prayers to aliens

if theres anything i feel strongly about its that any novel worth its weight in digiglyphs should have prayers in it

so heres prayer number thirtynine

 

                  dear aliens

                  we know a lot of us have been suckerpunched by lines like

                                    a little lower than the angels

                                    made in the image of god

                                    subdue the earth

the goal of the human soul is conquest perfection security superiority

the human subject is active and therefore exercises agency while the nonhuman object is passive thus nature and nonhuman animals are available for human exploitation

humans are intentional rational premeditated while animals are instinctual

unless you become a warrior youll be crushed and forgotten

humans are exceptional due to their superior language and toolmaking capacities

humans are manifestly the highest rung of the animal order

oh alieni

we know you laugh at us

we diminish oppression in one sector only to transfer it to another

we do and think the most horrible and irrational things and then surround them with virtuous clichés and this confidence game is society

we narcissistically believe whonymitys more entitled than other creatures and artifacts

we accomplish nothing but destruction but are so inept we cant restrain ourselves even when weve lost faith in our accomplishments

we know our institutions loves families religions philosophies arts actions attitudes thoughts are built from the elemental particles of fear deception indolence and greed and stories and ideas so infantile were wholly unworthy of the comforts that grace our lives and the walls that keep the darkness out

were endlessly fascinated by our lives  our every petty joy and misery  that new pimple on our butt  and care more for the comfortable cat that suddenly appears by our back door than we do for the millions of animals we incarcerate torture slaughter and devour each year

we are a worthless and disgusting species  not even a blip in geological time or a modified register in the consciousness of the universe

 

and the aliens shrug and briefly materialize

from their abstract geometric planes & games

and vaporize the one who prays

fog & fog talk in fog about fog

there is nothing for you here but madness

but there is nothing for me there but madness

so where will you go

here there  there here

you go to madness

i am always here

madness is always with us

what is madness

madness is herethere

madness is the going that has gone

hello nothing

hello madness

hello hello

here but you is for there

amen

for some say that order is the way

and others chaos

and neither right

and both right

yet who could walk both and neither?

and the path of trying is the path of madness

and the path of seeing but not trying is also the path

and the path of neither trying nor seeing is madness

and the madness that is not madness is also the path

there is no path outside the path for all is path

and this is madness

there is sky and land and sea and fire

but they are dead in our hearts

we have kept them alive technically

they are dead in our hearts

the gap between coitus and dream

this is madness

the wheel that re-turns

this is madness

the dove and the oil

this is madness

the word that has forgotten how to fly

this is madness

the the that keeps theing

this too is madness

here we are

in the this and the here and the the

we shall win a prize

from the society of the nonexistent

and it shall be called onk

the prize of onk shall be ours

we shall place it high on the shelves of our soul

and dust it like rare italian marble

we shall call ourselves those of onk

and those who disdain us shall call us onkists

and there shall be a war

between the onkists and the yoophians

between the onkists and the uffuls

between the uffuls and the yoophians

between all and all

and this is madness

let us go to sleep

for we have exhausted the possibilities

but rather we have not exhausted the possibilities but they have exhausted us

for the night has gone and day is here and it is time to sleep

for we no longer know how to distinguish day and night

and this is madness

and this is the dusting

and this is madness

and here we are  the last poets

the last poets are always the last

and this is madness

we seek fog like others seek light or money or love

nothing for us here but fog

and fog is the wheel

and the wheel is the sea

the sea the hello

the hello the prize

the prize the sleep

let us sleep

and this is madness

and this is sleep

this is sleep

dao de jing xii

the five colours make a human’s eyes blind

riding and hunting make its mind go wild with excitement

goods hard to come by serve to hinder its progress

the five tastes injure a human’s palate

the five notes make its ears deaf

hence in her rule the sage is for the belly not for the eye

therefore he discards the one and takes the other

dear twelves,

feed the people. don’t let them get hungry or thirsty. give them clean water and sufficient shelter. provide them with entertainment poking fun at remote leaders and providing hope that the human will become something other than itself. show them love as some soft cuddly attainable thing. separate good and evil and let the former vanquish. mute their senses and dull their minds. put them in front of screens from the earliest age and in desks as soon as possible. teach them to behave and to be good citizens and not to question too much and to obey authority and to put actions in one place and words in another, for such compartments are necessary for an orderly life. destroy wildness and incarcerate enthusiasm. blind vision and make values tools of sedation. let education be a process of conformity and the home a fortress of coddled fear. numb all excess and thinking, eradicate the imagination, discard vitality

indulge your appetites, enforce order, and adapt your behaviour, emotions, attitudes and thoughts to the dominant social environment in which you find yourself

work it out that on occasion when a true work of art or an outsider of some sort manages to get past the barriers of acceptability and be heard that their subversive messages and forms will be transformed through money and abstraction such that they will not be heard, that through their success they will be brought into the happiness of the dominant, and the people will laugh at themselves without realizing it or effecting any change