“Build a wall,” you say. “Keep those people out.”

Lay brick

upon brick,

c s i c

o t n e

a e m

t e e

l n

t,

d n c

i e h

g r e

t s,

and

*a*d*d* *b*a*r*b*e*d* *w*i*r*e.*

l

l

e

And t e l l all the people.

e

l

l

Tell them they are unwelcome.

Scrutinize the folly of the outsiders and magnify each into a mortal sin. Create fiction and sell it as fact. Redefine Gomorrah with your rhetoric. With your pen of righteousness, draft propaganda. Sketch a hooked nose and jagged eyebrows. Dip your brush into acerbic condemnation that masquerades as wisdom. You are the artist; now paint your monsters.

When finished, admire your work. Examine those within your domain and cast out all who do not fit in your illusion.

Congratulate yourself. You are the artist and audience. You are Congress and St. Peter. You alone have created good. . . you alone have created evil.

Tune your ear exclusively to your own echos to reassure yourself of your righteousness, and in your parapet of isolation, rest well.

And when the voices come for you - voices of your own making, do not ruminate on the fact no one will be there to drown out their critique.

As your caustic barbs ricochet, puncturing your inflated persona, resist the urge to cry out. Do not turn to the outsiders you banished. Do not beseech them for pity or support. After all, any demand leaking from such a venomous, deflated shell of a person would almost certainly be,

unwelcome.

You lay in a hospital bed, wheezing and staring at a ceiling, wishing you had stuck with weed or hell, even cocaine because nothing has hurt this bad before. Copper wires tighten around your lungs every time that you try to breathe, and you look around the room. The hospital over there probably lacks basic things, but you have enough resources to fight the virus off and still feel every painful blow you are dealt. I can see you getting weaker, becoming skin and bones, and dying of something so mundane. The bass comes into the song I was listening to and I am pulled back to the United States, back to my room, back to whatever I was doing before my brain took over.

People die daily in my head, perks of being someone I love. Though I can bear minutes, hours, or even weeks not talking to them (just ask my poor grandparents who have no idea where I am), the graves of the people I love have already been dug in my brain and their deaths plague my dreams. I like to pretend that it is all porn and high ass jokes, yet I always wake up to a teary pillow and a need to talk to someone. My legs have shaken endlessly since I was a child (and I have an Achilles heel of steel), and I began to map out an escape route for every situation in the middle of lectures in middle school and just never stopped.

I think you were just as perplexed that anxiety racks my brain as I was that you had never had Death stop for you and offer you a lift. No part of your childhood was spent crying in stalls for reasons that you can’t articulate. Your soul never choked on a fly’s spirit then spent the month lamenting the futility of life. You don’t get to experience death until it happens while I have been a funeral director since birth. Yet, the hardest part is that real death merely grazes me as it whizzes past. My hyperactive intuition always forgets to carry a number, and the calculation goes awry and the situation turns out better than I thought it would.

I can feel the cart coming though, collecting the bones of the people I love. The expiration date of my loved ones is speeding towards me in slow motion and I have no idea how to handle it. Delving into my interests just leads to word vomit, the world collapsing again, and earsplitting migraines. The pandemic only increased my irrational thoughts, and the hospital scene comes more aggressively, and the tears flow less and less which strikes fear into me. No logic can tell me you’re okay when I watch you flatline again. The phobia started well before the hiatus and will continue well after, but I didn’t want you to hurt. I don’t want you to cry and see the world through my twisted greyscale lenses.

