Fliegen Sie auf, in die Morgendämmerung.
Posted: Fri Feb 13, 2009 2:06 pm
((Play this in the background while listening. Repeat when necessary. Also this story is told entirely with metaphor. Do not take this as verbatim fact as Nick's past.))
What would it be like to fly? To have the winds blowing across your skin, hair whipping like tiny tendrils across your face and neck. That uplifting feeling of weightlessness as you plummet through the air, heart leaping into your throat, seeking to escape in fear of hitting the ground below. That surge of adrenaline as the body flirts with death...It would be fun...wouldn't it? To fly? To look Death in the face and laugh, soaring upwards out of the free fall. It would be fun.
I wish that were the case.
Falling...it's a perfect word to describe my life up to now. A constant fall...through the sky, into the water, and sinking deeper and deeper into the darkness below, the crushing depth which holds and never gives back. The crushing despair of a cage, unseen, but nonetheless felt and all encompassing; powerful and constant, strangling the life and light from those caught within its cold formless bars. I fell. I fell and fell and fell...sinking deeper, watching and feeling the cage constrict around me with the power of a serpent and the agonizing slowness of a gentle lover. All the while, knowing that I deserved it. I deserved that cage, to fall, to hit the water and sink and be forgotten into the black abyss. To roll over and let the sun rise and fall, unable to reach me with its light....Darkness was more than I deserved...
Yet life is a cruel mistress at times...throwing you curveballs with pleasure and joyful tidings just as often as she slams your head into the mud and grinds it into the gravel, slicing your face, lips, and eyes....and eyes....
I was not always falling....or maybe I was? Perhaps it was right as I first left my mother's womb that I began my gentle and silent fall deep down from the heavens above into the hellish life of the earth below. A silent world born with trumpets and sweet clarion bells which sang with beauty and tearfully perfect emotion fell upon a poor soul, already falling away from the perfect world which sang in herald of my arrival. Silence, deep and heavy like the grave covered my fall. I could see the songs being sung, the instruments being played, and the sweet laughter of my family around me, growing farther and farther apart, drifting away as I fell down, down, down and away from that perfect world. My eyes looked upon them with wonder, yearning so that my heart would beat out of my chest and cut away my limbs so that I could just look upon my mother and hear her voice sing me softly to sleep, clutched in her warm and safe bosom.
But life is cruel.
I fell farther, drifting down in a slow spiral, plummeting through an endless sky which darkened around me as the light above grew dimmer. I could not even call out to those above, asking them to save me from my fall, for them to reach out their hands and catch me. My voice failed me as much so as did my hearing and my fall sped on. My parents looked down at me with love, watching me fall, all the while, unknowing of their son's quick approach to the dark abyss below. Could I even be saved now? Was I worth saving? A horrible, deformed wreck of a child who could do nothing to save himself...was I worth it?
Then, just as every day has its end in its slow marching procession through dusk into night, my world's light faded in sudden, horrifying fashion. I watched in fear as my parents tripped, falling from their lofty height above me, falling with me into the blackness below. They sped past me, falling faster than I could ever believe possible, as if weighed down with thousands upon thousands of pounds. My parents fell, they joined me in our downfall, and during that moment, my fall matched theirs. I fell with them, and I am embarrassed to admit...I was happy. I was pleased...overjoyed and overcome with such raw emotion that I was finally reunited with my parents in an eternal free-fall of despair. Wherever we were to end up...we would be together. Warm arms enveloped around me. Mother and Father, their loving arms, which had never abandoned me, I realized, even during the free fall. I felt peace and light soar within my chest as we sank further through the air to the timeless depths which approached with such sudden alarming speed, that my mind cried for salvation and heart soothed with calm faith.
But then again...life is a cruel mistress.
