Shadows of the Soul in Furious Loneliness

We are each characters in our own sagas; between the stories others perceive you in and the stories you perceive yourself in, which analysis is truer? Is it so obvious that they are your own? Is one the best authority on one's own identity? This is not the pertinent question. The real question is: in such epics, is there even a difference between true and false? Events of the outside can be false of course, things such as "I did/didn't do that," or "She carved a void in my soul."

Internal events however, cannot acquire a sense of falsity, and if I am compiled of internal events only, how I can begin to comprehend another on the inside. Is that an event that ever comes to an end? Is the soul a place of truth? Or are these truths deceitful shadows of the self? Is our yen to connect with another simply to satiate ourselves of solitary experience? Is what torments us unattainable feelings? Feelings such as sitting at a polished Steinway and knowing only your own fingertips can play Beethoven despite not being able to play the piano? Is there a need to experience things from within in order to narrate and navigate our soul more accurately?

Is it a fundamental question of the self–the fateful identity we created for ourselves long ago of what we must've accomplished and experienced so that it would be a life we could approve of in the end? This approval must be coupled with a freedom to do as we please. The fear of death is then of this foretold identity being unfulfilled; this is completely within our power for we can draw the image of our life as it was personally ordained to be actualized. What is more apparent than this is that we can change this image such that it fits our identity as we deem appropriate. If this is successful, the fear of death should dissipate completely, and if it doesn't, it's because the self-image (which we alone have created) rises not from the fluxing identities we have to deal with (both by ourselves and with others), but that it's anchored in us and grows out of our control by forces that serve to assist changing identities of who we thought we were or could be. Ergo, the fear of death is the fear of not being able to become who we'd planned to be. 

Everyone dies alone, thus the root of these fears must be loneliness. Can it be that everything we do is done as an exodus from lamenting solitude? Is that why we renounce our rues only at the end of our life? Is that why people so seldom say what they're thinking? Why else would we hold on to unfaithful lovers, unrequited beloveds, false friendships, and boring social obligations? What would happen if we refused these and ended the perpetual blackmail of social responsibilities? If we allowed these enslaved wishes and the fury of our oppressions to rise as high as a mountain peak? For this dreaded solitude, what does it truly consist of? Is it the silence of possible absent consequences? Of not requiring to dredge through the minefield of deceitful relationships and friendly half-truths while holding our breath in the face of sophistry? Why? For the freedom not to have anyone across from us during meals? For the linearity of time that yawns when the onus of responsibility falls silent? Aren't those beautiful things? Isn't that the paradise Dante dotes upon? So why do we fear it? Is it a fear that exists solely because we haven't thought through its end? A fear that we've been talked into by thoughtless parents, ignorant teachers, and dogmatic politicians? Why are we so sure others wouldn't envy us when they gaze upon our ascended freedom? And in that, wouldn't they seek our company? Wouldn't they then, seek to be as free as us? Wouldn't they seek to discover this freedom with us, and serve to make us mask our loneliness with love?

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Reflection; Odilon Redon; Pastel on Paper

An Open Letter to Prime Minister Harper

To the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, the twenty-second Prime Minister of Canada, as written on June 16th, 2015.

I have retained your rank of “right” and “honourable” despite not agreeing that you are either because I hold my beloved country in an esteem that transcends petty words and ranks; our laws and designators stand for something more than profits for corporations and the slithering propaganda your party is privy to. I respect our laws where you do not and I believe in the history of this country where you do not.

Others call me a nationalist and I respond in the affirmative because Canada is something to be proud of. Yes. I am from Canada. Yes my country is great. Yes I am indeed proud of it. … At least I used to be. This emulates an average conversation I used to have with an American or a European… used to, Right Honourable Stephen Harper. I used to but no longer. Now I laugh when others, under your tyrannical hand and clever propagandists, say Canada is great. I laugh until I find myself weeping with despair at what my country has now become. The center for violations of human rights and privacy and the environment; you have made us a nation of death that bleeds black.

Why? Your assistant is thinking after having read and vetted this letter before handing it to you if at all; I wonder if your eyes can even read something other than hefty bank account balances and corporate tax-break forms.

