. “That’s a most terrible thing to happen, terrible indeed, but you mustn’t be concerned with my feelings, that girl and I had come to a mutual understanding and have long since parted ways, and as It is with any existence, as precious as they may be people will come and go, out of both your life and theirs, at one point. Do know, I whole-heartedly agree, that is quite the tragedy though! This town? Such a young woman! Beautiful she was, inside and out, I must say through my experience."
“Young man you DO speak the truth, it is just as well, I have to be cleanin now. It’s just, just that, well…”
“Yes Mrs. Vanderbreght?"
“Well, I found her layin’ there, musta been not long at all after the evil deed. Found her layin’ with throat slit and face all cut open and her hair wasn’t even golden anymore. You would probably think me of Ill mind but she was, she…"
Mrs. Vanderbreght began to choke up even more and studder as she bowed her head as to hide the embarrassed, pudgy face, almost as if she were ashamed of some thought she’d had.
“Mrs. Vanderbreght, you must confess, what is it you mean to say, I shall not judge you if it is odd.”
The first four words were whispered softly and drawn out with an end as the last three began, loudly and as haunting as the whole experience until now had been-
… still beautiful layin’ there, in bloody repose!”
As she uttered those last two words, still in shock and fear,she looked at the ground for a long spell, I assume to escape the physical confines of my home by looking on once more in her mind to the mental images that had most assuredly been seared into her mind before returning to her work.
In my usual taciturn manner, at least, as it is with the old woman, I left her without words and retired to my library to process the past few days’ happenings.
I felt a compelling force bring to my attention one instance of my vision that I’d failed to recount. It wasn’t just that I had not recounted the experience, but that I could only vaguely recall its occurrence. This vexed me to an extreme degree. It was as if the underlying motive of some seemingly irrational but extravagant display of madness was lost in the translation from subconscious to the conscious state of mind, therefore losing significance, which was associated to all of those imperative details that I so lacked.
After breakfast, I ventured back to the quiet recesses of my bedroom. I thumbed around aimlessly in my journal, which was always kept at bedside. I discovered an entry that I had written several months before and had I not been disconcerted from the week, I may have not been of the mind to fiddle through my things in so random a fashion.
“I must concede, the longer I dwell on the recent happenings of my life and my life in general, the more it has become clear to me that my dabbling in dark things has taken over my life and also my will for what I seek to become an avatar of my existence, never more than now have I desired my life to serve as admonishment to mankind in regard to the manner in which one would treat another as well as something more, [that ‘something’ more, I cannot name at this time, for it is but an elusive entity lurking within me that has yet to reveal its full self and this, since childhood, has left me in torment.]
I admit, it has been far more than a dabbling and also, at times, I feel regret approaching the mind and the only way to stave off its force is to revisit such crude memories as Amelia, or perhaps other sad events in my life that invoke similar feelings. I would not be entirely accurate in saying I have reached a point where I peer backward through time and crave the ignorance I once had for this practice, likely because I cannot ignore my adeptness in this art. Although I do wish to proceed, perhaps this notion will not be so casual a one in days to come.
When I reflect upon my childhood, I am able still to recall those nefarious visions from below, is it so that every child sees these things and dreams in such morbid detail and so becomes infatuated with the dark corridor of a life made by the curiosity of death and all that abound? Surely not, but just as surely as I had made light of these facts of myself as a boy, I would have been stricken with shame; left with a stigma; condemned by the very same man that I, myself am; sentenced to a life, or subordinate form of existence by the very same curious, self-righteous heathen of which I walk alongside the earth each day.
This quandary leaves me in wonder for what I may achieve while following this path and also what destruction may lie ahead. Alas, as permanent as I would wish this comfortable life to be, I also cannot help but give mind to the possibility that there are worlds beyond that cause one to do things for a reason, regardless of whether they are right or wrong in this world.
So the question is, which is of more importance and is that importance to contend with a present happiness?”
I sat back and sunk deep into my reading chair, it was as if pieces of a puzzle began to come together in revealing the purpose for my existence. Many fulfill their purpose or purposes in this life, some I believe, do not. Where does that leave me?
I am finding that there are few things able to be experienced in this life more powerful than a pure faith in knowing for what purpose one exists. I, obviously had written this passage, and read it to myself before, although this time it carried some inexplicable form of authority; a message that I had not intended upon writing it to convey, rather it was more of a verse of mental illiteracy vomited uncoordinatedly onto paper. Now though, now this had proved to be a piece of my mind that struck a light illuminating a whole world I’d been treading upon since my birth, but only now have I realized the fullness of such an existence.
