Canto IV: Final Sacrifices and Echoes of a Last Request
Making an impact on the surface, a disturbance and a wave form documented, an observance. The mellow tones and the dramatic drones of different elemental properties all designed in accordance to certain prophecies. Some choose to listen to something else, while others share their experiences, books on shelves. The song played just after twelve.
Yes, implored here to tarnish beauty, and before there's cheer, a warning sent to me: Go to the book and let the cover be opened, forge the destiny in the face of the old one. Let the Dirge ring out to the masses as the carnage grows with a fastness. Bleed the bloodless and make heroes out of the loveless. Weather it takes war or a super virus, end this bore and forget about forgiveness. There is going to be a draining of millions of souls, it will be bloody, rivers of blood will flow. The darkness is just the masses and the people who are in line for death's lashes. So much sorrow and unrelenting death, the world is crushing all in its path. The attempts to try to survive in the fury turn into even more dismemberment and the reflections are traumatic for the survivors: the survivors are the future, and they know who they are. From whatever choice by some unknown source, survivors are chosen and know they will be going in. The purging. The end of what you call life as you know it, it's no longer bullshit, it's real, it's here, it's now.
But you can't figure out why you go from drought to drought still chasing the dragon, and always lagging. Sometimes you feel like there's a monkey on your back, taunting you with the grave just to suck away all of the goodness you save as someone else is depraved - a tease to all who gave at the sacrifice.
Sweet melody of imminent death, sing to me with your last breath. Be the inspiration, fulfill my creative needs, break my heart again, drink from it as it bleeds. Every note, every word, every tap of every drum, I must succumb as the song and the wind become as one. The rain begins a new song, replacing the chimes and the windsong. Besieging a memory and suppressing where it went wrong. Setting a higher standard in the storm of the opposition's commander. You were a believer of a better way until you were rejected day after day. Being contained like an animal in a cage, you will age, and you will be subdued according to your wage, so wage a war of fear not a career. Don't fall off of the path so many wish they could walk, don't drop the rock on the way to the mountain's top, don't stop, it's just a test - if you loose, they'll deny you of any last request.
In the shallow eyes of the ferryman, the trip is just a routine. There are times when you look back and the sacrifices have faces, some places suck you in like a magnet, you had it, but you held on instead of letting go. And it lives on to mock you, even after you die. Why? Because of that one last lie, or maybe because of the times you didn't try. So look to your inner self before you begin to wonder about someone else. There are a lot of things in life left hanging, like the singing and the training, the gang banging hot chicks with friends from sex clicks. Lighting match sticks like an exquisite movie from the world war two flicks. Looking for answers in a bag of Raman noodles, wishing for tools to help build a way out of the place you seem forever trapped in and the torture continues as the spiral spins. Death is like a door and there is never remorse. People who you know went through, now you must go too, it is time, no more things to talk about. Everything seems to be your life flashing before your eyes because it is, it is all about demise. Nothing can reverse it so just let go, close your eyes, release your soul.
Your last thought as you feel yourself slip into the grave is the sacrifices you made and the situations that were saved. It seems as though it means something to you now, on your way out. You have finally felt what other's talked about. About death and the thoughts just before you die, the underlying question is always "why? why? why?" The sacrificial virgin didn't cry. The mother never said goodbye, the sunshine stayed in the sky, Why?
Did you die? The netherworld is a short process, your memories will die, but not the emotions regressed. You can have your thoughts back as soon as you get relaxed with the idea that the sacrifices were never made, your dues were never paid. So the stage is set, and don't forget, the Dirge still blares out of a million nowheres.
In the rhythm of you tapping your finger on the chair. There . . . then gone, where did you belong? What did you do wrong? Somebody please turn off that song! That omen that seeps through the cracks, blends in with other sounds and is always in stereo, no matter when it is or where you go. I hear it too, my friend, so think of me as your guide. Step inside, let's go for a ride. The stops are far and few between a true destiny and a dream. You failed and now you must go out like a true Sagittarian, which you are - no doubt. And as with others throughout history, you will live on through your artistry. Your spirit will be heard at the symphony. The composer knows the song so well, echoing in every wishing well.
You had a choice and was put through a test. Your heart wasn't with you, and now you know best. But it's too late, you cannot reverse this fate. It has been reviewed by the grand wizard of Karma many lifetimes gone by, your soul is limited to dreams that die when you die. Inseparable from your heart now, you wish to find a way out. Only one sacrifice can be made, and that would be a poor trade. Is it worth it to live a lifetime of rotting? Just to continue the life of running and hiding. You must choose this death for it represents a new beginning. Give up on the quest and stop all this deceiving. You can only hurt the soul that must go on and when it is reborn, it must be strong. Don't break it with the lies that have left your dreams denied. Don't try to hide. Take off the disguise. You are going to have to tell the others involved that your problem is solved. You're not going to go on and there is no reason. No reason. The season. Autumn. You feel you life fading as the leaves begin falling. The song slows to a moody pace, hitting deep chords and putting lines of sadness on your face. A face that has endured pain in ways unthinkable to most, and your body is just its host. It eats you from the blackness to the red and every color in-between fades to gray after you're dead. Go to them now, let them get out. It's not too late to let them find better, but it's different than a suicide letter. You aren't killing yourself and neither am I, we're just two Sagittarians who know they are going to die. The song we hear the fate we fear - anticipating the end of the song wishing it would stop wishing it would go on and on. Feel the melody for its sorrow bringing beauty.
