Addiction, Witchcraft & Suffocation

[Matt_the_poet]

Suffocation


“Is it really that unreasonable”, he asked himself, as he reached to open the curtains, “when looking up toward the heavens, to expect to be able to see the sky?” In this place however, at this as at most times of the year, unreasonable is exactly what it was. For reason and rational thought, taking into account the dullness of the light that penetrated the as yet unopened curtains into his room, had led him to the assumption that an all too familiar blanket of unbroken whitish-grey cloud would preclude the sighting of even the merest hint of blue. As the curtain drew back, assumption and perception were two dark clouds merging seamlessly into one.
Blue had always been his favourite colour. He had long since realised that this had little if anything to do with ‘pink for girls, blue for boys’, but owed everything to the inner contentment he felt when staring out into the big blue yonder. A simple and basic, but very powerful intrinsic satisfaction that spoke to him of his place in the universe, not in human terms, but as an organismic element of the ecosystem, a tiny insignificant part of something miraculous and beautiful.
He reflected that whenever he had enjoyed a rare opportunity to look out upon the ocean this feeling had been intensified, heightened by the increased sense of liberation, and he began to understand the passion for sailing displayed by someone whom he had come to perceive as a kindred spirit. The ocean, however, was something he had seen on very few occasions in his life, so it was the sky whom he had befriended.
He recalled lying on a grass bank by a canal one summer’s day many years ago, looking up at a vast expanse of blue for hours on end, observing aeroplanes inaudibly scything through the troposphere on their flight-paths into Manchester Airport, or out to some similarly sun-drenched package holiday destination, leaving matrices in their collective wake, and pondering whether this spoilt the pristine spectacle before him, or made the experience more interesting. A clear recollection of the conclusion he had reached engendered a sense of poignancy; “at least I can see the sky”, he had thought.
How unfortunate for any living organism that perceives itself in those terms to have to live in a place perpetually insulated from the heavens, and the revitalising rays of our beautiful golden sun, by multitudinous layers of smog and a dense whitish-grey duvet of cloud. Suffocation rather than insulation, one might suggest, particularly when surrounded by urbanisation. The natural colours of this majestic planet are blue and green. To be able to see neither had always been, for him, quite literally soul-destroying. Maybe this explained why the inhabitants of this place seemed to him so soulless. Perhaps prolonged alienation from nature had a dehumanising effect, diminishing compassion for fellow organisms, resulting in other life becoming seen as competition or food, nothing more.
During this period of recollection and contemplation he had become aware that the late afternoon winter sun was beginning to set. “How unfulfilling; to be aware of the sun’s presence, to perceive it slipping away, without ever being able to actually see it”. And with it, of course, slipped away any hope of being able to transfix his gaze upon a sliver of blue that might be revealed by a chink in the clouds’ armour, at least for today. He reminded himself that the mornings can often be clearer, with clouds closing-in in the afternoons, and chastised himself for lack of regulation of his circadian rhythms.

His thoughts turned to her, no longer a daily occurrence but still far more frequent than he cared to admit to himself. ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned’ they say. They, those blighted men from time immemorial, certainly know what they are talking about. Still fortunate enough never to have had his heart broken, it had however been his misfortune to be responsible for the breaking of said organ on more than one occasion. Upon the termination of two of his previous relationships, the legitimacy of this proverb had been hinted at sufficiently to render him guarded and wary when the time came to effect a clean break from her. So much so that he flagged-up his intention to do so, elucidated his reasons, and explicitly stated the timescale over which his decision would come to fruition, thus providing her with an opportunity to hasten the impending finality and enter into it on her own terms, or at least get used to the idea, rather than be subjected to a sudden life-altering shock. Quite magnanimous, he felt.

And get used to the idea she did, eventually. All contact was to be broken, at least for a while, (several months as a minimum), at the end of the summer when they would each return to university well over a hundred miles apart to complete the final year of their respective courses. Perhaps a close friendship might ensue, once graduation had been achieved by both. With Euro 2004 taking place the following summer, they might arrange to meet at an outdoor big-screen in city-centre Birmingham, and enjoy a glorious England victory together over drinks on a sunny summer’s evening. She would even be welcome to stay in one of the spare rooms at his house for a while, if her plans for the summer permitted, but the requirement for clarity of thought necessitated a clean break until then. Nine months. One academic year. Reasonable and sensible, he felt.

Reasonableness and sensibleness were not on her agenda. The rationality of the decision was not important, not to her. The only important aspect of this decision-making process concerned, not the decision itself, but which of them was making it. Once it took effect, the resultant totality of the separation meant his decision was tantamount to a rejection. If she was being rejected, he must have come to view her as worthless. The only logical interpretation was that she was being scorned, if you are a woman that is, whom we all know have been proved incapable of rational thought! He must pay. “You can’t just pick me up and put me down, and decide when you want me in your life and when you don’t”, she had warned. “I’m going to use your friends against you. I’ll say and do whatever it takes to cause you enough pain for you to realise how much pain you’re causing me.”

To destroy a man’s reputation, his friendships, his only support network if he had no family to fall back on, surely that would be an unforgivable act of cruelty that would threaten his mental stability. Knowing how gullible men can be when attractive women hold sway, to say that he was concerned would be to monumentally understate. He was terrified.
Attractive women can manipulate men, and because they can, they do. It is a fact of life. As the benevolent Duke in Shakespeare’s ‘Measure for Measure’ so nobly enunciated, the truly powerful man is the man who has the power over himself to choose not to exercise that power which he has over others. How unfortunate that so few among us possess such capacity for restraint.