Through the course of my pondering, it had become clear to me that most, if not all of those whom I dwelt with on this earth were in fact not sitting, contemplating what mental tools to use in an order to fully grasp what I presently was and most likely had not and would not do so. Perhaps my vanity had afforded me a full fairy ride into a hallowed land of madness, or perhaps I was more right than ever I could have been in life.
It seems more clear as the days, no, as the hours pass, that I carry some divine task on my shoulders but still I cannot see my way to understand in full faculty what it is. And what of that curious dream I dreamt?
At that, I scurried into my study to jot down some of the thoughts already becoming tangled in my mind.
When I turned the corner to the left from the short hallway dividing several rooms of my house, I entered the study to find a white candle melted into a puddle of wax on my writing desk, alongside the candle lay a journal of mine, opened many pages deep with pen still drawn from quill, holding the place of the last entry. As I crept upon the sight, a since of delirium and fright cradled me as I was now looking upon the very spectacle which I had left just before waking from my dream! It was no dream! it was not a dream?
“No you imbecile, it was not a dream!”
“Who said that!?”
“I did!”
“Who!?”
“You really are a dense one aren’t you?”
“I’m no such, who Is speaking to me?”
“Tis yourself, perhaps beginning to suffer from ah… amentia.”
“Who dare hurl such an insult, show yourself, I’ll have you arrested, or worse!”
“The face has shown all our life, dear self.”
This inexplicable bemusement sustained itself for some minutes before I claimed focus on the reflection of a distant mirror of which I stood opposite.
No, no no, this isn’t happening, I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart. I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart. I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart. I am of sound mind, strong will and pure of heart.
Of course it wasn’t a dream, I knew all too well that this was very real, very real indeed. I crept to and sat in my rocking chair next to the fire place full of ashes, revealing many cold nights in the recent past of which I had been up most hours of the night, studying. I stared into the nothingness that the room became, the candle, the pen, the cigar box, of which that ghastly character must have sat just to the left. My sight grew hazy and everything in my sight lost their edges and began to bleed together.
I began to remember random verses of what was spoken to me to write, I remember the flicker of light upon his pale, encroaching face, I remember the stench of his presence while looking past him to the window, wishing for childhood once more. After a brief period of shock, while my mind settled, teetering on the borders of disbelief and defeated logic, I stood up, paced away, turned and then once again approached the desk, sat in my chair and began to read carefully the nervously handwritten chapters of life that were yet to live. I flipped the pages back to the first, and read, as it was written, in chronological order the entries. It was as if each next page was a window boasting drawn curtains, clear for the peering through to a new world of destitute, abrasive, degenerate existence. If there was to be a life impoverished and hidden by prosperity, these entries were of that life.
Of those writings, I was clearly a dweller, but not in the sense that many written of were. This visitation had been something of a blessing to me; it had rid me of that torment I spoke of in my journal entry! It was then that all of those ‘pieces’ of life had come together in a divine coordination to me; I had feasted my eyes upon the very blue prints of a purpose in all ways superior to any I could serve here, now, alive.
*********************************************
So it is, in my cell I sit perched upon my cot reminiscing the last several days, It has caused me to be most attentive as I pertain to the future that I now have made complete sense of the past few years of my life leading up to this event. Many diverge from the conversation of roaming spirits inhabiting this earth bodiless. Many a time, myself have I dismissed the notion as a fantastical delusion dreamed up of those gone mad. I must divulge my intimate most thoughts though upon the fact, now having met more than once with such a profoundly terrifying creature such as did visit me. My visions have employed my mind to establish an ever-definitive purpose that I shall serve, not in this life perhaps, yet in this existence.
The chimes sound when the storm approaches, until then they are only heard faintly carried with the subtle wind measures beyond our means away. Know now, the wind is blowing vehemently! This town is quaint and peculiarly settled, but a storm is rising up to devour the minds of those of purity as was mine and also the spirit whom I have referred to as the messenger. We have fallen pray to endlessly unscrupulous acts of hatred, each in our own time of tangibility to others.
I face death within the hour now, and it is said that our eyes become opened the widest just before we leave this body, this earth. Many would say I was a madman. Few, those who understood the levity of my disposition and the gravity of my hurt, would assert that it was in jealous rage followed by mild lunacy, still yet other critics of my abrasive organ would suggest my rearing was of questionable nature.