In a whisper in the dark you start to recall that there are unanswered questions that beckon your call. A thinking so obscure it's like an epidemic and the cure. You grasp all of the meaning that anything ever meant, you spend all the fortunes you thought you'd already spent. Respawning one last time to avenge all who changed their mind. Nothing can make a mission like yours fail as effectively as total betrayal. So get into their heads and wiggle around, make one last big sound. You only get one go at life, don't end up remembered as a burned out light. Tossed in the alley, shattering to tiny pieces left there and forgotten about. You doubt, and the doubt grows. Doubt for foes doubt about heroes. Thinking in great strides about the changing of the tides and how they got inside just before you died. A symbolic cast of mortals stand at your final portal, waiting to see you descend into eternity's sand to become just another spec so small it's hard to detect. You never thought about it so deep yet you are here now, entering the great sleep. The song the verse, that dirty ol' bastard of a Dirge. It played for you forever, mortal being or bare soul. You could even come back as an animal, and still it will roll. That's the way of the world turning the fire burning the lost souls yearning. It all comes back full circle, like the world, as big as it seems, becomes so small in the eyes of the dreams. The sun beams and the demons: The hosts they have found, the entire world: debound. It sinks into the mire of the great purging's fire. Consuming everything that exists like an abyss that feeds on liveliness. The more it can take in the greater wages are paid as they get sucked in. Glowing in the coals is everyone you ever loved getting pushed along and shoved into the burning fires that are desires and love. Love for the few that walk out of the devastation. Forged like a tool, a new peaceful time. Love and beauty, art and music. Technology left behind to get back to a better time. A birth you'll be no part of, for you'll go up in the heart of the firestorm of death. But it won't be like that, it will be as mandatory as breath but as sneaky as a laugh. Finally, the song begins to revert back to the chorus. Your skin becomes pekid and porous, the light you see through the emerald forest is dim. The choir comes in softly as if they put more emotions into it. You can't bring yourself to listen to it, but you have to do it anticipating the end. The end is now a friend as the wait becomes too hard to endure, you try to repel you will from its lure. The skin the song the short the long the tick the tock the red flashing light of the radioclock, it only plays the Dirge and unplugging it don't make it stop. The thoughts continue to jump from one thing to another, a friend, a brother, an enemy, a lover.
Cringing from the final blow, you know now it has been handed to you after it's too late to try to do. No working your way up to, no having to go to school, just living the life like there's no tomorrow, no money to worry about, no lifetime to borrow. Nothing to trade at the trading post, nothing to worry about, just one final toast: to the completion of this; and blowing death a kiss. Can you really expect to move the focus during the final hour? Your efforts will be rewarded, but you can't deny the power. A long wait now, now a time of reflection. One last walk through the exile and you are leaving behind its denial. Denying that you ever existed in the first place, denying you of your value - even if only at face. It's easy to do, and I think I can agree with the logic if I tried, I have been a contributing factor to more than one suicide. But never wincing an eye after they died, others thought I was cold inside. But it's much more complicated than that, and you would have to know all of the facts. Facts I care not to reflect upon, and it is forbidden to share the wisdom with someone who is about to enter the schism of unrelenting emotional fission. A probable solution to things that don't quite work out with resolution. Dead musicians singing the Dirge in the Valley of the Dead as the Carrion flies circles overhead. There is a tall dark figure looming, your excited eyes keep jumping around zooming, trying to see the third dimension of everything that requires apprehension. You are the chosen one this time and it can cause pain to know this, but in the final analysis, it was you who chose this: this was your wish, your last request. Before becoming a ghost on the scene, you wanted to trade something for the spotlight beam. The sunshine was not enough for the barter, so you thought a little smarter, knowing that only your soul was adequate pay for a way out - the life, as they say. And to live the life, you are willing to sacrifice just about everything you have come to know - it's time, let's go. I am your guide, I will give you a tour of the freak show. Only because you are of pure Sagittarian composition are you aloud to be in this position. Unfortunately, there is too many dues you have yet to pay, so there isn't any other way to get the barters to play. Your time here in this life has expired, the loss: everything you ever desired. The trip is over, you must leave the bus, the rest of the world and the rest of us. One last goodbye and a song dedicated to your quest: your spirit is carried away by the birds as you mourners hear the sorrowful words and the hidden verse contained in the melodic chants of the Sagittarian Dirge.
-braden
canto IV
6.2.99
