Sorrows of a Young Man

The sorrows of a young man in the city, being a palimpsest of Goethe's Werther.

Tuesday, September 09, 2003

What made you happy

Is it possible that what made you happy turns into the source of greatest pain?

The complete and warm feeling for nature and everything that was getting into me, filling me with a lot of pleasure, lifting to heaven everything surrounding me... it's now a shadow, hunting me down, torturing me wherever I go. When I was watching the people on the street walk by, watching them dress in different clothes and walking their different walks (all equally proud of the differences)... when the loud cars were driving by and I heard kids screaming and running around, always being watched by one of their parents (or the big sister)... and when I felt the warm air mingling with that noise and I knew everyone passing by had a place to head to, and a reason to go on walking... when I was sitting like this and leaning back and sipping my coffee, which would touch my lips, fill my mouth, run down my throat, and warm my belly. And when I got up and stretched myself and smiled at the people and paid my bill, and when I got my stuff and was lighting a cigarette and raising my head up to the sky... and my eyes follow that bird, it lands on the roof of that gray house, and its shadow must be falling somewhere, I'm not sure where but it's not doing any harm (and the bird's all happy, like me)... and there's thousands of things moving, endlessly moving! And all the things moving are just a little part of the big thing, the one thing, holding them together, giving them direction, motivation, meaning... in every village and big city, in every pub, in every office, coffee house, in every traffic jam, on every corner on every dark street... when I wanted to get up the tallest building and see how things keep crawling, black little spots in blurred gray, endlessly moving... and I wanted to close my eyes and feel the one thing keeping them in motion.

Long time ago, it seems. Now I can't get back that feeling. Can't for my life get back to it and know it so badly that it just makes me suffer more. Can't find joy in that motion. The movement stopped and became an eternal grave. Wax figures in front of me. And they're standing on the stage. And the curtain is closing. And I realize I'm the only one in the audience. And I can't get out of this place. Can't leave my seat, which probably tries to eat me up like some monster. Forgot how I came here, and if I paid to get in. And the seats begin to shake, but I can't feel too much. And the lights dim, or I'm drunk. Maybe the world around me died already and I wouldn't notice. Right here there might be someone out there about to kill me. Such are the ways of nature, which brings forth nothing but destruction. I grab the red cushion of the seat in front of me. Maybe, just maybe I'm safe – but the show stopped, and there's nothing I could do to make it start again.


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