The Great Morning

The great morning, alive and waking to the world. The mountain casts its silhouette over the city, hulking and mad, a smoking volcano waiting to erupt. Traffic goes back and forth with the frenetic speed of early risers waking late to run off to work and toil in meaningless symmetry with the dead-minded approach of gold and silver to cast their sarcophagi in ornate decoration, the only solace for a lifetime of slavery. I am alive in the morning, rising at seven before my usual hour of ten. I have slept off the night, dreamt strange dreams I no longer remember and am not sad they are gone, forgotten. I have the morning and the traffic and the old man walking by o the street trying to stay younger than death, but Death is old as time and waiting for him at the bottom of the stairs in the early hours of some evening, waiting like a patient, old friend at the bottom of the stairs for him to descend a little too quickly, missing the bottom step and plunging down and to his death. And Death stands there with a warm sardonic grin, saying, “Hello, old friend. I’ve been waiting for you a long time here at the bottom of the stairs.” And off they go, hand in hand towards the eternal dark awaiting us all. But today I am here and alive and watching the morning as though I were the Angel of Death come to take them all away; here I am waiting for the coffee to percolate, not waiting too long and taking my mug and replacing it under the thin spout of coffee shooting out of the machine to fill my mug and not spill too much. Here I am sipping piping hot coffee and smoking a cigarette like a raging volcano waiting to erupt. And that is what I am, a volcano waiting for the perfect moment to erupt my fury upon the unsuspecting crowd gathered below me to see why after centuries of quiet the thunder god should begin his rumblings all over again. The look on their faces as the lava rushes towards them is priceless, or rather worth the waiting and the toiling in mindless oblivion, working my arms and legs into a frenzied froth of sweat and blood for the sake of someone else. But now my arms and legs, my brain and my cock serve me and no one else—I am become the master of my own fate. And how poorly I manage it! How poorly I serve myself when for so long I have served faithfully and mindlessly for others. I must teach myself the honor and joy one finds in working for himself, must remember that I am no longer the slave of wages and hours, but the maker of my own system. I am become the volcano waiting for the right moment to erupt and spew myself over half the sky and all the world, choking the air black as night and thick as wolves. I am awake and alive, the very heart of the volcano come to life, waiting, waiting. And all the while, they come and go on the street in their shiny cars that define the color and contour of their souls traveling towards a destination they would rather not think about except in movies where the hero dies at the end of a long and grueling battle with the forces of evil, triumphant even in defeat. But they do not know that they are simply waiting for the chance to descend the stairs a little too quickly, waiting for the stairs to slip from under them on a quiet night with no pomp and certainly no circumstance. They are waiting for their death even though they rush too quickly into the arms of Death at an awkward hour and forgot to live while they toiled away the hours and spent their blood-stained gold on useless trinkets and fools’ paradises imagined by Mongoloid idiot recluses working hard to sell the world something it never needed and will never need. They rush too quickly into the arms of Death expecting Jesus or the Devil and finding only Death, calm and patient, a warm embrace compared to the cold certainty of oblivion. And I think of all the hours and all the days I spent in this mad rush towards something that did not exist, never existed but in dreams of dead men and fools who were promised something more than an empty grave for a bed and worms for neighbors. I am alive and sitting calmly watching the fools rush to and fro like ants. But ants have a more noble purpose, one they accept without the gold and certainty of religion men need in order to stave off the demons of doubt that descend upon them in the dead of night when the pastor is sleeping soundly like the fool he is in his bed, and the boss is toasting to the backs of his slaves who work for a pittance of what they are worth. It descends upon them from a dead sleep and they suddenly wake with a start and wonder what the loud noise was coming from the bottom of the stairs and so they jump out of bed and rush down to meet the intruder only to find Death lurking at the bottom of the stairs, his smile ever present on his face, a study in the virtue of patience. The great morning rises out of the clouds and warms my skin, blinding me, but I am alive and in love with the world even with all of its faults and fools, in love with the world and ready for the new day like a volcano that has begun to rumble and will soon erupt…