I write this now to let it be known, the truth follows no such discrepant notion. For those who hold me yet in reproach, allow me to advocate a free life, here on earth, in this human form you so fervently covet and let your mistakes run rampant and see where your fate falls, then we will speak of right and wrong and who will lay blame. For now my house will belong to the bank, my personal affects burned, Zurich will stray from his home only to be seen prancing about the streets in the early hours of the morning. My family will mourn, friends will become disconnected from the incident in all possible ways and my body will slumber in the cemetery half way down Craven St. in a plot strangely close to that of Amelia’s. But know that I will ever be following my commission from this flaming light that has already begun to consume my being, among you.
The Tale Of A Violet Mind
Part III- Dreamscape. The Friend In Waiting
The morning light shot through the window and seeped inside between the sills and the drawn curtains that were a beautiful, deep, maroon color, almost matching my sleeve from the stains of the night before. The clock rang out eight bells for the hour of morning. Startled, I rose to my feet with a very strange inner calmness I should not have felt, at least not without feeling a bit sinister as well. Though I did not.
I once again gathered my belongings, attempted to straighten myself up and hastily walked to the stairwell. As I mentioned, we humans are such curious things, but I dare not procrastinate any longer. I had already over stayed by several hours, just as I stepped in front of the stairs to leave I heard a knock on the door below. I froze in place. It was my worst fear realized, Ms. Vanderbreght was here to clean. But did she have a key? No! Amelia wouldn’t trust that snoopy old quack with a key to her own home, but would she? With nowhere to run, I crept back a few steps as to be out of site completely from the door and watched anxiously that cold iron doorknob. “She doesn’t have a key, I know she doesn’t. She’ll have to come back later, after I’ve had time to do something about all of this. She’s leaving now isn’t she? Of course she is! Yes, go home Ms. Vanderbreght, you stupid old bird. Go be about someone else’s privacy, peddle another’s business for a cup of hot coffee just as I see you do, endlessly.” Though this old woman had done me no harm directly, she was quite liberal in making assumptions about my drawn curtains during the day and organ playing in the evening.
I heard the knock again, louder and longer this time. As if she was already growing tiresome. Indeed she would be leaving soon. And then, after another long silence, to my terror, I heard a jingling of keys. That ignorant woman had given Ms. Vanderbreght a key alas! She stuck it into the keyhole and commenced to turn the key, as she did this I could only watch in agony, feeling as though I had laid out the most extravagant trap and placed myself in the midst of it. No! That would have been better, then, I would know the workings of said trap and therefore know my way through. No, this trap was iron clad. I was a deaf man in a labyrinth of foreign language. The jingling stopped, the key was pulled from the keyhole. Then turned the black doorknob. “oh my god” I thought, what was I to do? Where could I hide? Surely the sight of this all would cause her to faint, cause her to flee or at least stun her long enough for me to make my escape. What has this become? I creep into this house as a predator and run from it as prey? Oh, how demeaning!
As the door opens and she steps inside with a glance up the stairs I can do nothing but feel my body tingle as I start to lose consciousness. She began up the stairs, slowly but just as sure as there was a bloody corpse in the next room, she was nearing me, and at once an idea! The window! The open window that I so hurriedly attempted to leap from the night before was still opened! She had several steps left, but was not more than ten feet from me. She was looking down now managing those narrow little steps; this was my very last chance of escape. I had to take it. As she was halfway up the stairs, I ran across the top of the stairwell, over toward the window and now had to squeeze my body out of it and shut it before she ascended the last 8 stairs. I did this by sitting out on the ledge of the window facing the house with my legs still inside, then, one leg stepped up onto the ledge where I sat while I held on to the window that I felt was going to come loose the whole time, after all, these windows were not made for murderous madmen to clime out of each morning. Maybe this window would afford me just one morning.
As I stepped my second foot out onto the ledge and steadied in a squatting position, I promised the window it would be only this once, movement caught my eye from inside, it was Ms. Vanderbreght’s gray head of hair ascending the stairs, she only had a few more to go! With a deep breath, I gripped the window tightly and as I dropped from the ledge I pulled it down as far as I could without slamming it shut. Of course, at the speed my body dropped, this was not an easy task. I hit the bush with more force than I thought possible from a second story drop. I broke most of the branches yet the plant kept it’s form while I broke no bones. It had indeed lent me a hand in my getaway.