Every day I take the VIVA blue from Yonge and Finch northbound to visit my mother and sister in Richmond Hill. I've been taking this route for nearly a decade; I know every tree, every storefront, every bus driver, every shade of grey of the pavement, and every snowflake that weaves through the sky during our long lasting winters. Every day, I see a Canadian flag perched high during this route and every day, I bow my head for a moment and contemplate it. I muse upon its historical significance, from the Union Jack variation in 1957 to Lester B. Pearson's monumental decision to shift away in 1964 and establish the flag that represents our home and native land, the symbol of pride and dignity and grandeur. Every day I fall in love with this flag, this symbol that I would happily bleed for to make sure the maple leaf stays red, every day except today. I shudder when I see it behind you when you speak in a press conference.

Today you made me a second-class citizen, demoting me to the ranks of Egyptian slaves and brutes and animals that wake up every day with plans to threaten our way of life. Today you stand apart from the rest of our prime ministers as one that I am not proud of, but am ashamed of. You hold in your hands the power to guide our nation to a light henceforth unseen by any other in civilization and yet it seems you are content with settling for the easy way out… since when did Canada become a nation to adhere to such values and take the easy way out? Since when has Canada shrunk in the corner in shame because our citizens can no longer hold up their chins with their fists in the air and scream the slogan of our most famous lager? Since when have I stopped screaming "I AM CANADIAN" at other travellers I meet in Europe or in the United States like a person insane and drunk with a love of his own country? Since today.

I ask you, what is next? Am I now to have a designated drinking fountain at parks and restaurants separate from yours? Do you seek to establish Canada as a bigoted, extremist, and separatist state rather than the one we have been known for until you came to power? One of inclusion, plurality, progression, and prosperity? I inquire why you are to against the great pluralism of our nation that has made us who we are. Have you forgotten the 3rd Canadian Division on that fearful day on the sands of Juno Beach on June 6, 1944? Have you forgotten that our divisions had penetrated further than all of the other allies? These were Canadian too, Right Honourable Stephan Harper, how many of them of them under your law are now second-class citizens? The soldiers that have bled for you? Have you forgotten the Battle of the Scheldt and our liberation of the Netherlands? Our great drive and hospitality to the Dutch Royal family, especially on January 19, 1943 where their flag was hung proudly atop our Peace Tower to celebrate the birth of Princess Margriet, the only time a foreign flag was waved on top of one of our parliament buildings, a place I am sure that you pass every day on your way to work to ostracize our country from the rest of the developed world.

I am well aware that you are not ignorant of the history of our nation, but I doubt whether you are interested in keeping Canada progressive and educated, rather than passing laws and speaking like the enemies you seem to despise; enemies that seek to destabilize our values and support systems… do they not segregate those they have lived with for so long? Do they not destroy the identities of those they could've called their friends had someone not labeled them as “different”? They are succeeding, and it is by your hand. A single law that oppresses us guarantees their victory.

Am I Canadian? You seem to think I am not and have been working with passionate disdain to make sure of this. Am I not Canadian despite having lived in this near-perfect nation for two decades? Have I not met and loved people? Have I not learned from the learned? Have I now experienced the infinite joys our country has to offer? Are those moments destroyed now that I am no longer Canadian? I serve the country and not you. I am at its beck and call and I will gladly wear an armband on my bicep or a stamp on my passport to segregate me from the woman I have loved, the friends that have now become family, and the flag I'd gladly die for if it means my heart remains Canadian. A Canadian’s heart is a red Maple Leaf and not a black oil drill or a shaded drone plane, Right Honourable Stephen Harper. You will never change that no matter how hard you try.

A first-class Canadian no matter what you or your ignorant and indoctrinated supporters think.

With cordial respect and eternal belief in the Maple Leaf,

Bruce Crown, a Canadian patriot.

Cc. Chris Alexander: the Shameful Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.  

The Nature of Psyches

The wind howled until sunrise, seeming to converse with him in a waltz of hope, despair, agony, and faith, and although he knew deep down he could never get her back, he liked thinking he could, part of the natural, albiet elusive self-deceptions all humans abide by to further their survival. But the thought only lasted so long before the hard truth of present realities crashed down at his feet near the poplar he'd been standing beside. He was beset by the ironies of his life, hoping that he wouldn't be so hopeless in the attributes of his character, of his soul, and of his mind.

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Kuinji, Archip; “La ronda di notte”