He had been with her throughout the period of her realisation that she held this power to manipulate, maybe he had even been the first to furnish her with it, and he had witnessed, perhaps unwittingly caused, her metamorphosis from a beautiful, sweet and apparently innocent young woman into an ugly, calculating, manipulative sorceress. Only when her outward veneer of subjective beauty had become totally transparent, revealing the ugliest elements of her character within, had he been able to remove himself from under her spell. Two of his friends lived in the same city as she, and he knew how susceptible to her persuasion they would be.

As he swallowed a mouthful of the supposedly strawberry flavoured protein shake he’d prepared during a brief sojourn at the kitchen, acquired to keep his strength up in the face of the paranoia-stress-anxiety-depression induced loss of appetite that had seen him attenuated to an all-time low adult bodyweight, he clearly recalled that when he had referred to her as being lovely, “you make me lovely”, she used to say, “no one else thinks I’m lovely”. He reflected on how he had been with her at times, how she had made him, and concluded that she had brought out the very worst in him, sides of himself unseen by anyone before, unknown even to himself.

Not wanting to dwell on the feelings of melancholy engendered by these recollections, from which there seemed no escape, he tried to focus on the positivity of being emancipated, free to bestow on another the affection that she had consumed like a potent and highly addictive drug, and had continued to abuse and misuse long after she had ceased to experience the rush. It now seemed their entire relationship had been imbued with narcotic qualities; intoxicating in small doses, compulsive and ultimately injurious. Her self-proclaimed obsession turned out to be as unhealthy as that description suggested.

The reflexivity afforded him by the recording of thoughts, formulated into a short story, was having an encouragingly cathartic effect. He could almost feel his animosity dissipate a little more with every stroke of the pen. He found being able to work through what had transpired in this to some extent detached way somewhat liberating, perhaps evidence of the shackles having been removed. He wondered if a re-emergence of his enthusiasm for life might follow. With his faith in human nature severely diminished, withered by a sense of betrayal induced by the actions of people he once considered friends, the damage she had done was still debilitating.

Self-deprecating thoughts re-entered his consciousness, but were superseded, not by reproachful introspection as had been the case for so long, but by a determination to find someone who might bring out only the best in him. Someone worthy of the best in him, who would not look down on him from the pedestal upon which she was placed, if there be a creature with such humility in this world? As for her, perhaps she had forgotten that Love is a doing word, rather than simply a descriptive label, or perhaps she had latterly become thoroughly disingenuous in her use of the word? He wondered whether she might even have been deceiving herself as much as him, though he felt this would probably be an unduly lenient view. Perhaps she had convinced herself that she hated him, and sought to punish him for the wrongs he had perpetrated? She had certainly been unable to let go, like an addict experiencing withdrawals, lashing out and thrashing around with no regard for the damage she might cause.

He consoled himself with his ability to inspire such passion in another, even in the face of the evident discovery that pure love, when no longer requited, had the capacity to transform itself into pure hatred, and project itself with seemingly greater force than ever before. He knew that if he got his way, and it would be for the best for both of them if he did, he would probably never see her again.
He had been sitting in the big, comfortable armchair beside his bed, thinking, feeling, remembering and writing for a little over three hours, his room now illuminated by only the unnatural light emitted from his bedside lamp. His story was finished, and encapsulated everything that had been seeking a form of expression. He wondered whether posting it might provide a sense of closure, if not now, one day perhaps? His stomach had been rumbling remorselessly throughout. “That’ll do”, he thought, “Time for dinner.”










Witchcraft

Happiness
I’ve heard of it, I even thought I’d found it once or twice.
Maybe it’s a myth, an unattainable state to strive for?
In conscious sleep, to suffer is to strive
But now I am awake; suffering is for suffering’s sake.

Hatred
I’m living it, the destroyer of hope and beauty.
Never underestimate, when Love turns to Hate,
The destructive desire of the sorceress,
But does the witch deserve to die, by drowning or burning at the stake?

Suddenly it’s hard to breathe, and I’m wondering what it’s like to feel no pain.
Suffering intensified, reality out of reach; I’m wondering if I’ve gone insane.

The reign is over but it’s still raining, when will it ever end?
Do I blame the witch and her evil pitch, or my indoctrinated friends?

[Rena Hands]

You are missing some spacing between the first five paragraphs.

To destroy a man’s reputation, his friendships, his only support network if he had no family to fall back on, surely that would be an unforgivable act of cruelty that would threaten his mental stability. Knowing how gullible men can be when attractive women hold sway, to say that he was concerned would be to monumentally understate. He was terrified.
Attractive women can manipulate men, and because they can, they do. It is a fact of life. As the benevolent Duke in Shakespeare’s ‘Measure for Measure’ so nobly enunciated, the truly powerful man is the man who has the power over himself to choose not to exercise that power which he has over others. How unfortunate that so few among us possess such capacity for restraint.

You have missed a space here between these two paragraphs if it is your intention to make them two separate paragraphs.

A most creative illustration. Your selection of vocabulary was extremely ingenious. This excerpt reminded me of John Polidori’s The Vampyre.

Example: His peculiarities caused him to be invited to every house; all wished to see him, and those who had been accustomed to violent excitement, and now felt the weight of ennui, were pleased at having something in their presence of capable of engaging their attention.

The two poems fitted very well with the story.