in the tradition of our species, I’m going to try and tell a story instead of actually facing the horrors straight on. Maybe you know some of it yourself, it’s a common enough one
There was a spiral in the distance, in the clouds one day it seemed it was just a passing thing. What an odd thing the townspeople thought. The clouds never spiraled before. Yet the next day, there were more spirals in the water, and people found themselves dancing spirals on the way to work
the town was soon beset by spirals. Everywhere you went, there was the spiral. At the doctors surgery, the doctor got lost in diagnosis, going back to the beginning and starting again. People saw spirals too, where once there were circles. All the dishes somehow bore the symbol of the spiral now. Noodles seemed to get very popular, and noodles they do spiral you know.
and it was as though a great pointlessness would never be escaped. Was the spiral growing or shrinking? People got caught up in the whirlwind, but nobody really knew why.
and out on the outskirts sat those the spiral had discarded. Those who had found the whole thing absurd from the get go. The spiral was sloppy. The people still caught up saw those sitting at the side, envied them but feared to become them. For sitting still was more frightening still.
How does the story end I wonder. Does it stop as suddenly as it started, with as little fanfair and as little sense? Or perhaps the spiral must consume some flesh to atone for some kind of imbalance, one wonders. When one wonders though, one wanders into the spiral.
The true secret is to be without wonder, without arousal entirely, sit and watch. Maybe as maybe. The spiral is there to consume those foolish enough to engage. The wise would do better to stay away, I think.
But that spiral, it does entwine our eyes and our minds. It scoops up, and once again we find ourselves engaged to the whirlwind. You silly dancers, it’s all for nothing.
There is no maturity but to laugh at our own misfortune. There is no escape but to hope for a hand to pull us out.