Be it the night, be it a dream, be it the days of lonesome wandering or the nightmares of reality, be it the waking of the innocent lambs or the wondrously peaceful sleeping of children, be it the loving embrace or the callous hate, be it the kind gesture or malevolent grin, be it the sublime ecstasy of existence or the morbid decay of spasming mortal limbs, be it the truth or the lies, be it reality or hallucination, be it the crushing fear of death or the yearning for deeper life, be it the nights of stillness by secluded lakes thinking of nothing and everything or the harrowing days of bitter despair and grief, be it the gut-wrenching sorrow, the blood-curdling melancholy, the wretched horror or the beautiful fantasy, the exquisite wonder, the sensual comfort of a lover’s caress, be it the end of beauty or the beginning of truth, be it everything we ever wished for, or everything we ever feared, be it the terror of past trauma or the mesmerising delight of pleasures yet to come, be it everything, or nothing, or all that lies in between, be it lost lovers or old friends, it is but the stuff of dreams, not yet dreamt.
As though a demon were rising up within me, as if my very soul is to be vomited out of my eye sockets, as though the bucolic earth squelching beneath my naked feet is the soft ground into which my mind is tumbling, as if the looming oak trees – with their gnarled trunks and knotted roots piercing deep into the earth – were the rotting bones of ancient mythological creatures, as though the mud-spattered rags cloaking my hideous bony legs were dissolving onto my shivering skin, as if the smoke billowing atop lonesome chimneys in the grey light of an urban dusk was an omen prophesying our mortal doom, as if the fuzzy orange glow of a distant incandescent light was the shimmering reflection of a cosmic portal – of strange and surreal tunnels winding through time and space – leading to a mystical utopia of fantasy and illusion, as though the stars were a wondrous aurora of ecstasy raining gleefully down upon the desolate hills beyond the hazy horizon, I lay awake through the night mired in peculiar visions; as I gaze out of the frosty window beside my tender skull and the bitter wind howls and crashes into the derelict farmhouse buildings, as the serene moonlight dances in the night sky and bats swim through the air with fluttering wings and flickering tufts of fur upon their ears, as the open fire gently crackles – exuding a faint orange hue, that covers the furnishings in the room, like a warm blanket – and the glinting cogs in my mind churn on through the night, awaiting the solemn creeping rays of dawn’s first light and a cacophony of dissonant birdsong insidiously declaring victory over the mournful night.
How does it come to pass, that blissful ecstasy can so quickly turn to bitter despair? That a love, once pure and angelic, can decay into the rotten carcass of a sour fruit? That sublime beauty can be corroded, battered and mutilated, until the blinding lights of vision reveal only the rancid skeleton of horror itself? That the raging fires of a wild and tempestuous passion can wither and dull, leaving nothing but weary resentment? That the burning urges for adventure and revelation can so morbidly devolve into a sullen resignation to the cruel hands of fate and the mortal terror of time? That the innocent joy and unthinking compassion of the childlike mind, that once glistened with mysterious illumination and rhapsodic elation, can be stripped of its ethereal softness and cruelly beaten, by the iron boot of existential agony, into a bruised and pulpy mush of rage and fear? That the vast and sacred woodlands of mother earth – the amalgamation of an infinite array of moments, of cause and effect, and of energy transforming forevermore through space and time over billions of years – can be mown down by the senseless greed of humanities destructive lust for materialism and trembling addiction to consumption and consumerism? I walk upon the sodden earth of this bucolic and wintry land, mired in the horror of these visions and wondering how my mind grew estranged, from the bliss and elation that I felt as a child, and wondered into the darkened realms of existence, cutting my mind on the serrated shards of reality, that have been drenched in cosmic melancholy, over the writhing course of time.
The day grows dark. The night approaches. The clouds have converged upon us. The rains are pouring down. The frail windows are battered by biting winds. And here I sit, brooding alone, musing mournfully and somehow content with the horror of these visions.
Journal Extract by Stamos Mardou