* The ocean was inky black, the black beyond dark matter and petroleum spills, when the only light was the faintest sliver of a moon in a starless sky; and everything was absence. This was the dream that kept recurring and he didn't know why. Black on black, uncanny, beautiful of course, in all its mystery and power, the vast sea, a distant shore, a profound lack. The chaos of the Bangkok streets, the busy stalls, the choking traffic, the crowds of office workers so heavy he had to step out on the road to pass their slow moving masses. That was the world he mostly inhabited. Yet it wasn't the world he really wanted. He wanted a different place, as if the beauty of the present was too much to bear without distorting and simplifying it with science fiction clichés. So instead there were times when he cycled back through former mistakes; and other times when the present situation seemed too perfect to bear. It was just that he wasn't used to things going well. Rather it had become a custom to stumble from crisis to crisis, to regroup just enough to survive and then to move on to the next appalling deconstruction, the next painful embarrassment, the next success which didn't feel like a success because inside he was so deeply hidden from the truth, so carefully tucked away, that nothing real would ever impose itself.
A History Never Written
A History Never Written
A History Never Written
* The ocean was inky black, the black beyond dark matter and petroleum spills, when the only light was the faintest sliver of a moon in a starless sky; and everything was absence. This was the dream that kept recurring and he didn't know why. Black on black, uncanny, beautiful of course, in all its mystery and power, the vast sea, a distant shore, a profound lack. The chaos of the Bangkok streets, the busy stalls, the choking traffic, the crowds of office workers so heavy he had to step out on the road to pass their slow moving masses. That was the world he mostly inhabited. Yet it wasn't the world he really wanted. He wanted a different place, as if the beauty of the present was too much to bear without distorting and simplifying it with science fiction clichés. So instead there were times when he cycled back through former mistakes; and other times when the present situation seemed too perfect to bear. It was just that he wasn't used to things going well. Rather it had become a custom to stumble from crisis to crisis, to regroup just enough to survive and then to move on to the next appalling deconstruction, the next painful embarrassment, the next success which didn't feel like a success because inside he was so deeply hidden from the truth, so carefully tucked away, that nothing real would ever impose itself.