They have won, you know. I wouldn’t like you to be in any doubt about that. They’ve won so completely that – now – we actually think that we are them. Can you believe that? Everything’s been erased, everything has been rewritten and we are the World’s Greatest Dummies. We are recipients of the prize for Outstanding Gullibility in the Face of All The Odds. Medals have been won in other words; medals have been won and a good time was had by all. ‘It’s all good’, your friend tells you cheerily, ‘life’s never been better and all that kind of stuff’.
Your friend is full of crap though – you do know that don’t you? That old friend of yours is so full of crap. Whenever crap wants to come into existence in this oh-so-well-regulated little world of ours it simply has to use this friend of yours as a conduit. What could be easier? That’s as much convenience has anyone has a right to expect, in my book. Medals have never been won so easily and that’s got to be worth something. Everything’s got to be worth something, surely? Apart from a few things I suppose – apart from the odd thing here and there. Such as the crappy old world that I have built in my head…
What a crappy world that is, huh? You’d wonder what I get out of it. You would wonder why I bother. ‘Well’, you say wisely, after a respectful interval, ‘you bother because it’s meaningful to you. It’s meaningless for anyone else it’s true, but as far as you’re concerned it’s all good!’ Your point is a good one and I will concede it. I’m obliged to concede it – I could hardly do otherwise! The days are long and fruitful and the nights are full of fear. The nights are always full of fear, aren’t they? Full of fear and trepidation, full of barely repressed horror. The Landscape of Fear. The Territory of Unbridled Terror. We all know that territory, don’t we? Tell me about it! We all know that landscape – it is etched forever in our brains, is it not?
What a crappy world, what a crappy world this invented world of mine is. What a wretched charade, fooling no one but myself. Not even fooling myself. Not fooling myself. So bloody awful – shocking really. Can you imagine? Of course you can, of course you can. I’m insulting your intelligence there and I must ask you to forgive me for that. The days are bountiful but the nights are barren, as we all know. Rich are the days and frighteningly impoverished are the nights. ‘Save us from the terrors of the night’, we pray. Such is the way of things – the days are lush and the nights are arid. Such was ever the way, such was ever the way.
Bees buzz from here to there in the sunlit meadows, badgers gamble in their dens. It is day, and all is well. All is ever well. It is Day and the day is full of glory. Ra ascends on his Sektet boat – he sails the Solar Barque in a great arc over the splendour of all existence. The great dome of the sky is intense blue and everything is as vivid as a dream. You don’t know whether reality happened or whether it didn’t happen. Dead things squirm on the ground around your feet; the withered hands of the dead rise from their shallow graves and pluck grimly at the seams of your jeans. The serpent stirs uneasily within the dark earth and then sprouts wings. The phoenix rises from the toxic smoke of the Underworld. The resplendent hawk swoops up into the air. The cicadas sing in unison in the sunlit meadow.
