Soliloquies of Mahinda Vito

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
shall lure it back to cancel half

a Line, nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it. O, but they say, the tongues of dying men enforce attention, like
deep harmony: where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain: for they breathe truth, that breathe their
words in pain. he, that no more must say, is listened more than they whom youth and ease have taught to gloze;
more are men’s ends marked, than their lives before: the setting sun, and music at the close, as the last taste of
sweets, is sweetest last; writ in remembrance more than things long past. And thus I clothe my naked villany with
odd old ends stolen out of holy writ; and seem a saint, when most I play the devil.
SOLILOQUIES.
Of Mahinda Vito
SOLILOQUIES of Mahinda Vito
I
Hello world
Hope you’re listening
Forgive me if am young
For speaking out of turn.
Heard you could see your future
Inside a glass of water
Or even fish the moon out of it.
Heaven bend to take my hand
And lead me through the fire.
Truth be told I’ve tried my best
But somewhere along the way
I got caught up in all there was to offer.
I messed up, sunk so low, better I should know
But don’t come round here and tell me I told you so.
We all begin with good intent,
Believing we could change ourselves,
The past could be undone.
We carry on our backs the burden,
The wound that would not heal,
It’s the bitter taste of losing we hold so dear.
I’m lost to all those I though were friends,
To everyone I know.
Heaven bend to take my hand,
There is nowhere left to turn.
II
Some cost a passing bell, some a light sigh,
Some merry and sad to tell.
If there were dreams to sell, what would you buy?
I remembered you with my soul clenched
In that sadness of mine that you know
Never say I was false of heart
All men fault, and even I in this.
Loathsome canker lives in the sweetest bud
Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud
In sweet silence I summon memories past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
Drowning my eyes, moaning a vanished sight.
Shall I look upon myself and curse my fate?
Desiring that man’s this, and the other’s that.
A disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,
How soon we forget, the pen was lifted and the ink has dried.
So let those in favour with their stars boast,
In themselves their pride lie buried,
I hope and pray that a sweet thing turn not sour by my deeds
III
Leave me my blamer
For the sake of the love that unites your soul
With that of your beloved one.
Go and leave me to my own.
Leave me to sail in the ocean of my dreams,
For tomorrow is free to do with me as he wishes.
I have a little heart within me,
And I like to bring him out to my palm and pour out his secrets.
So aim not your arrows lest he takes fright.
I want to free myself from the quilted slumber of wrong.
Do not detain me, my blamer.
Cavil me not by mention of the lion in the forest
Or the snakes of the valley, for my soul knows no fear of earth.
Sit not up high and point your finger,
For calamities have opened my heart,
Tears have cleansed my eyes,
Errors have taught me the language.
Talk not of banishment, for conscience is my judge
And he will justify me,
And protect me if I am innocent, and deny me if I am criminal.
Disturb not my contrition, my blamer, let me walk.
Relate not the tales of wealth and greatness,
For my soul is rich with bounty, and great with God’s glory.
Speak not of kingdoms, for the whole earth belongs to God,
And from Him we come, and verily is our return.
Go from me, my blamer.
V
Whatever you do, you need courage.
Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you
That you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to
Believe your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it
To an end requires some of the same courage that a soldier needs.
Peace has its victories, but it takes brave men and women to win them.
- MY EPIPHANY (CHIRI) 01.07.09
VI
A crowd is not company,
And faces are but a gallery of pictures,
And talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love.
Friend after friend depart, who hath not lost a friend?
There is no union here of hearts that finds not here an end.
But my friend is my needed answer.
The field upon which I sow with love, and reap with thanksgiving.
He is my board, my fireside.
Doubles my joys and cuts my grief into half.
I came to him with hunger, and seek him for peace.
When he speaks his mind I fret not the ‘nay’ in my mind nor do I
withhold the ‘ay’.
In silence I cease not to listen, for even without words, all is shared, with
joy unacclaimed.
When I part from him I grieve not, for that which I love the most in him
is clearer in his absence.
He is but for the deepening of my spirit, for my best is for my friend.
He knows the ebb of my tide, and so its flood as well.
For what is your friend that you seek him with hours to kill?
Seek him with hours to live. For it is his to fill my need, and not my
emptiness.
In the sweetness of friendship there is laughter, there is pleasure,
For in the dew of little things, the heart finds its morning.
VII
I am not sorry for my soul, that it must go unsatisfied,
Eternity is deep and wide, for it can live a thousand times.
But o my body, back to a drift of dust it must go without knowing the joy
It longed to know. Could you believe this is the body of one that loved?
Well, wishing and the crime are but one, says the abbot, heaven punishes
Desires as the deed were done. If wishing damns us, you and I are damned
To all our hearts content, coffers filled with tears when heaven repels our
Prayers.
With all my will, much against my heart, we must part.
My very dear, our solace is the sad road that lies ahead so clear,
It need no art, with many a tear in our opposed paths to persevere.
Despite it all, it’s not merely the frost or the heat spell that determines
Which trees grow on the mountain. So remember to help goals reach the
People for one or two wills will interest all though not for all. I have no
Secrets to confide, I don’t know what to tell you, just don’t lose that
Smile.
When skies are gray and you are blue, remember to give thanks, it’s the
Secret to success as you travel your mile.
