THERE IS NOTHING LEFT TO SHARE, FOR I SHALL HAVE NO MORE:

Can There Be Any Music Within The Ending Of A World?

These motions hold no meaning o me now, for they hold no power over that which I have left undone, as there is nothing left to share, for I shall have no more.

There is no humanity left in me, for it is taken by the voices, shattered by the silent whispers which now dwell within this place. I can hold nothing in, no living spark, no trace of laughter, no hope for better things to come, as I breathe with the slow, cold breath of anger and despair.

I listen to the deluge of loneliness and destruction, to the cinders of Faith and Justice, burning in the wind. The Time of Trial is come, and none shall sway the workings of catastrophe. I stand apart, cold in the bitter recesses of my soul, tormented by illusion and deceived by calamity. I cannot sing within these Shadows of the Encroaching Dark, for I have suddenly become, that which I most had feared.

CONFESSIONS OF THE LICH QUEEN:

As She Resides Forever In Her Tormented Grandeur:

I am overcome by the notion that the world is not my own. I am tempted by its beauty, and yet, I am none of it. I cannot find my place, that which belongs to me, that which I call my own. I am searching for the Truth; but its very nature is deceptive, elusive and uncanny. I look at the centre of my being, and perceive a hole, an emptiness, a need to fill my lack. This oddly knowing silence makes me wise and willful, both strong and sad.

Here we are given life, and it is everywhere garbed in dismal tatters. Here we are given decadence, and it is everywhere prone to fruitless spoil. Here we are given justice, and it is everywhere a broken ruin, reeking of frailty and decay. We are slaves to our own dark, infernal wills, as the demons of our hearts both continue and consume. I have sickened of it; yet, I will certainly be frustrated by my own monumental failure.

I am half unlife, my tomb conceals the inhuman desires within me, which rave and pine and die, beside the wasted fragments of my weak and insubstantial soul.

BEYOND THE MORTAL SCOPE OF THE HUMAN IMAGINATION:

Offerings, And Other Useless Things:

To capture it, to know it, to love it, to truly understand it, and then to set it free. To let it pass through and beyond you, into something greater; to discover that which is the most important: the knowledge that it has no place in you, that you cannot hold it, mean nothing to it; you belong to the past, while it is the future.

You must let it go, you cannot keep it whole; you must pause to reflect, only then to proceed, to do that which is most hateful and contemptuous. You must learn to love again, to find that laughter that will be, to step away from the tears which have been, to become yourself again.

Offerings, and other useless things, beyond the mortal scope of the human imagination. The knowledge of so many brave and timeless things, comes fitfully unto you; naught but an idle bit of speculation. The darkness creeps upon us once again, under the drowsy poisoned sun, sinking lazily, behind the endless and impossible horizons of tomorrow.

The realizations, the impending discernment, the conceptual totem of spiritual priority, and the vast, deceptive emptiness, which has become a part of me. I have sought out this murky, open grave before; a toothless, darkened maw, hungry for my lifeblood, adrift within the broken seas of human lovingkindness. Behold, ye among you, who have eyes to see, the ever-present ending is at hand; yet for so many of our kind, it remains too close to The Face of the Unseen for our weak and worthless mortal eyes to bear.

THE EPIC AND SPECTACULAR PREHISTORY OF THE NEW AND IMPROVED ADVENTURES OF ALLEGORY AND ITALICS:

The Unmaking of the First Dwelling Place:

We left them dying, punctured, gasping for their last, eyes bulging, tongues swelling, blood leaking from their mortal wounds. We killed so many of their kind; but now, these dying few will be the last.

Once we laboured with them, to build beyond The Righteous Worlds of the First Dwelling Place, but those ages are now long forgotten, swallowed by an unforgiving past. We loved them once, but we cannot give them back even one small portion of the destruction, suffering and torment which they bestowed upon our people for generations, within The Second Years of the Unyielding Strife.

Yet we survived their blackened treachery, and we outlived their dark betrayal: their unholy prayers, their wretched songs, and their many sacred weapons, with which we, The Gifted Ones of the Elder Dawn, were slain for bloody centuries beyond reckoning.