I sped through the backyard and through the walkway, passing her garden. As I drew close to the street I heard a blood-curdling scream. Undoubtedly, it was that of Ms. Vanderbreght. “Dear me!” Had I forgotten my tools after all? Did I just put myself through that agony only to be caught? How ridiculous! I felt my wrist for that blade and was still there. I stopped and felt my boot for the Lister knife, oh dear, it was there as well. I thought I must have been going insane. What a pathetic understatement that is. I murder my one true love and then walk home questioning my sanity.
Well, maybe I should question such a notion. It may be a bit outlandish after all. I had spent many days, many nights deciding whether or not to follow through with my plot, spent many lonely times recounting her sheer wickedness in what she did to me. How many times did I count that she had lied to me about Albert? It was too many, far too many. How long were they involved with each other before that night when I made a fool of myself? Obviously long enough for he to place his ring on her finger. Perhaps I had gone to far by not letting my studies work for me. It was the Magick that delivered her dear Albert into the street on the same night those black stallions leading a carriage of politicians ran wild with rage and stomped him out. It was my foresight and became a reality. Maybe I should have left this work to my words and will as well. Regardless of what I should have done, what I HAVE done IS already done and I lack the know how to turn back time, at least for now.My mind ran unrelenting on my stroll home.
After I returned to my residence, I locked the doors, pulled all curtains not drawn, hid away in my sleeping quarters and laid on my bed to await the news. I found myself to be unremorseful; just the way that I was the night before. It was strange, almost as if all of my emotional energy had been drawn from me and I was emptied of any logic to ponder the happenings any further, at that I fell fast asleep. It had to be the deepest sleep I’d ever experienced.
As I lay in slumber, I fervently believe that I left my body in that pitch-dark room which was fixed in the front right corner of that rather spacious house which sat on the corner of Eden Avenue and 7th. I felt no rising of my soul, no glimpse of myself from the corner of the room, no loss of senses or gain of a second mind. I embarked on a journey that would, as I had come to find, show me much of the years to come, not only my years but also years beyond me and beyond those of even the youngest children in my time. This visitation was one of extreme insight, it was frightening, exhausting to the mind, yet I must say my will to believe what I had somehow been privy to was exceedingly unproblematic to except.
I sat in my reading chair, looking up through the window opposite of me I could see the moon light through the leaves of the trees that were hanging from the branches that draped over the north end of my house. It was a mostly clear night with thick, heavy clouds sporadically interrupting the bright reflection of the sun off of the moon.
The wind would blow, sending an ominous howl to caper around my home. As I was pondering what I was about to do, I heard raspy, and seemingly labored breathing, it grew louder as though something was making it’s way towards me. The sound was very odd and resembled that of a wounded animal and one of great size at that.
Suddenly, I spotted movement outside my window, but could not see anything that was not in the light of the moon. Still behind me, the gravely tone of breath grew even more loudly and I became a bit reluctant to stay in my study. After what has taken place so recently, I was quite on edge and was beginning to pass this off as perhaps delirium. I refocused my sight just beyond the window and squinted slightly to try once more at making out what the devil was outside my house. At once they came into the light of the moon.
A haunting! The breathing now all around me and rumbling deeply, stripping my courage down to the core, I turned in my chair to meet a most unearthly, hellish creature standing in front of me! It reeked of burned hair and flesh; a stench that caused vomit to spew from my mouth and nostrils the very second it drew near enough to affect me. I fell to my knees in dizziness. Frightened, I leaned back, elbows resting on my chair, I propped myself upward and at an angle so as to face the apparition, vomit sodden on my front. This being was not of imposing stature, but rather bore imposing features, those of a human, but not of this world.
His face struck a fear in me that I had never felt, not on my loneliest of nights, nor in my darkest, the essence of my nightmares would cower to he and I dare say that even the most senseless beast would suddenly know his place upon sight of this, this thing. He stood no taller than I, in fact, if I were to wager I would say my exact height. As I said, he was of no extraordinary stature, most probably of my exact measurements; we could have probably shared a wardrobe. Although, that is where we differed.
