The bleakness of my existence

was challenged aggressively when

a being of mortal perfection

turned and stared at me

her eyes consumed my soul

leaving me stunned

in the wake of

her remarkable sensuality

at that moment

everything was different

yet remained the same

her beauty was indomitable

against the nauseating ugliness

life regurgitated

as a matter of habit

while I vacillated

between illusion and disillusion

after realizing I conjured

this amazing being

into my unbalanced reality

attempting to temporarily offset

the pathetic loneliness

of my existence

forcing me to admit

“I need humankind.”

In the heart of flames, shadows dance,

Cleansing whispers, a fiery trance.

Embrace the heat, let it ignite,

As old wounds fade, into the night.

A symphony of crackling cries,

Beneath the moon, the phoenix flies.

From ashes rise, a spirit new,

In the furnace of trials, reborn true.

Scorched memories, seared and charred,

A cleansing by fire, no longer marred.

Through the furnace of pain, we find our light,

In the crucible of trials, we take flight.

So let it burn, let it blaze,

Through the darkest nights, and endless days.

For in the flames, we find our might,

A cleansing by fire, set alight.

Stoicism ultimately aims at the harmony of order--order within one's self, order of one's actions and possessions, and order of self within the context of the whole cosmos. Achieving harmony in these ways is Stoic eudaimonia, that is, the perfection or fulfillment of the human unto beatitude or absolute happiness. In other words, the Stoic believes that if human beings are able to achieve this three-fold order, they will not want or desire anything else--they are perfected or complete.

According to the Stoic, one's self, one's actions, and all the parts of one's self all fall under the human being's "power" to order. This is largely true. Because of my nature as a human being, here I am sitting at my computer, because I have to be somewhere. I am typing these words because I know how and I have some proclivity or tendency to do it. Further, I am content in the knowledge of what I am doing is in conformity with the logic of the cosmos such that I am not experiencing any extremity of emotion. Thus, I demonstrate the order of myself in conformity to the world around me, order in my actions, and inner order.

Again, according to the Stoic, if there is any disorder to be found among these things, there is a single remedy: knowledge. If I am sad that I am sitting here typing this rather than doing something else that I might think to be more worth my time, it is because I am ignorant of some part of the overarching logic of the universe. Either it has been ordained that I be sitting here typing and I am just ignorant as to the reason why, or I am actually supposed to be doing something else, and so that hypothetical sadness would have driven me to be doing something else. If I am sick or injured, I can be healed through a knowledge of medicine or the knowledge of a doctor, to bring myself back to a certain equanimity of life. For whatever disorder, knowledge can bring order.

It very much seems that Stoicism is the answer to the many ills of our time. The teenage mental health crisis as a result of social media addiction seems able to be solved by the knowledge that putting down the phone and hanging out with people is good for teenagers. If tech CEOs and boards knew not to be so tight-fisted over the trillions (yes, with a capital "TR") of dollars in their control, perhaps the economy would be in better shape. Perhaps, someone should tell them.

On paper (or in this case, on screen), this all sounds like it should work and lead to happiness, but it ultimately does not. There are a few problems with Stoicism that are insurmountable. For one, it certainly seems our will is free contra Stoic determinism. I think many people, teens included, know that scrolling for hours on end is bad for them and yet they fall into it because it is something of a natural tendency. The Stoic is all about following our tendencies and inclinations. As a result people are sad and depressed in alarming numbers. Why? I think Aristotle had the right answer in saying there are conflicting appetites in human nature, and that we have to choose to follow our intellectual appetites. There is a free choice to make, and a certain amount of effort needed to make that choice. Knowledge is not enough.

Another related problem is the reality of our emotions. Stoicism denies the moral usefulness and value of our passions. One thing the Stoics definitely get right is that our decisions should be made in an "even-keeled" emotional state as much as possible. In doing so, we are able to let reason take the reins and make the best, most reasonable decision. However, I question both the sanity and moral compass of anyone who does not want to mourn the death of a loved one, or rejoice in the birth of their child.

I can understand if someone wants to cry and yet cannot, since mourning is a complex experience. But death is a natural evil which should move anyone to sadness even if it is not exteriorly expressed. A Stoic apatheia is not really welcome in such a case, which we modernly would call an emotional numbness. Again, that numbness is a tendency that we can just "fall into" suffering, but most people will say that it is not something they really want. People want to feel. It takes effort to actively process, become vulnerable, and let the gravity of loss "sink in." There is such a thing as "a good cry," and it comes with the knowledge of the reality that death is not a good thing, even if it is a natural thing. The experience of feeling is a two-sided coin. It is only by allowing oneself to be vulnerable to mourning and feeling sadness that one is thus also enabled to rejoice and feel joy. To reject emotions is to reject both sadness and joy.