Their shameless, mechanical gods walked, overwhelming and invincible among us, bright and terrible, laying waste to all The Nations of the Shattered Empire; yet we endured the endless torture, and for generations, we were helpless, until we forsook our Sacred Vows of Purity, taking up their fallen tools and foundries, to manufacture wretched metal deities of our own.

Within this epic conflict, The Sixth Ensuing Cataclysm, the very firmament of our helpless worlds were set aflame; our Successive Lines of Sons and Daughters were cast down, ashamed and broken, by these newly fabricated gods. They died upon the blades of their own treachery, as we, The Godless and Forsaken Peoples, fell suddenly upon them, bringing them deliverance and death, without respite or mercy.

Our newly constructed deities consumed them, yet once their gods had been defeated, and imprisoned within The Uncounted and Undying Realms of the Eternal Night, only a very few of us remained; from thence forward, those of us still living are sworn to punish their very memory, and to remove all records of their existence from our past.

Therefore, leaving them for dead, withering and afraid, beneath the frightful poisoned rays of The Now Wearied and Distempered Suns, we labour to complete our final business, within this, our dying world; our sons and daughters taken from us, we too will surly perish, as our false and mindless gods turn now to devour us as well.

OUR POWER LASTS NO LONGER, OUR HOPE IS BUT A MEMORY:

The Horrific Outcome Is Unquestionably The Same:

The art of poetry is dead, in our narcisistic, self-destructive human world. Our potency is gone, our power lasts no longer; our hope is but a memory, and our bleak and bitter destiny, skulks ever closer, breathes us in. We are seduced by its dark embrace, overcome by the malicious, carnal orgy of destruction and renewal.

I am no help; I have no vision, it has passed regretfully away. Devoid of any sense of self, any notion of the real, any cosmic purpose, the horrific outcome is unquestionably the same. A great purge of all emotion, a sacred hearing of all council, of certain action, and of pain, all leading to the one, unavoidable and unthinkable, decision.

The fear, the one burning fear, the living all-consuming fear, and the beautiful tempation. The thought of it, the feel of it, leaves me paralyzed and shivering. I cannot escape the future, I cannot find the light; blinded by the darkness, and eaten by the night.

What is world, and in what fashion is it peopled? What is mind, and in what fashion does it function? What is life, and by what method does this ill-fated love bring us one step further to the end?

For once, long ago, all was right with the universe, all things were grasped soundly, within a magnificent and incomprehensible harmony, fashioned by a single, complete eternity, a channelled, flowing rythem, one continuous chorus of indescribable chaos, purpose, suffering, strangeness and joy.

NOT BY HANDS SUCH AS THESE:

The Innumerable Manifestations Of Sin And Frailty:

Nothing more to stand for, no reason to compete, commit, control or capitulate; no need to continue, no desire to go on, but the torture is vibrant, vast, vivid and voracious in its sultry, never-ending tyranny. The conflict grows, swells into a bulbous putrid mass, groans deeply, heaves repeatedly, and then proceeds to void its bowels, in several explosive and impressive fits.

The lights depart once more, I am a victim of my own desire, entombed by apprehensions and over-expectations, fear and doubt. There is nothing I can tell him of myself, The Hateful Prince of Lies, Insults and Ridicule. He is the beast I am forced to live within, his scathing remarks show across my face: a contorted symphony of grief and shame and pain. I love the beast, for he is mine; but hate him for his knowledge: he knows me, considers me a friend, but devours everything I am.

You will never be human again, you will be changed, changed utterly, as the reflections and demensions of it all find their place in you. Humanity will destroy you; believe in something real.

A gift I give unto you, a passage of grief, of misery, of everlasting pain. A promise I send unto you, of grave intent, of mutually assured destruction. There will be war among the heavenlies, as the folly of the headstrong leads to their own demise.

But not by hands such as these: mortal jealous, corruptible human hands, washed in all the innumerable manifestations of sin and frailty. Pitiable in their useless, infernal rage, devoid of compassion, hope and empathy: deranged, maligned, distraught, the race of men is all but broken, standing only now as a twisted and deceptive form.