His manner of clothing was a mixture of those seen only in paintings with other fashions of the queerest form. He wore a robust cloak draped over a hard, shell-like, close fitting vest with full-length sleeves. The vest had shoulder pads made of what looked like iron and stretched far out past his shoulders several inches with large tassels, one hanging from each shoulder pad. The vest had buttons aligned down the front and on each side of the torso. On the sides, the buttons ran from just under the arm down to the waistline. The buttons in front ran from the neckline all the way to the very bottom of the vest, which came to a sharp point in front of the pants he wore, which were also quite curious. They were extremely form fitting, the leg tapered down to a pair of colonial styled boots fastened in front by one large golden buckle and elevated by a heel in back with a pointed toe. Eight of his ten digits were adorned with silver and onyx rings. His skin was a deathly pale, pale to the extent that one could make out a vascular system beneath the thin, cold skin, blue veins running wild all over the visible surface of the body. The hair was white with hints of blue, as well from the veins on the head, but eyebrows as black as the experience I was nigh upon having. The face bore no nose, only a gapping hole; the ridges outlining the hole were jagged, resembling a flesh wound by design of a bluntly sided carving instrument. Fleshy fibers of the face lay exposed near it. With sharp features and gray teeth, he cast a gaze upon me and caressed me with a fear that only my own gaze the night before could liken.
Before I could speak, or even know what to say in any astute manner, he opened his mouth and with black saliva soaking his teeth and tongue, lips and gums, spoke to me in what seemed to be occasional rhyme, as that of a poet attempting to reclaim a flare for his passion that was birthed, or rebirthed mind I, out of something most unworldly.
“Upon thy wrath have I road to thee, save delay. We two have nobbut an reason to dwell dolven in waning existence and it will be writ up on the doors of all days for every ear to hear and have spake and to pray away those ominous things, which were spirits down yon. Ye hath not what vision wilt compel thee on to netherworlds, though erelong will I bring ye unto a straightened path unscathed by yon dissention, he that dwells upon the stallion of great stride. Also doeth he dwell upon where the watcher sits, does hunger for thine soul and flesh and to feed with voracious appetite on ye heart.
For I do not cozen thee, you, in good company shall see through thine eyes a journey of demise, that of a world so pure, which doeth end not needlessly, but doeth give way to a greater thing. Come, hasten ye pace, for centuries have cradled I to thine slumber, ye time is nigh, in the gloam of this eve, we shall tarry no longer. T’was I, of baneful madness whom did taint the world before thee, the world of which I was begotten and so was cast to grimness of rasp in the soul as to and did show a will and a way, t’was the end of a life what did drown me in discord but here ye, know, t’is I to stay. Be ye keen to thy greatest need, thou wilt do as I say”
As I sat kneeling, still perched back on my chair while this ghastly orator spoke, standing with a cane carved from bone to a sharp point clutching in his right hand, it became clear to me I was indeed in the presence of a rare being. One who may bestow upon me the clearest yet understanding of an ever-apocalyptic nature this earth was beginning to conjure upon its once beautiful surface. It was upon that last sentence that I knew, whether fate or merely my careless hand had, in some way thrust me into a realm that would tear me quickly away from this life, or my way of life, as I knew it.This ghastly shadow of a man proceeded in instructing me to write a series of proclamations for him. These proclamations were of a very sinister sort. As he would recite, myself would write them down. He spoke of some of the most terrifying and horrific acts I could ever imagine being committed by we humans! He dictated to me exact dates, names, physical features of individuals in astonishing depth and clarity and urged me to maintain as much detail in my journal as he in speaking and so I did.
After many hours I became weary, hungry, thirsty for water, thirsty for sleep, thirsty for fresh air, but to no avail he prodded me along, quite literally in fact. As I began to waver and fall off to sleep, he would raise that crudely shaped cane and jab my leg with wrath like force as if to convey his disgust for my need of rest.
It was in the beginning that i remained excited; eager, hanging to every next word that sputtered out of the death infected mouth of the queer messenger, but it would not be long before I struggled to hold my head at an upright angle. My neck tingled with pain, tightness of my musculature overwhelmed me, my hand cramped as if It had altogether revolted against me, I could no longer deceive neither he, nor myself that my mind had wondered on to another path, one that lead nowhere, but at the same time lead my belief to a falsehood, selling my trust on the idea of food, water and rest.
This was a journey indeed. As I sat in my study writing what seemed to be a book of some overtly hellish future, he had by now perched up on my desk as an eagle might aside a cliff, waiting for me to desist once more with that now bloody point of a cane resting just to the left of my writing hand. I could not tell one how long this ledgering episode lasted, I only knew that I was exhausted, famished and began to experience extreme dizziness.
