Harlequin - clown or buffoon, a mute character in a play or pantomime.
Harlequin lovers, tearing each other apart in their hatred and neglect.
But surely it wasn't always like this?
No, i know there was love there once; and i believe there is love there still, for only out of love is that most intense of hatreds born;
And where has all the happiness gone?
I know not when it dried up, only that it did; and although it shines through from time to time, her smile has largely deserted her;
A wasteland separates them measured only in inches;
And though the sounds of their voices may fail to cross the distance;
He can see himself reflected in her eyes, and he tries to drown it by his own hands;
For he hates, too, what he sees, and it hurts him to see her pain;
And she takes it;
Because she knows, when her voice finally crosses that ocean, dripping with the salts that sting all the more as they slice into his heart, that she hurts him more than he ever will her;
Because she knows him like no-one else;
Because sometimes words will cause more pain than sticks and stones ever will;
And though wounds to the flesh may heal;
Though they may leave a scar;
You know now where you stand, in their eyes;
You know how deep these feelings run;
And though forgiveness may come, that doubt remains in the back of your mind;
Whispering dark truths in your ear;
Forgiveness is their lie;
Because you know;
You know what lies beneath;
And they stay together;
As surely as they tear themselves apart;
Because there was love there once, which i believe is still there;
Twisted and contorted though it may be;
And they stay together;
Because with each other they know where they stand.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
This Deafening Silence
How did it get this far?
He lost his iPod once, and in the dark that followed, without the music rattling about in his ears, the noise began anew. It was a Friday afternoon. Lost, he thought, truly. He'd been so many places that day, far and wide, and he'd shoved it into a pocket so shallow, it could not have sat patiently. It seemed then as though technology were crumbling about him, in his world alone from those about. First his laptop (though to be fair, that was almost a year ago), then the video camera goes missing, and now this. "It's only money," he laughs off to the security guard as he's told nothing has been returned, "when was the last time anybody did anything decent?" Sure, it seems cynical, he's not about to deny it, but then, if he found an iPod on the ground, he'd probably keep it. Why should anybody else be any better?
Still, he dismisses it, as if it were only a minor inconvenience, as if only a small thing had been lost, though it was in fact a whole lot more. Voices inside no longer drowned out, rose up from inside, and he found it hard to breathe.
Actions past, responsibilities present, and consequences on their way took hold in the forefront of his thoughts, and for a moment he is overwhelmed. He stops for a time, eyes tight shut, deep breaths, conjuring a tune, a song that's catchy, to take his mind from that place. He'll try to forget that feeling, hungering for home, to grab a book or a film or a CD, something to in turn grab his attention, to free himself from this silence, and worse what comes with it. Yet still he feels contaminated; so he calls a friend, or few, and more than likely grabs some drinks from the local. And all the night he'll talk, and say nothing at all.
He wanders for a time. This is not to say there was no method to his meanderings, there are places to go, people to see. But it is as if a layer has been stripped from the world, an emotion, a feeling, and left with a void in its place. An almost unbearable quiet, and as he sits on the tram, he takes notice of the world about him. Everyone keeps to themselves, barely allowing eye contact, so many protecting themselves from that unwanted contact with the distance of headphones. There is a silence there so unbearable where contact is discouraged. All of them confined to their own worlds, so close about them, that he wants to scream. He tries to focus instead on the sounds of the world outside, building new music with the drumbeat of the tram over tracks, the bells at each stop, and in time, in the city, he is rewarded. A busker stands on a corner, and plays his guitar to the city's tune, and the boy, he is mesmerized. With pen and paper he writes the joy of it, the sneaking pleasure that feels like eavesdropping on this stranger's thoughts, writing of somebody else's blues...
'I didn't have much to offer
but it didn't seem right
to leave nothing at all
i was, like so many others
held captive by the sounds he created
so filled with hope and sorrow
yet nonetheless uplifting
a beautiful music only rarely accompanied by words
because it didn't need to be...
