Interlude

Well, since the only inspired things I have to say are attacks, I may as well become a song-and-dance gal, eh? The fat bear in a bowler on a bicycle. Danny-O Pianny-O.

It would be better, is all I'm saying. Harboring bitterness is like holding a cobra by the tail. Sure, it's lithe muscley figure gives you power when it's striking outward, but what about when you're alone with it? When the muscles contract and whip backward, teeth first. And the thing is, those sessions alone with you are what give your bitterness it's bite. So now we arrive at the image of a snake eating itself. Infinity. Hopeless infinity, not wondrous infinity.

Now you see why I should be Danny-O. Because the bear is not bitter. She's a buffoon. She lacks the iron ribcage, sinks inward into drool and blubber. But really, that's a step backwards after all, isn't it? Better to be the cynic. The critic. Bitterness is a crutch. Crutches hurt. So they're a source. That's why it's so easy to depend on them.

What's a step forward? Carson McCullers. Except that she's bounds forward. Not one measley step. The step forward and the step back look so similar when you're standing right there on the path, that's the problem. Either way, the bitterness must leave before it consumes you whole. That is unquestionable. I can't name the step forward, it's so miniscule. We'll just have to say Carson McCullers. She is forward, beautiful.

I remember the first time I understood that not everyone believes that having a beautiful soul is the most important thing in the world. I don't remember the person, but the reverberations are in me still. They manifest as doubt. They have to because I don't understand. If I can't understand, I can't know. Of course, feeding yourself could be the most important thing in the world, if you're more practical. But I'm speaking of ideals, not necessities. Only it's a fact that the two intersect, no matter how much I like to imagine them as parallel. It is not so simple when your family is starving, or being slaughtered, or being fucked out of existence in a million different ways. Generous as I'd like to be, I'm insulated from all that. I cannot speak to it. And if you're insulated like me, and you don't believe in the importance of your soul, then I don't understand you.

Too many of us are too weak to live up to our ideals, though. How did that happen to us? Nature or nurture? I'm learning that questions and writing are useless if you can't live it.