With the last passage entered, he bid me a farewell and gave me much reason to expect his presence again sometime in the near future. At that he seemingly dematerialized from my study. I felt my body moving on a horizontal plain, even though I was in fact sitting opposite of that, vertically.
This was, with no doubt in my heart, the most vivid and most inexplicable dream I could or would ever have.
Ever.
The morning light shot through the window and seeped inside between the sills and the drawn curtains that were a beautiful, deep, maroon color, almost matching my sleeve from the stains of the night before. The clock rang out eight bells for the hour of morning. Startled, I rose to my feet with a very strange inner calmness I should not have felt, at least not without feeling a bit sinister as well. Though I did not.
I once again gathered my belongings, attempted to straighten myself up and hastily walked to the stairwell. As I mentioned, we humans are such curious things, but I dare not procrastinate any longer. I had already over stayed by several hours, just as I stepped in front of the stairs to leave I heard a knock on the door below. I froze in place. It was my worst fear realized, Ms. Vanderbreght was here to clean. But did she have a key? No! Amelia wouldn’t trust that snoopy old quack with a key to her own home, but would she? With nowhere to run, I crept back a few steps as to be out of site completely from the door and watched anxiously that cold iron doorknob. “She doesn’t have a key, I know she doesn’t. She’ll have to come back later, after I’ve had time to do something about all of this. She’s leaving now isn’t she? Of course she is! Yes, go home Ms. Vanderbreght, you stupid old bird. Go be about someone else’s privacy, peddle another’s business for a cup of hot coffee just as I see you do, endlessly.” Though this old woman had done me no harm directly, she was quite liberal in making assumptions about my drawn curtains during the day and organ playing in the evening.
I heard the knock again, louder and longer this time. As if she was already growing tiresome. Indeed she would be leaving soon. And then, after another long silence, to my terror, I heard a jingling of keys. That ignorant woman had given Ms. Vanderbreght a key alas! She stuck it into the keyhole and commenced to turn the key, as she did this I could only watch in agony, feeling as though I had laid out the most extravagant trap and placed myself in the midst of it. No! That would have been better, then, I would know the workings of said trap and therefore know my way through. No, this trap was iron clad. I was a deaf man in a labyrinth of foreign language. The jingling stopped, the key was pulled from the keyhole. Then turned the black doorknob. “oh my god” I thought, what was I to do? Where could I hide? Surely the sight of this all would cause her to faint, cause her to flee or at least stun her long enough for me to make my escape. What has this become? I creep into this house as a predator and run from it as prey? Oh, how demeaning!
As the door opens and she steps inside with a glance up the stairs I can do nothing but feel my body tingle as I start to lose consciousness. She began up the stairs, slowly but just as sure as there was a bloody corpse in the next room, she was nearing me, and at once an idea! The window! The open window that I so hurriedly attempted to leap from the night before was still opened! She had several steps left, but was not more than ten feet from me. She was looking down now managing those narrow little steps; this was my very last chance of escape. I had to take it. As she was halfway up the stairs, I ran across the top of the stairwell, over toward the window and now had to squeeze my body out of it and shut it before she ascended the last 8 stairs. I did this by sitting out on the ledge of the window facing the house with my legs still inside, then, one leg stepped up onto the ledge where I sat while I held on to the window that I felt was going to come loose the whole time, after all, these windows were not made for murderous madmen to clime out of each morning. Maybe this window would afford me just one morning.
As I stepped my second foot out onto the ledge and steadied in a squatting position, I promised the window it would be only this once, movement caught my eye from inside, it was Ms. Vanderbreght’s gray head of hair ascending the stairs, she only had a few more to go! With a deep breath, I gripped the window tightly and as I dropped from the ledge I pulled it down as far as I could without slamming it shut. Of course, at the speed my body dropped, this was not an easy task. I hit the bush with more force than I thought possible from a second story drop. I broke most of the branches yet the plant kept it’s form while I broke no bones. It had indeed lent me a hand in my getaway.
I sped through the backyard and through the walkway, passing her garden. As I drew close to the street I heard a blood-curdling scream. Undoubtedly, it was that of Ms. Vanderbreght. “Dear me!” Had I forgotten my tools after all? Did I just put myself through that agony only to be caught? How ridiculous! I felt my wrist for that blade and was still there. I stopped and felt my boot for the Lister knife, oh dear, it was there as well. I thought I must have been going insane. What a pathetic understatement that is. I murder my one true love and then walk home questioning my sanity.