"Did i tell you'bout my woman?
...There she goes in the dark of the moon..."'
Eventually he got his music back (and as it happened, his camera too), and he stopped worrying, and in time exiled that dark to the back of his thoughts once more, as he buried himself, as always, deeper in distraction.
But soon enough he broke one promise too many, and he found himself back again.
Perhaps he was lost too deep in mindless pursuit, that he thought what he did wouldn't mean as much as it did, that it wasn't as much a problem as it was. That despite the past, he could stay friends with who he shouldn't. That despite the past, he could keep going as he did. That despite the past, he could handle himself.
And for all such selfish and naive reasonings, it fell apart nonetheless.
So now he finds himself lost, and it all his doing. He watched it come, from quite a distance, while warnings fell on his deaf ears, while he made promises he wouldn't keep, though sincere at the time, while the joke became the insult, while he was too caught up with himself to really see it. What he wanted was exactly what he didn't, and what that was, was truth. It turned him inwards, and so blind to what was coming. Trapped inside selfish desires, to keep everything and everyone happy, or what he thought was happy. Perhaps content, or less, on good terms, is more accurate, so afraid of losing anyone, of being thought any less of. And instead it happens, and where it matters most. As it had happened a year ago, it happened again, as he raised his glass in a toast to his own demise, though he didn't know it before, and didn't again.
Retrospect, or history, as they say, has 20/20 vision. And history is a bitch. You cant escape from beneath it, for all that you do, so though time passes, when you slip back into the old ways, it's as fresh as the day it happened. So it is that he finds himself with music, and yet engulfed in a silence worse than when he was without it, for this silence cannot be drowned out. Instead the music fades away, and he's left with that silence as if never interrupted.
Why did he make those promises? Truly, he believed he could keep them. But not then. One week later is when he should have made them. Just one week, and by then the tourists would have come and gone. Just one week, and those promises be kept. But no, confronted by some home truths, he had felt small and sorry for himself, and eager to please, not for the benefit of those around him, but for himself, that he could tell himself he was worth more, because he had convinced them he was. Still, no matter the reason, it is no excuse. He betrayed their trust in that way. Yet somehow he remained blind.
He doesn't hear from them in nearly two months, and in truth, though he tries, they don't want to hear from him either, and all he can do is leave messages, and hope. Still it goes on, and he hopes that more time is all it needs, though he knows it isn't. What he's done since then are in penance, cutting away at what led him here, putting down that glass, erasing those numbers, cutting the lines of communication with the silence he receives now. But perhaps, he wonders, it's too little, too late. So still it goes on, hoping the next apology will find them, that the next time he speaks, it won't just be a message.
That this silence will lift.
He lost his iPod once, and in the dark that followed, without the music rattling about in his ears, the noise began anew. It was a Friday afternoon. Lost, he thought, truly. He'd been so many places that day, far and wide, and he'd shoved it into a pocket so shallow, it could not have sat patiently. It seemed then as though technology were crumbling about him, in his world alone from those about. First his laptop (though to be fair, that was almost a year ago), then the video camera goes missing, and now this. "It's only money," he laughs off to the security guard as he's told nothing has been returned, "when was the last time anybody did anything decent?" Sure, it seems cynical, he's not about to deny it, but then, if he found an iPod on the ground, he'd probably keep it. Why should anybody else be any better?
Still, he dismisses it, as if it were only a minor inconvenience, as if only a small thing had been lost, though it was in fact a whole lot more. Voices inside no longer drowned out, rose up from inside, and he found it hard to breathe.
Actions past, responsibilities present, and consequences on their way took hold in the forefront of his thoughts, and for a moment he is overwhelmed. He stops for a time, eyes tight shut, deep breaths, conjuring a tune, a song that's catchy, to take his mind from that place. He'll try to forget that feeling, hungering for home, to grab a book or a film or a CD, something to in turn grab his attention, to free himself from this silence, and worse what comes with it. Yet still he feels contaminated; so he calls a friend, or few, and more than likely grabs some drinks from the local. And all the night he'll talk, and say nothing at all.