Suddenly, as if being birthed for a second time, the warm, protective embrace which held me tight, glued to my parents by love, was shattered, ripped away with such burning ferocity and cold aftermath that my world ended. Over and over, I see it happen again in my mind as I watch my parents continue to fall, striking the water and vanishing below the deep and dark depths, out of sight and out of reach. The speed at which it happened was frightening. Ripped from me so forcefully, I prayed to the above, pleading and crying that they should have flayed my skin off instead of taking that which I love. I tore at my flesh and hair in agony, despair and hopelessness. My descent had slowed. A parachute had attached itself to my back, stopping my fall from a deathly plummet to a slow drifting spiral. Had they done this? When they embraced me, made me safe and warm....did they give this to me? Did they stop my fall with their last moments before striking their doom below? I felt my heart die, curling in itself like an insect, torn of its mortal coil. My fall continued, deepening as my feet gently stroked the surface of the water, sending ripples out in all directions, signaling the predators of the abyss of my arrival.
No one was there to catch me...to console my body as I gently drifted off on top of the surface of the depths, the water sucking at my feet and back, eager to draw me down to the cold, clammy grasping hands of death. I should've just let them take me...pull me down to the end my parents met. I could see them, even then, just beyond arm's reach, below the surface, smiling and holding their arms out to me in a warm promise. Yet I refused to sink, floating on the surface of the water, arms and legs splayed out, numb from the cold. Silent whisperings edged into my mind, wordless and formless. I felt them as ghostly arms gently slid out of the water, wrapping about my chest and waist. Yet these were no arms of a lover.
Fear spiked through my body, formless, cold, and intense. A fear without words to describe it as a shattered and demonic visage of my father rose up from the depths, arms wrapped around my body and hurled me from the surface, holding me just above the mirror-like surface and striking me over and over again with heavy blows. Pain, sharp and jarring filled my life, turning the sky red and striking the water with countless lightning bolts of black energy with each blow struck upon my body. I longed to fall under the cold surface of that water, hoping that I could find peace and respite from this terrible hell which kept me from joining my family in a loving embrace. An eternity of pain passed as that hellish fake which seemed to pose itself as my father struck me, beat me, and brought me closer and closer to the surface of the water before jerking me back into the sky to begin the beatings over again.
In despair, my eyes sought the heavens above, the gentle light snuffed out by the darkness and red skies of pain. There was no escape from this pain, from this life. It was life I had brought upon myself. If I had held onto my parents, I could've slowed their fall too. I could've saved them. I could've done so much! I would not be alone! This is punishment I deserve!
When it comes down to it...time is an illusion. A figment of our minds which we use to describe the passage of moments to moments. Time has no meaning...existing only as shackles thrown on a period of moments to anchor it into something comprehendable by our minds. For a silent eternity of moments, my fall was halted in a life of harsh pain. Despair pushed at my mind, commanding me to fall deeper and deeper, to break away and seek the cold embrace of the abyss. I could see them there...still close yet too far away, my parents smiled, holding out their arms to me with gentle smiles. Oh how I yearned for their touch, for their embrace just one last time!
I do not know how or when I realized it, but knew...just knew...that my parents were telling me a message. Their arms held out were not out of desire to hold their child again, but they were stretched out, as if warding me away. Their faces calm, gentle, and smiling, urged me not to seek them, but to leave them to their rest. They wanted me to leave this place. They wanted me to stop falling.
How do you stop falling?
I found the answer to that....someone stops you. I saw it clear as day as a bright light, white and brilliant shone from the heavens as a figure burst through the clouds, soaring towards me like a star. The demon that held me released me, crying in rage and pain as the light seared its flesh, causing it to boil and smoke. I fell into the water, splashing, seeking this moment to escape into the depth. However, my parents were there and pushed me back, pushed me out of the water, hands on my back and legs into the light above. I looked up and saw it...a fantastic, majestic angel hovered above me with golden hair the fell in long streams to his shoulders, curled at the tips. A halo of golden fire ringed his brow like a crown, casting intense light on his brilliant metal-scale armor, turning him into a miniature sun. Pearl-white wings fanned out behind his back, impossibly large. Flowing robes fanned out of the armor like a soft breeze, like his hair. One arm held a giant shield, shaped like a kite with a mural showing arms, many, countless arms encircling a child held in the middle, protecting and bearing it up. In the other, a sword burned with the wrath of the heavens. Golden flames roared and flickered along its length, making it impossible to look at directly. It was a blade that could cut people in twain.