Well, maybe I should question such a notion. It may be a bit outlandish after all. I had spent many days, many nights deciding whether or not to follow through with my plot, spent many lonely times recounting her sheer wickedness in what she did to me. How many times did I count that she had lied to me about Albert? It was too many, far too many. How long were they involved with each other before that night when I made a fool of myself? Obviously long enough for he to place his ring on her finger. Perhaps I had gone to far by not letting my studies work for me. It was the Magick that delivered her dear Albert into the street on the same night those black stallions leading a carriage of politicians ran wild with rage and stomped him out. It was my foresight and became a reality. Maybe I should have left this work to my words and will as well. Regardless of what I should have done, what I HAVE done IS already done and I lack the know how to turn back time, at least for now.My mind ran unrelenting on my stroll home.
After I returned to my residence, I locked the doors, pulled all curtains not drawn, hid away in my sleeping quarters and laid on my bed to await the news. I found myself to be unremorseful; just the way that I was the night before. It was strange, almost as if all of my emotional energy had been drawn from me and I was emptied of any logic to ponder the happenings any further, at that I fell fast asleep. It had to be the deepest sleep I’d ever experienced.
As I lay in slumber, I fervently believe that I left my body in that pitch-dark room which was fixed in the front right corner of that rather spacious house which sat on the corner of Eden Avenue and 7th. I felt no rising of my soul, no glimpse of myself from the corner of the room, no loss of senses or gain of a second mind. I embarked on a journey that would, as I had come to find, show me much of the years to come, not only my years but also years beyond me and beyond those of even the youngest children in my time. This visitation was one of extreme insight, it was frightening, exhausting to the mind, yet I must say my will to believe what I had somehow been privy to was exceedingly unproblematic to except.
I sat in my reading chair, looking up through the window opposite of me I could see the moon light through the leaves of the trees that were hanging from the branches that draped over the north end of my house. It was a mostly clear night with thick, heavy clouds sporadically interrupting the bright reflection of the sun off of the moon.
The wind would blow, sending an ominous howl to caper around my home. As I was pondering what I was about to do, I heard raspy, and seemingly labored breathing, it grew louder as though something was making it’s way towards me. The sound was very odd and resembled that of a wounded animal and one of great size at that.
Suddenly, I spotted movement outside my window, but could not see anything that was not in the light of the moon. Still behind me, the gravely tone of breath grew even more loudly and I became a bit reluctant to stay in my study. After what has taken place so recently, I was quite on edge and was beginning to pass this off as perhaps delirium. I refocused my sight just beyond the window and squinted slightly to try once more at making out what the devil was outside my house. At once they came into the light of the moon.
A haunting! The breathing now all around me and rumbling deeply, stripping my courage down to the core, I turned in my chair to meet a most unearthly, hellish creature standing in front of me! It reeked of burned hair and flesh; a stench that caused vomit to spew from my mouth and nostrils the very second it drew near enough to affect me. I fell to my knees in dizziness. Frightened, I leaned back, elbows resting on my chair, I propped myself upward and at an angle so as to face the apparition, vomit sodden on my front. This being was not of imposing stature, but rather bore imposing features, those of a human, but not of this world.
His face struck a fear in me that I had never felt, not on my loneliest of nights, nor in my darkest, the essence of my nightmares would cower to he and I dare say that even the most senseless beast would suddenly know his place upon sight of this, this thing. He stood no taller than I, in fact, if I were to wager I would say my exact height. As I said, he was of no extraordinary stature, most probably of my exact measurements; we could have probably shared a wardrobe. Although, that is where we differed.