There once was a man named Brian. Brian enjoyed Mac n’ Cheese. So Brian took some pasta out of his pantry and placed it on the counter. He then proceeded to pull butter, milk, and cheese out of his refridgerator. After filling a pot from a nearby cupboard with water from his kitchen sink Brian was ready. With a sigh of anticipation, Brian opened up a journal on the counter to a fresh page and dated the top left corner, then without delay he began his process. Salting the boiling water like a pure professional, stirring the pot with the finesse of a renowned home cook, producing beautiful pasta at a perfect al dente. Swiftly he moved to the sink, colander in one hand and pot full of boiling, steaming, bubbling saltwater in the other. Carefully and slowly he poured, losing no more than seven peices. He softly and carefully shook the pasta in the colander to shed any excess water then poured his pasta back into the pot. Carefully and precisely, he sliced into his butter and poured milk into his measuring cup. After pouring the milk and butter into the pot full of thick, luscious pasta, he reached for his cheese. He opened his bag, assessed the contents, and then proceeded to pour the whole bag in with the pasta, butter, and milk. He then placed the pot back on the stove and began to stir. As the cheese and butter began to melt and the milk began to bubble, Brian began to blush, a slight smile crept across his face as he slowly stirred his Mac’ n Cheese. Brian’s eyes went wide. He realized he’d forgotten something. He raced to the pantry full speed, sliding on his linoleum floor straight to the door and swinging it wide open. He swiftly reached inside and grabbed a aluminum tin full of home-made Panko bread crumbs. Bolting back to the stove, sliding to a perfect stop right in front of his pot, he popped off the lid and poured a moderate handful of bread crumbs on top of his Mac n’ Cheese. He paused, a giddy feeling filled his heart and an involuntary grin flashed across his face. He turned off the stove, got a bowl from the nearest cupboard, and poured the golden, cheese drenched pasta into the bowl. Delicately he took a spoon out of a drawer beneath the countertop and placed his bowl next to the notebook. With a flush, pink face and a massive grin, he dug his spoon into his Mac n’ Cheese, scooped out a heaping spoonful, and stuck it in his mouth. Slowly chewing, he closed his eyes, his face expressing pure ecstacy. He chewed and chewed until suddenly, his expression changed. He swallowed quickly with a displeased look on his face. Brian picked up his pen and one line below the date he wrote, “More butter.” He slammed his notebook closed and dumped his Mac’ n Cheese in the garbage can. He placed his bowl in the sink, grabbed a single piece of bread out of the pantry and walked up the stairs back to his room. The End.

I see a paper with another paper, the paper with another paper has another paper on top. The paper with another paper with another paper has another paper on top. The paper with another paper with another paper with another paper has another paper on top. The paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper has another paper on top. The paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper has another paper on top. The paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper has another paper on top. The paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper with another paper has another paper on top.

Data Entry 7

Discovered humanoid remains

within tall structure barricades.

Initial estimate is eight million,

beyond what myth dictates.

Data Entry 13

Despite no fields to grow their food,

quite little they sought to accrue.

Instead, they stacked up plant-based pulp on rolls

by bowls of white on stumps.

Religious offerings, were they?

A humble shrine to which one prayed?

Displays, though varied, seem to be widespread-

a thread I'll trace with glee.

Data Entry 42

The pictograms on each device-

though primitive, revived-

suggest a demon, Rona, caused the blight

that frightened and embalmed.

Their God, Commode, on porc'lain throne,

was inspiration for the clones-

they prayed quite often, begging to be saved,

and paid their pulpy dues.

Data Entry 56

Analysis of tissues shows

a concentrated viral load.

Mutations guaranteed mortality,

foreseen by no locale.

We've still not learned what masquerade

the fibrous rolls of tribute played,

but posit that their ink has been erased

as space and time infringed.

Data Entry 78

No ink discernible on pulp,

so now we dig beneath the sculpt

and follow where the curvy hollow leads.

My plea: no curse befalls.

Data Entry 94

Disintegrated remnants found,

stored mixed with waste far underground.

Perhaps a holy cleansing ritual

that lulled them into bliss?

Data Entry 1939

Our linguist picked the language lock,

translating data from The Docs

and found that when the novel virus jumped,

abruptly humans resupplied:

They traded printed Paper pulp

for rolls of pristine pulp in bulk.

A frantic dash for tribute offerings

that swings the tide of coughs?

Data Entry 2020

Command has ordered our return,

the excavation data firm.

These humans had no great intelligence;

percepts have been dispelled.

When imperiled by a menace

that was grim and overzealous,

they flout new orders and emerge, begin

hoarding toilet paper.

God cannot exist because of Eric the God-Eating Magic Penguin. Since Eric is God-Eating by definition, he has no choice but to eat God. So, if God exists, he automatically ceases to exist as a result of being eaten. Unless you can prove that Eric doesn’t exist, God doesn’t exist. Even if you can prove that Eric doesn’t exist, that same proof will also be applicable to God.

There are only two possibilities: either you can prove that Eric doesn’t exist or you cannot.

In both cases it logically follows that God doesn’t exist.

#religion #atheism #allhailEric #lol