I feel ashamed, for the wars will be both great and long, as The Final Cataclysm befalls the world; The Seven Seals, the call of holy silver trumpets, and the ever-present markings worn upon the faces of The Legions of the Fallen.

FALLING FORWARD CALMLY NOW, INTO BRIGHT OBLIVION:

To Protect Your Fragile Ego From Your Overwhelming Id:

I know nothing of what I am, programmed to kill, to torture and to maim. I progress upon the battlefield, inhuman, as I terminate without thought or prejudice. I am the ghost in the machine, awaiting a wayward Shinto priest, dying for rebirth.

He was a puppet and a king, a prophet and a sage, to lead his troubled people from a vast undying age. I have betrayed him, I have turned astray; my faithlessness reaches to the sky: for I have failed, failed utterly, as a terrible mutiny is born.

Give nothing, receive nothing, be cut apart. I am not here to shield you, to protect your fragile ego from your overwhelming id. I am not here to soothe your hurts, your swollen pride, your empty faith, because dear reader, it is you who must grow to be, who must learn to trust again.

I heed the silent call, returning to the vile, repulsive depths of the sickened human maind. I find the doorways open, the hallways filled with steam and seat and tears. I find other peoples there as well, blinking in and out of my existence. I notice their words, how in this black demented world, they somehow become my own.

The pit descends, the match burns clearly in the mist, assuming Heaven unto Earth, as all energy within releases its glistening tethers, which were once employed, holding the universe together, falling forward calmly now, into bright oblivion. The light returns again, the match burns out, the pit and mist are gone, only the overwhelming id remains.

CONFLICT IS THE SORDID SMOKE I BREATHE:

Praying To The Voiceless God I Have Made Myself To Be:

Enraged, befouled, disturbed, I am not to be believed, or pitied, or even understood. I am of embittered temperment, a flawed and disputable expression: a liar and a fraud. I am ill at ease, convinced of my own superiority, deceived by my own dillusions, enslaved by my own haughtiness and pride.

I wish for greatness, but have only fear; I long for recognition, but have only mediocrity; I desire independence, but I am stiffled; I know only pain. I worship at the broken shrine of my own making, praying to the voiceless god I have made myself to be; proclaiming my own resurrection and immortality.

I desire power, but fail myself to respect authority. I thrive on confrontation; conflict is the sordid smoke I breathe; I am not satisfied without the victory, without the trophy I deserve. I despise him, and his creativity, his gift which I shall never have, his gentleness, his confidence. I hate everything that makes him better than I am.

I am so pathetic, insecure, and hopelessly alone; I cannot speak, my hands are bound, by the fear that I am nothing, no one, nowhere -- by worry, hate, indecisiveness and doubt.

THE SHAMBLES THAT REMAIN:

As The Waters Tremble, So Too Do I Fall:

The torn visions opening my mind, stomping through my neural pathways, toward something more vast and incomprehensible. The laughter in my ears, insulting, scuffling, muffled, never-ending. He shines, but whith what light? What secret inner knowledge? What sight of things to come, that shall know better, once hearafter.

I dig a shallow grave, amid the burbling water falls, the droplets clothe me happily, and yet I am afraid; consumed by the pursuit of nightmare: unyeilding, unknown, unrelenting forces of disaster. A shock, a spirit, the thoughts of deeper merit; along with the all-too-certain shame, and the shambles that remain.

O, I would give anything to be there, would give all that I have to know, to stand, to live; to learn to love again. But it has come to nothing, dust and tears, which speak silently, as the waters tremble, so too do I fall. I have become a hateful being; a monster, and a slave. I have fallen. Thus melted, into atoms, a flourish of sulphides and bicarbonates is all that remains of the relentless, simple, tortured man you thought you knew.

I am arisen, for some purpose, that I may yet deceive, and walk unknowingly amonst these little innocents. This is the child, who hates the light; the light which burns, his gentle, tear-filled eyes, into disfigured shards of hate and blindness.