His manner of clothing was a mixture of those seen only in paintings with other fashions of the queerest form. He wore a robust cloak draped over a hard, shell-like, close fitting vest with full-length sleeves. The vest had shoulder pads made of what looked like iron and stretched far out past his shoulders several inches with large tassels, one hanging from each shoulder pad. The vest had buttons aligned down the front and on each side of the torso. On the sides, the buttons ran from just under the arm down to the waistline. The buttons in front ran from the neckline all the way to the very bottom of the vest, which came to a sharp point in front of the pants he wore, which were also quite curious. They were extremely form fitting, the leg tapered down to a pair of colonial styled boots fastened in front by one large golden buckle and elevated by a heel in back with a pointed toe. Eight of his ten digits were adorned with silver and onyx rings. His skin was a deathly pale, pale to the extent that one could make out a vascular system beneath the thin, cold skin, blue veins running wild all over the visible surface of the body. The hair was white with hints of blue, as well from the veins on the head, but eyebrows as black as the experience I was nigh upon having. The face bore no nose, only a gapping hole; the ridges outlining the hole were jagged, resembling a flesh wound by design of a bluntly sided carving instrument. Fleshy fibers of the face lay exposed near it. With sharp features and gray teeth, he cast a gaze upon me and caressed me with a fear that only my own gaze the night before could liken.
Before I could speak, or even know what to say in any astute manner, he opened his mouth and with black saliva soaking his teeth and tongue, lips and gums, spoke to me in what seemed to be occasional rhyme, as that of a poet attempting to reclaim a flare for his passion that was birthed, or rebirthed mind I, out of something most unworldly.
“Upon thy wrath have I road to thee, save delay. We two have nobbut an reason to dwell dolven in waning existence and it will be writ up on the doors of all days for every ear to hear and have spake and to pray away those ominous things, which were spirits down yon. Ye hath not what vision wilt compel thee on to netherworlds, though erelong will I bring ye unto a straightened path unscathed by yon dissention, he that dwells upon the stallion of great stride. Also doeth he dwell upon where the watcher sits, does hunger for thine soul and flesh and to feed with voracious appetite on ye heart.
For I do not cozen thee, you, in good company shall see through thine eyes a journey of demise, that of a world so pure, which doeth end not needlessly, but doeth give way to a greater thing. Come, hasten ye pace, for centuries have cradled I to thine slumber, ye time is nigh, in the gloam of this eve, we shall tarry no longer. T’was I, of baneful madness whom did taint the world before thee, the world of which I was begotten and so was cast to grimness of rasp in the soul as to and did show a will and a way, t’was the end of a life what did drown me in discord but here ye, know, t’is I to stay. Be ye keen to thy greatest need, thou wilt do as I say”
As I sat kneeling, still perched back on my chair while this ghastly orator spoke, standing with a cane carved from bone to a sharp point clutching in his right hand, it became clear to me I was indeed in the presence of a rare being. One who may bestow upon me the clearest yet understanding of an ever-apocalyptic nature this earth was beginning to conjure upon its once beautiful surface. It was upon that last sentence that I knew, whether fate or merely my careless hand had, in some way thrust me into a realm that would tear me quickly away from this life, or my way of life, as I knew it.This ghastly shadow of a man proceeded in instructing me to write a series of proclamations for him. These proclamations were of a very sinister sort. As he would recite, myself would write them down. He spoke of some of the most terrifying and horrific acts I could ever imagine being committed by we humans! He dictated to me exact dates, names, physical features of individuals in astonishing depth and clarity and urged me to maintain as much detail in my journal as he in speaking and so I did.
After many hours I became weary, hungry, thirsty for water, thirsty for sleep, thirsty for fresh air, but to no avail he prodded me along, quite literally in fact. As I began to waver and fall off to sleep, he would raise that crudely shaped cane and jab my leg with wrath like force as if to convey his disgust for my need of rest.
It was in the beginning that i remained excited; eager, hanging to every next word that sputtered out of the death infected mouth of the queer messenger, but it would not be long before I struggled to hold my head at an upright angle. My neck tingled with pain, tightness of my musculature overwhelmed me, my hand cramped as if It had altogether revolted against me, I could no longer deceive neither he, nor myself that my mind had wondered on to another path, one that lead nowhere, but at the same time lead my belief to a falsehood, selling my trust on the idea of food, water and rest.
This was a journey indeed. As I sat in my study writing what seemed to be a book of some overtly hellish future, he had by now perched up on my desk as an eagle might aside a cliff, waiting for me to desist once more with that now bloody point of a cane resting just to the left of my writing hand. I could not tell one how long this ledgering episode lasted, I only knew that I was exhausted, famished and began to experience extreme dizziness.
With the last passage entered, he bid me a farewell and gave me much reason to expect his presence again sometime in the near future. At that he seemingly dematerialized from my study. I felt my body moving on a horizontal plain, even though I was in fact sitting opposite of that, vertically.
This was, with no doubt in my heart, the most vivid and most inexplicable dream I could or would ever have.
Ever.
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