So what does all this mean in application? No, I do not think that just because Stoicism is wrong that it should be entirely dismissed and never talked about. There are certainly parts of life that it gets right. Making decisions based purely on passion and instinct is certanly not the right way to live life. Living life only in and by emotions does not capture the truth of human nature and experience. And, obviously, harmony and order are good and noble things for which we should definitely seek. So, parts of Stoicism are helpful pedagogically in the quest for the real truth of the human being, who is a rational animal. Living stoically up to a point, then, is helpful for developing the virtue of temperance which is one of the Stoic virtues. Temperance is the control of the emotions. If someone is overly emotional, Stoicism can help in the practice of developing the habit of "tamping" them down before thinking and making a decision, which helps also in the exercise of another virtue, prudence. This leads to an inner harmony and order, letting reason reign as the most important part of human nature. However, as mentioned above, the feeling of emotions is a part of human nature, a reality that Stoicism denies as a human good. Further, being physicalist-materialist in essence, Stoicism denies that the human will is free. The merely Stoic man may be free of sadness, but he is not truly free.

Shooting my eyes across the prettiest hues, hints of miracles,

traces of history left behind each boot print made to unsettle the wintery Eden in this…

My other mystery.

Stiff backed and leaning against the giant walls made callous from my wishes

to love more

to see more

to never leave this place

reaching for a sweater left forgotten like a heart on the clothesline

left to bleed for no one and nothing but the aftermath

and nothing but the memory remains.

Fading now like bad weather, like bad skin,

like hallways mute the echo of the scream of which I screamed into and found no way back.

Expiring like the stuff of fantasy made to taunt the sleepy dreamer in her wake.

This is not a love story or a hero journey

I am held captive tricked by the steel beast,

fierce and hungry, bribing me with its promise of forever

and forever is a song.

A million miles lay out like a snake roasting in the stink of heat and I hold and grasp

but Ah! The void is truly empty

and eh! It knows me

No matter how much I believe in your wildest dreams

I knew when I felt my heart tearing from the inside watching my own surgery

hey! come look inside my chest cavity

See the exits are all blocked, that there was no way back.

But oh!

But oh!

How that courtyard kept me like an etched Inferno scene

I am not a saint, or whore or any one’s mystery

I had something more than a pile of photos.

I was running my own river of thought

Remember the night? the one that opened its mouth, grinning at us from all the wrong directions

swallowed us up like a whale, mangled our luggage.

I don’t want to roll around down here for crumbs anymore

But all there is

IS THIS

All rage turned beast, and our beauty IS our ugliness

The flaw, the cut, the death… Perfect

Unimpressed in the world’s greatest theaters turn our backs at the glitter

And all we are IS THIS

Sensitive to touch

Inspired by sound

Memories that grieve us and not the other way around

If only I knew of an alphabet that doesn’t frighten me…

The Slippery Slope Remains the Undefeated Champion

The lessons of history

Are forgotten

Are ignored

Are deemed irrelevant

And thus,

Are required to be relearned (again and again)

The payments for this tuition

Are paid in the blood of millions

Too busy to care, too apathetic to know to care

President Washington warned of the dangers of foreign entanglements

President Eisenhower told of the military industrial complex

Martin Niemöller spoke of no one being left to speak out for me

And still, the ignorant remain blissfully ignorant

Hitler killed millions, Stalin more than Hitler, Mao more than Stalin

Socialism and Communism (vote your way in, shoot your way out)

Killed more than all three combined in the 20th Century alone

George Santayana forewarned of the consequences of failure

But, TikTok is more fun

You may wonder which message was lost, but I don’t wonder as to why

Rules for Radicals and Mein Kampf are blueprints

1984 is fiction

The difference becomes moot when everyone is literate, but no one wants to prove it

Once the door becomes the slightest of ajar to the narrative and not the truth

Appeasing the shouters, the leeches, and the looters

Once men actively seek a benevolent master over personal freedom

Then the slippery slope becomes more than a placation

It becomes a daily expectation

It becomes easy to do nothing else

And such is how slaves have always been made

From epigraph to epitaph

My epic is a pictograph

Graphically depicting an epithet

Of the e'pithiness I beget

Festooned within an epigram

Sums up who I really am

From my swaddled cradle to my toppled grave

Gravely gave my all — but then forgave

From my trumble in the womb

To the crumble of my tomb

Extrapolated my epithet

Of vignettes sinned without regret

My life proceeded Gaussian

All my motion speeded Brownian

Followed linear: beginning to middle — to end'd

Nosedove, sloped down, from the slope I began, ascended

Presumed regally alive or declared legally dead

My life, all planned and lived, was all in my head

Colliding with the others who happenstanced their ways

Into mine and breached my entranceways

I assumed a nom de plume

In life lived in the bedded room

Making creatures of epithelium

To seed the interstellar medium

I started in a bang, on-rushed

Doomed to fall into the epic crush

Episodes repeating in redundant splendors

And connect, ends to starts, to epicenters

Those from the ilk of my same cloth

Will follow on silk, my coattails, forth

But when all episodes are said and done

My epilogue will be — from one to none

Humanity, used to earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, wars, and pandemics, could deal with this. Waves of discontent said otherwise.

