The story is mottled—unclear, like a rain-stained window pane or the
smudged colours of a ripening apple. There are pieces of it,
fragments—a book with pages missing and torn corners; incomplete—as it
should be, really, or as it inevitably always will be; as a story can
never be told in totality: there is always more detail possible to add
and parts omitted.
Memory is never the best testimony
anyways—now you see it, now you don’t—and possibly never will again.
Experience gets lived and lost in a maelstrom of brainstorm, buried in
piles of stones like sea-glass pebbles broken and strewn. Sometimes
hidden—like a bottle within a paper bag; or hermetically sealed, never
again to be revealed. At times, memories glint up from within—glass
prisms of broken glass, barely perceptible, but a reminder they are
there—were there—and have a story to tell.
The copyright of this post belongs to Monica Jenkins
Wednesday 15 July 2015
Wednesday 8 July 2015
Responsibility
We are born into a world of life. We breathe living air, stride upon
living soil, swim in a living sea. The earth yields plants that grow
and nourish its inhabitants.
But we don’t perpetuate life. Like sparks on a leafy forest floor, we ignite and consume; fell trees and smoke the air.
We create death.
We sculpt elephants whilst the real ones are being slaughtered and decimated. We form inanimate objects that don’t require living water to keep cool or clean air to breathe.
The sculptor tips the scales with his artistic thumb and upsets the balance.
We cannot change what is past, regenerate what has perished, or return an accumulated mass to its former state of being.
If we do not govern the Earth, we will be left to guard dead men and sunken treasure.
The copyright of this post belongs to Monica Jenkins
But we don’t perpetuate life. Like sparks on a leafy forest floor, we ignite and consume; fell trees and smoke the air.
We create death.
We sculpt elephants whilst the real ones are being slaughtered and decimated. We form inanimate objects that don’t require living water to keep cool or clean air to breathe.
The sculptor tips the scales with his artistic thumb and upsets the balance.
We cannot change what is past, regenerate what has perished, or return an accumulated mass to its former state of being.
If we do not govern the Earth, we will be left to guard dead men and sunken treasure.
The copyright of this post belongs to Monica Jenkins
Love
What I invented for myself is our love. You were just you— yet
another man on the same earth—another face in a sea of faces—the crowd
of skin and eyes and hair—blurred and nondescript, melded together and
indistinct.
I heard your voice, and your words enticed. I gambled a seed on you—and within your willing embrace, it sprouted. The bud that grew whispered a promise: I would never be alone- never anonymous. Face recognition would yield identity.
Now we water and fertilize this love with horse manure and bull shit. You offer it as a bursary to subsidize my initial loan. Can we persist in our invented bucolic bliss? I want to know the truth, but I’m scared of it.
The copyright of this post belongs to Monica Jenkins
I heard your voice, and your words enticed. I gambled a seed on you—and within your willing embrace, it sprouted. The bud that grew whispered a promise: I would never be alone- never anonymous. Face recognition would yield identity.
Now we water and fertilize this love with horse manure and bull shit. You offer it as a bursary to subsidize my initial loan. Can we persist in our invented bucolic bliss? I want to know the truth, but I’m scared of it.
The copyright of this post belongs to Monica Jenkins
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