Monday, September 27, 2010

A Spirit World of Concrete and Glass

Early morning. Evenly gray sky like a single stroke of a brush across the atmosphere. I'm biking along the streets of the outer rim of the city, no cars, no bikes, no people. Only the swirr of the wheels and sense of the earth's powers as I lean to take a corner and experience the soft, powerful feeling of physics in perfect harmony with the metal contraption and my own body. It makes me feel at peace with the world. It makes me feel poetic.
I enter the blocky neighborhood of two-story buildings. The square windows, black in shadows, stare out at me like the gaping void holes where the soul has fled. Their darkness promises solace, sleep and safety. They do not lie, but they are as cold on the inside as the stone is to the touch.
It is the wind that puts me in this mood, perhaps. Like a searching spirit it rushes between the maze of buildings, whirls around the city, voicelessly whispering "where are you?". It blows right through me as if I was a ghost, and I feel its cold touch on my skin and on my heart. "Where are you?"
Perhaps I walk the spirit world. Perhaps there are a dozen people around me, laughing, walking, looking, but I am on the other side of the veil and the cold, sharp air leaves me hearing nothing but my own breath, seeing nothing but my own hands and the canvas, the background, of buildings with gaping dark holes and grave silence.
Nothing moves. The maze is absolutely still as the wind crashes against the walls, writhes and turns and rushes ahead and veers around the corners like a wounded animal fleeing for its life. This is humanity without its bestial side, I think. This is humanity stripped of its nature. Perfect angles that adher to reason and stay utterly, completely still. This is our spirit world of concrete and glass.
Next time I turn a corner there are trees, bowing in the wind, shaking their leaves at me. I stop the bike, feel the forces of physics work with me and against me as I press the breaks, feel rubber against asphalt through the metal frame, and I smile at the trees. They fill my ears with white noise as if to say, don't do this, don't look at the world so hard, just let it be. They are like well-meaning aunts, the trees. Annoying you out of love and concern, while you smile and nod and ignore them.
I think, the spirit world of concrete and glass is a place of perfection. Of absolutely silence, of ethereal beauty, of thoughts and feelings greater than myself. I think, I am the luckiest human alive to get to tap into it like this. It is worth everything.