The angel looked down on me with a gentle smile, soft and fair skin spreading as his teeth shined down on me. I found myself lost in the blue of his eyes, as if seeing that bright blue sky of my youth before I started my fall. His hand reached down towards me and I found myself moving without thought, taking his hand. Gently, he pulled me from the water, watching as the demon writhed and screamed at the edge of the angel's radiance. My body felt heavy and broken, sticking to the water. However, the gentle pull never ceased and I slowly made it onto my feet, standing on the waters below. The angel smiled, pointing upwards where the sky cleared and parted, revealing blue light and gentle white clouds. I could not help but smile back. As the angel turned to leave, I clutched his hand frantically, afraid that once he left, I'd fall back down again. I could not take that again. My parents had pushed me up. They wanted me to soar in the sky. I could not break the wish they had of their child! I looked down to the waters, seeing my parents below me, standing on the surface of the water, yet in the opposite direction of myself, like a twisted shadow. They smiled at me, arm in arm and waved to me, ushering me to leave this place. But how?!
The angel placed his hand on my shoulder and pulled. Blinking, I looked up to him and watched as he unfurled his alabaster wings. Fear boiled at the pit of my stomach, knowing I could not follow him. I could not fly. I could not leave this place. I could only fall. Yet he pulled again and I took a tentative step forward.
Then, my wings unfurled.
Golden, shimmering wings spread from my back, flourishing like a butterfly just out of its cocoon, the wings caught the light and shone. My heart froze as the wings beat of their own volition, pulling me up into the air with the angel. Together we soared upwards, farther, farther, farther, until we left the clouds of pain below and the sight of the howling demon to the wayside. Frantically, I looked to the angel, who smiled and brought my gaze to the side. It was the first time I had looked anywhere but up or down, and I was shocked at what I saw.
Dozens of people fell with varying speeds. Tumbling down their paths like leaves in the breeze. He smiled at me, the angel, and pushed me towards them. I knew, without any more prodding, what it was I was doing now. I had escaped pain and despair. I had been to the surface of that cold, hellish water and back...and now? Now I have wings. Now, I no longer fall. Now, I can soar and pick up others, halt their falls and put them back up into their paradise. I will save them and give them wings to soar on into that new dawn for themselves. It is what my parents would want me to do. It is what I have the power to do. It is the Right Thing to do.
What would it be like to fly?
It feels free.
What would it be like to fly? To have the winds blowing across your skin, hair whipping like tiny tendrils across your face and neck. That uplifting feeling of weightlessness as you plummet through the air, heart leaping into your throat, seeking to escape in fear of hitting the ground below. That surge of adrenaline as the body flirts with death...It would be fun...wouldn't it? To fly? To look Death in the face and laugh, soaring upwards out of the free fall. It would be fun.
I wish that were the case.
Falling...it's a perfect word to describe my life up to now. A constant fall...through the sky, into the water, and sinking deeper and deeper into the darkness below, the crushing depth which holds and never gives back. The crushing despair of a cage, unseen, but nonetheless felt and all encompassing; powerful and constant, strangling the life and light from those caught within its cold formless bars. I fell. I fell and fell and fell...sinking deeper, watching and feeling the cage constrict around me with the power of a serpent and the agonizing slowness of a gentle lover. All the while, knowing that I deserved it. I deserved that cage, to fall, to hit the water and sink and be forgotten into the black abyss. To roll over and let the sun rise and fall, unable to reach me with its light....Darkness was more than I deserved...
Yet life is a cruel mistress at times...throwing you curveballs with pleasure and joyful tidings just as often as she slams your head into the mud and grinds it into the gravel, slicing your face, lips, and eyes....and eyes....
I was not always falling....or maybe I was? Perhaps it was right as I first left my mother's womb that I began my gentle and silent fall deep down from the heavens above into the hellish life of the earth below. A silent world born with trumpets and sweet clarion bells which sang with beauty and tearfully perfect emotion fell upon a poor soul, already falling away from the perfect world which sang in herald of my arrival. Silence, deep and heavy like the grave covered my fall. I could see the songs being sung, the instruments being played, and the sweet laughter of my family around me, growing farther and farther apart, drifting away as I fell down, down, down and away from that perfect world. My eyes looked upon them with wonder, yearning so that my heart would beat out of my chest and cut away my limbs so that I could just look upon my mother and hear her voice sing me softly to sleep, clutched in her warm and safe bosom.
