The Art Of Unreality

My hand, grasping the pen loosely, traced figures lightly upon the notebook, a tribute to the nothingness in my mind. My hand ached with a purely mental ache, the ache to write something, to write some form of art; nothing normal though, anyone could write a poem or story. There is a capacity within each of us to do anything mediocre. But that was not my objective. My objective was to write something superior to the words of a poet, to write with an elegance and eloquence and fervor unknown to the sidewalk performer. My objective was to create words and worlds that drew her into it, something that grasped her with the reality of unreality.
I sighed. Was it within me to write beauty? I glanced at the notepad. There were a few hearts, some indefinable shapes that somehow seemed to contradict the laws of mathematics. But there were no words, nothing intelligible anyhow. I concentrated. I thought about her, how I felt for her, but still nothing came to mind. I longed to tell her of nothing, of everything. Why could I not do this? Ah, what was this? I had some spark of an idea and began jotting it down. I looked at it. I growled. It was some half-insensible, sentimental piece of garbage. I crumpled it up and threw it down.
I leaned back and let my mind wander. It wandered over unexplored planets, through the outer reaches of the galaxy, until it finally came to rest somewhere in the realm of impossibility. It landed in the world of Love, where everything goes right, and the ending is always happily ever after. That truly was the realm of impossibility. In my life I had never had the propensity for happily-ever-afters. They never worked for me, in my writing, or in my reality. The ending was always some butchered, horrifying truth.
How was love created, I wondered? What was love, and what was the purpose? I half imagined a figure dressed as an executioner. He was standing over his victim who looked about to die. A figure in the shadows sighed.
“Look. Tell us the truth of the matter or we will be forced to play our last card, our last act of torture for which you will want to die because the pain is so great.” (What it was the poor devil was to confess was beyond my writing capabilities, but whatever it was, it was obvious that he wouldn’t give it up.) He sat silently. His head bowed.
The interrogator in the shadows nodded to the executioner. The executioner left the room but returned momentarily carrying a bow and a quiver of arrows. Cupid (for Cupid it was, though he looked nothing like the little baby. Instead, he was a menacing almost demonic looking man) threw back his hood and smirked. He drew an arrow from his quiver and deftly set it to the bow. He grinned maniacally and stared down the shaft of the heart-tipped arrow. He let it fly and it thunked into the poor devil’s head. The victim groaned. Cupid and the mysterious man of the shadows left. The poor devil was left alone with his fate which truly was horrible. He left the place and fell in love, and forever ever after was in constant pain for that love, that ultimate act of torture.
I grinned. It was too close to reality and people don’t read books to immerse themselves in reality. They want to be set down in a world that has a happy ending. They want to live a lie for some short period of time, because that period in their life of that lie is far less painful than the reality.
I sighed. Yes, a lie was far less painful than the reality. So why did I always feel the need to write about truth, about pain, and about love? Was I some sort of emotional masochist? Would I be able to live a full life if I wasn’t in pain? I had done something wrong somewhere. Life was not supposed to be like this. Or maybe I only thought that because of my miserable failures.
I groaned and sighed almost at the same time. I couldn’t do this. There was no way I could write of something wonderful when I didn’t even believe myself that there was anything in anyway redeeming about love.
I unconsciously ran my hands through my hair to make sure there were no arrows sticking out. That would have been so much simpler. Drawing an arrow out of my skull was easier than giving up love. Well, giving up love wasn’t the hard part. The hard part was getting over the one I loved. I wanted to. I had no reason to love. If only there were an arrow to pull out, how much simpler it would be.
I was in a paradox. I wanted to give up love and write of it at the same time. Ah! Life would be so much easier of there were one gender, and everyone reproduced asexually. Why must there be love? Why must there be some sort of universal torture on all man kind? To love love would be sadistic, for love is pain and to love pain is sadism. Something was dreadfully wrong. Had I screwed up in any way? Of course I did. I fell in love. And now, now I was desperately trying to climb out. It seemed, though, that I was swimming further in. There was no answer. One thing I knew; I could not write this love story. I could not write anything of anything that had to do with happily-ever-afters. I needed Someone else. I needed an Author Who could write love in the most unlikely stories.
“Ok God. Here’s the pen. I tried to write romance, but it became horror. You write the story, I’ll enjoy it.”
I got up from the bench and walked away, already feeling a little lighter. Life was easier if you didn’t have to worry about the story.