The Malaise.

Perhaps it was a ticking bomb hardwired into our DNA. Perhaps it was Chaos theory, the infinite number of small perturbations throughout history summating, finally.

A malady--unmeasurable, then immeasurable--passed not from person to person or demographic to demographic, but from the æther to the soul, relentlessly emptying all it invaded.

Beauty remained only as the standard against which all ugliness was judged. Charity survived, but only when tax-deductible. Music evolved and still moved people, but atonality segregated those listening from those who simply heard.

The pure of heart, steadfast against the Malaise, were called uncool, retards, and neo-Luddites. They were also called non-seculars, which were fighting words.

Untethered to Creation, the devout of organized religions experienced, quaintly put, a time-out for re-evaluating the meaning and sacrifice of their devotion. From there, a defiance matured into an agnostic apostasy.

Within a decade there would be only 150,000 Catholics left, mainly clergy. There would remain only 220,000 Muslims. There would be only 8,000 practicing Jews. There would remain no Protestants whatsoever. The Mormon count projected would be only 150—hardly enough to proselytize adequately in even one city—so wouldn’t count at all. The Amish numbers wouldn’t change (but the Amish never changed). The Jehovah’s Witnesses, it was predicted, would fall from eight million to only 144,000, which they claimed was just perfect.

Financial markets crashed, recovered, and then crashed again. Market corrections reset the stock averages and made billionaires millionaires and made millionaires start over.

Doomsday apologists, the only religious zealots who would persevere, began announcing Judgment Day on Bourbon St., in the Latin Quarter, in Rembrandtplein, on Kuta Beach, in the Skadarlija district, Taksim Square, and Puerto Banús. Still, no one took them seriously; but no one laughed at them, either.

Mental quirks and tics increased. Scientific journals debated whether there was an increase in the incidence of autism or whether there were just new subcategories, previously unrecognized, applicable to the spectrum. People began claiming they were seeing more ghosts than usual, attributed to a new anxiety state that had its own ICD code.

Suicides spiked due to the tangled web of economic decline.

Children were tested and demonstrated an underlying sadness. Cancer patients became more likely to give up their brave fights for cowardice. An insidious surrender began building that nothing mattered. Crime increased.

Ecosystems faltered, effect begetting cause begetting effect, trickling down, inexplicably, to the life cycles of nocturnal species, in turn influencing all circadian life. The 17-year locusts would never re-emerge. Migratory birds would stake out permanent residences, giving up their nomadic lifecycle and suffering deadly seasonal realities. The fishing industry was decimated in a complex, undecipherable interaction among dozens of species. Dogs didn’t know what had happened, but they didn’t care; cats did, but also didn’t care.

People became different. They quarreled more often and more viciously. Divorce became the expected, natural consequence of marriage, like its anti-sacrament; parenting suffered and delinquency increased. Erudite studies about all the changes were published in learned journals, but it was only speculation.

The next generation would be expected to determine their own spirituality, hollow, and portending poorly for the last churches, which would remain empty. Next, even the hollow personal spirituality would erode away, not even a shell remaining.

There was a lifespan, a life during it, and nothing after it. Self-indulgence became the authenticity of existentialism. It became wrong only to get caught doing wrong. Countless generations had evolved convolutions around the brain to suppress the amygdaloidal thinking of everyone’s private reptile, but the Malaise engendered devolution.

A new paradigm defined success, ambition, celebrity, and worth, inscribed on the caveman’s walls but re-emerging in modernity as the One Commandment:

If you want it, you take it; if you take it, it's yours.

It easily replaced the ten previously handed down from Mt. Sinai.

It was pure luck that ovum # 102,364 was released via ovulation from my mother on that exact day in that exact year and was waved down the ciliated tube to meet a suitable suitor. It could've been any of the other hundred thousand eggs she was born with and, if so, I wouldn't be me.

It was pure luck that spermatozoon #43,438,822 was the exact vehicle to deliver the right exact half of my father's DNA. Had it been any other swimmer, then I just wouldn't be me.

And I really do like me, so I am very lucky.

What if

This wasn't your path all along?

You were made for something bigger

Something better?

What if

The stars are just aligning in your favour

And it's all about to fall in place

Hold tight.