But life is cruel.
I fell farther, drifting down in a slow spiral, plummeting through an endless sky which darkened around me as the light above grew dimmer. I could not even call out to those above, asking them to save me from my fall, for them to reach out their hands and catch me. My voice failed me as much so as did my hearing and my fall sped on. My parents looked down at me with love, watching me fall, all the while, unknowing of their son's quick approach to the dark abyss below. Could I even be saved now? Was I worth saving? A horrible, deformed wreck of a child who could do nothing to save himself...was I worth it?
Then, just as every day has its end in its slow marching procession through dusk into night, my world's light faded in sudden, horrifying fashion. I watched in fear as my parents tripped, falling from their lofty height above me, falling with me into the blackness below. They sped past me, falling faster than I could ever believe possible, as if weighed down with thousands upon thousands of pounds. My parents fell, they joined me in our downfall, and during that moment, my fall matched theirs. I fell with them, and I am embarrassed to admit...I was happy. I was pleased...overjoyed and overcome with such raw emotion that I was finally reunited with my parents in an eternal free-fall of despair. Wherever we were to end up...we would be together. Warm arms enveloped around me. Mother and Father, their loving arms, which had never abandoned me, I realized, even during the free fall. I felt peace and light soar within my chest as we sank further through the air to the timeless depths which approached with such sudden alarming speed, that my mind cried for salvation and heart soothed with calm faith.
But then again...life is a cruel mistress.
Suddenly, as if being birthed for a second time, the warm, protective embrace which held me tight, glued to my parents by love, was shattered, ripped away with such burning ferocity and cold aftermath that my world ended. Over and over, I see it happen again in my mind as I watch my parents continue to fall, striking the water and vanishing below the deep and dark depths, out of sight and out of reach. The speed at which it happened was frightening. Ripped from me so forcefully, I prayed to the above, pleading and crying that they should have flayed my skin off instead of taking that which I love. I tore at my flesh and hair in agony, despair and hopelessness. My descent had slowed. A parachute had attached itself to my back, stopping my fall from a deathly plummet to a slow drifting spiral. Had they done this? When they embraced me, made me safe and warm....did they give this to me? Did they stop my fall with their last moments before striking their doom below? I felt my heart die, curling in itself like an insect, torn of its mortal coil. My fall continued, deepening as my feet gently stroked the surface of the water, sending ripples out in all directions, signaling the predators of the abyss of my arrival.
No one was there to catch me...to console my body as I gently drifted off on top of the surface of the depths, the water sucking at my feet and back, eager to draw me down to the cold, clammy grasping hands of death. I should've just let them take me...pull me down to the end my parents met. I could see them, even then, just beyond arm's reach, below the surface, smiling and holding their arms out to me in a warm promise. Yet I refused to sink, floating on the surface of the water, arms and legs splayed out, numb from the cold. Silent whisperings edged into my mind, wordless and formless. I felt them as ghostly arms gently slid out of the water, wrapping about my chest and waist. Yet these were no arms of a lover.
Fear spiked through my body, formless, cold, and intense. A fear without words to describe it as a shattered and demonic visage of my father rose up from the depths, arms wrapped around my body and hurled me from the surface, holding me just above the mirror-like surface and striking me over and over again with heavy blows. Pain, sharp and jarring filled my life, turning the sky red and striking the water with countless lightning bolts of black energy with each blow struck upon my body. I longed to fall under the cold surface of that water, hoping that I could find peace and respite from this terrible hell which kept me from joining my family in a loving embrace. An eternity of pain passed as that hellish fake which seemed to pose itself as my father struck me, beat me, and brought me closer and closer to the surface of the water before jerking me back into the sky to begin the beatings over again.
In despair, my eyes sought the heavens above, the gentle light snuffed out by the darkness and red skies of pain. There was no escape from this pain, from this life. It was life I had brought upon myself. If I had held onto my parents, I could've slowed their fall too. I could've saved them. I could've done so much! I would not be alone! This is punishment I deserve!