He wanders for a time. This is not to say there was no method to his meanderings, there are places to go, people to see. But it is as if a layer has been stripped from the world, an emotion, a feeling, and left with a void in its place. An almost unbearable quiet, and as he sits on the tram, he takes notice of the world about him. Everyone keeps to themselves, barely allowing eye contact, so many protecting themselves from that unwanted contact with the distance of headphones. There is a silence there so unbearable where contact is discouraged. All of them confined to their own worlds, so close about them, that he wants to scream. He tries to focus instead on the sounds of the world outside, building new music with the drumbeat of the tram over tracks, the bells at each stop, and in time, in the city, he is rewarded. A busker stands on a corner, and plays his guitar to the city's tune, and the boy, he is mesmerized. With pen and paper he writes the joy of it, the sneaking pleasure that feels like eavesdropping on this stranger's thoughts, writing of somebody else's blues...
'I didn't have much to offer
but it didn't seem right
to leave nothing at all
i was, like so many others
held captive by the sounds he created
so filled with hope and sorrow
yet nonetheless uplifting
a beautiful music only rarely accompanied by words
because it didn't need to be...
"Did i tell you'bout my woman?
...There she goes in the dark of the moon..."'
Eventually he got his music back (and as it happened, his camera too), and he stopped worrying, and in time exiled that dark to the back of his thoughts once more, as he buried himself, as always, deeper in distraction.
But soon enough he broke one promise too many, and he found himself back again.
Perhaps he was lost too deep in mindless pursuit, that he thought what he did wouldn't mean as much as it did, that it wasn't as much a problem as it was. That despite the past, he could stay friends with who he shouldn't. That despite the past, he could keep going as he did. That despite the past, he could handle himself.
And for all such selfish and naive reasonings, it fell apart nonetheless.
So now he finds himself lost, and it all his doing. He watched it come, from quite a distance, while warnings fell on his deaf ears, while he made promises he wouldn't keep, though sincere at the time, while the joke became the insult, while he was too caught up with himself to really see it. What he wanted was exactly what he didn't, and what that was, was truth. It turned him inwards, and so blind to what was coming. Trapped inside selfish desires, to keep everything and everyone happy, or what he thought was happy. Perhaps content, or less, on good terms, is more accurate, so afraid of losing anyone, of being thought any less of. And instead it happens, and where it matters most. As it had happened a year ago, it happened again, as he raised his glass in a toast to his own demise, though he didn't know it before, and didn't again.
Retrospect, or history, as they say, has 20/20 vision. And history is a bitch. You cant escape from beneath it, for all that you do, so though time passes, when you slip back into the old ways, it's as fresh as the day it happened. So it is that he finds himself with music, and yet engulfed in a silence worse than when he was without it, for this silence cannot be drowned out. Instead the music fades away, and he's left with that silence as if never interrupted.
Why did he make those promises? Truly, he believed he could keep them. But not then. One week later is when he should have made them. Just one week, and by then the tourists would have come and gone. Just one week, and those promises be kept. But no, confronted by some home truths, he had felt small and sorry for himself, and eager to please, not for the benefit of those around him, but for himself, that he could tell himself he was worth more, because he had convinced them he was. Still, no matter the reason, it is no excuse. He betrayed their trust in that way. Yet somehow he remained blind.
He doesn't hear from them in nearly two months, and in truth, though he tries, they don't want to hear from him either, and all he can do is leave messages, and hope. Still it goes on, and he hopes that more time is all it needs, though he knows it isn't. What he's done since then are in penance, cutting away at what led him here, putting down that glass, erasing those numbers, cutting the lines of communication with the silence he receives now. But perhaps, he wonders, it's too little, too late. So still it goes on, hoping the next apology will find them, that the next time he speaks, it won't just be a message.
That this silence will lift.
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