When it comes down to it...time is an illusion. A figment of our minds which we use to describe the passage of moments to moments. Time has no meaning...existing only as shackles thrown on a period of moments to anchor it into something comprehendable by our minds. For a silent eternity of moments, my fall was halted in a life of harsh pain. Despair pushed at my mind, commanding me to fall deeper and deeper, to break away and seek the cold embrace of the abyss. I could see them there...still close yet too far away, my parents smiled, holding out their arms to me with gentle smiles. Oh how I yearned for their touch, for their embrace just one last time!
I do not know how or when I realized it, but knew...just knew...that my parents were telling me a message. Their arms held out were not out of desire to hold their child again, but they were stretched out, as if warding me away. Their faces calm, gentle, and smiling, urged me not to seek them, but to leave them to their rest. They wanted me to leave this place. They wanted me to stop falling.
How do you stop falling?
I found the answer to that....someone stops you. I saw it clear as day as a bright light, white and brilliant shone from the heavens as a figure burst through the clouds, soaring towards me like a star. The demon that held me released me, crying in rage and pain as the light seared its flesh, causing it to boil and smoke. I fell into the water, splashing, seeking this moment to escape into the depth. However, my parents were there and pushed me back, pushed me out of the water, hands on my back and legs into the light above. I looked up and saw it...a fantastic, majestic angel hovered above me with golden hair the fell in long streams to his shoulders, curled at the tips. A halo of golden fire ringed his brow like a crown, casting intense light on his brilliant metal-scale armor, turning him into a miniature sun. Pearl-white wings fanned out behind his back, impossibly large. Flowing robes fanned out of the armor like a soft breeze, like his hair. One arm held a giant shield, shaped like a kite with a mural showing arms, many, countless arms encircling a child held in the middle, protecting and bearing it up. In the other, a sword burned with the wrath of the heavens. Golden flames roared and flickered along its length, making it impossible to look at directly. It was a blade that could cut people in twain.
The angel looked down on me with a gentle smile, soft and fair skin spreading as his teeth shined down on me. I found myself lost in the blue of his eyes, as if seeing that bright blue sky of my youth before I started my fall. His hand reached down towards me and I found myself moving without thought, taking his hand. Gently, he pulled me from the water, watching as the demon writhed and screamed at the edge of the angel's radiance. My body felt heavy and broken, sticking to the water. However, the gentle pull never ceased and I slowly made it onto my feet, standing on the waters below. The angel smiled, pointing upwards where the sky cleared and parted, revealing blue light and gentle white clouds. I could not help but smile back. As the angel turned to leave, I clutched his hand frantically, afraid that once he left, I'd fall back down again. I could not take that again. My parents had pushed me up. They wanted me to soar in the sky. I could not break the wish they had of their child! I looked down to the waters, seeing my parents below me, standing on the surface of the water, yet in the opposite direction of myself, like a twisted shadow. They smiled at me, arm in arm and waved to me, ushering me to leave this place. But how?!
The angel placed his hand on my shoulder and pulled. Blinking, I looked up to him and watched as he unfurled his alabaster wings. Fear boiled at the pit of my stomach, knowing I could not follow him. I could not fly. I could not leave this place. I could only fall. Yet he pulled again and I took a tentative step forward.
Then, my wings unfurled.
Golden, shimmering wings spread from my back, flourishing like a butterfly just out of its cocoon, the wings caught the light and shone. My heart froze as the wings beat of their own volition, pulling me up into the air with the angel. Together we soared upwards, farther, farther, farther, until we left the clouds of pain below and the sight of the howling demon to the wayside. Frantically, I looked to the angel, who smiled and brought my gaze to the side. It was the first time I had looked anywhere but up or down, and I was shocked at what I saw.
Dozens of people fell with varying speeds. Tumbling down their paths like leaves in the breeze. He smiled at me, the angel, and pushed me towards them. I knew, without any more prodding, what it was I was doing now. I had escaped pain and despair. I had been to the surface of that cold, hellish water and back...and now? Now I have wings. Now, I no longer fall. Now, I can soar and pick up others, halt their falls and put them back up into their paradise. I will save them and give them wings to soar on into that new dawn for themselves. It is what my parents would want me to do. It is what I have the power to do. It is the Right Thing to do.
What would it be like to fly?
It feels free.