VIII
Chasing pleasure, running away from pain i learn. In tears, deep inside it
Fed me only to starve me, what can i do but paint my smiles, and light
Fools. Some have been running, probably all their lives, but if you ask me,
Nobody gets to escape their pain. It’s there when you brush your teeth at
Night, it’s there before breakfast, it will come piercing and sharp, recline
On you, blunt and heavy. I have learned the subtle difference between
Holding a hand and chaining a soul. That love doesn’t mean leaning and
Company doesn’t mean security. That kisses aren’t contracts and presents
Aren’t promises. slowly you begin to accept your defeats with your head
Up and your eyes ahead, with the grace of an adult, not the grief of a
child, and the most you can hope for is one good day, because on a good
day you get to tell yourself “I can fix this, today something might be
different, today something might change” Then you learn to build all
your roads on today because tomorrow’s ground is too uncertain for
plans, and futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight. Am i living
For pain? Is it all I’ve got, do i stay up afraid it will slip away? Keeping me
up from my dream! Thereafter you learn that even sunshine burns if you
get too much. So pleasure helps you to forget, but pain, pain forces you to
hope, you tell yourself “this cant last, today could be different, today
something just might change” So you plant the garden in your soul,
instead of waiting for someone to leave you flowers. Slowly you
adapt,endure; become strong, you learn your worth. And you learn, and
you learn With every glance in the crowd, with every smile, with every
goodbye you learn.
IX
Anyone who imagines that bliss is normal is going to waste a lot of time
Running around shouting that he has been robbed. The fact is that most
Putts don’t drop, most beef is tough, and most children grow up to be just like
People, most successful marriages require a high degree of mutual
Toleration and most jobs are more often dull than otherwise. Life is just
Like an old time rail journey ... delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders,
And jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling
Bursts of speed. The trick is to thank the God for letting you have the
Ride. Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes
Your way, and to give thanks continuously. And because many a thing
Have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in
Your gratitude. I'm making a list, I'm making a list of things I must
Say For politeness, and goodness and kindness and gentleness Sweetness
And rightness: In the end, though, maybe we must all give up trying to
Pay back the people in this world who sustain our lives. In the end,
Maybe it's wiser to surrender before the miraculous scope of human
Generosity, and goodwill and just keep saying thank you, forever and
Sincerely, for as long as we have voices, for we can only be said to be alive
In those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. So I
won't grieve for what doesn't come. Some things that don't happen keep
Disaster from happening. I won't complain, I won’t explain. Giving
Thanks for abundance is sweeter than the abundance itself. For the good
Deed usually done by those on whom I have no claim I forever remain
Grateful, I would thank you from the bottom of my heart, but for you my
Heart has no bottom. (Gratitude)
X
A beautiful heart is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases
And into nothingness never passes.
A sleep full of sweet dreams,
For a loving kindness was the great man’s fame.
Of the souls you left behind still, one teaches us to find you,
Of the sorrows you turned to joy,
Spites to passion, Shames to glory.
Though wisdom fled away, you taught better.
So I sit and ponder in silence,
Raising the present on the past, for him I sing.
But the hours are long, sore and heavy to the heart
Since that last breathe rocked you to sleep.
Dreams of joys to part, waking leave me broken hearted.
But thou was to me a beloved,
For which many did pine, a dream too bright to last.
The rest of the days are trances,
And all nightly dreams are where your eye glances.
Unnumbered souls breathe out a still applause
For once the soldier all men adored.
Your pains who to express? Toll on your passing bell,
Ring out my woeful peal,
O this cruel hap, I must taste this misery.
I must go, uncertain of my fate,
In circles I shall return, in a time not so far follow your party,
A word, a look, will never be enough for the tears of joy that stream
down my face. Think of me, left in the light,
From the endless calm of your dawnless night.
I keep your memories close at heart
Proud to behold you in your country’s eyes
Till long life over, I too depart,
To the dreamless sleep where you keep thoughts of me,
To the soft infinite night where you are.
Farewell my beloved. Farewell (Unforgotten)
XI
Many, if not all believe that the main aim in life is to follow a plan. Never
asking whose plan is it. They accumulate experiences, memories, things,
other people's ideas, and down the road, right about the bend, they forget
their dreams. How many do you know or heard say: I've never done what
I wanted? Well, at some point, they must have known what it was that
they did want. As for life, let it not be just a story that other people tell us
about the world and about how we should behave in it. It must be borne
in mind and spirit that the tragedy of life doesn’t lie in not reaching your
goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach. It isn’t a calamity to die
with dreams unfulfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream. It is not a
disaster to be unable to capture your ideal, but it is a disaster to have no
ideal to capture. It is not a disgrace not to reach the stars, but it is a
disgrace to have no stars to reach for. Success is never final nor failure
fatal, but low aim is sin. How terrible is it a thing to be happy? How
pleased we are with it! How all-sufficient we think it! How, being in
possession of the false aim of life, happiness, we forget the true aim, duty!
Like all else we have a hierarchy of values; pleasure is at the bottom of
the ladder, and you speak with a little thrill of self-satisfaction, of duty,
charity, and truthfulness. You think pleasure is only of the senses; the
wretched slaves who manufactured your morality despised a satisfaction
which they had small means of enjoying. You would not be so frightened
if I had spoken of happiness instead of pleasure: But I will speak of
pleasure, for I see that men aim at that, and I do not know that they aim
at happiness. It is pleasure that lurks in the practice of every one of your
virtues. Man performs actions because they are good for him, and when
they are good for other people as well they are thought virtuous: if he
finds pleasure in giving alms he is charitable; if he finds pleasure in
helping others he is benevolent; if he finds pleasure in working for
society he is public-spirited; but it is for your private pleasure that you
give two coins to a beggar as much as it is for my private pleasure that I
drink and eat some more. I, less of a humbug than you, neither applaud
myself for my pleasure nor demand your admiration. The fact remains
that getting people right is not what living is all about anyway. Even
worse are those people who say: I'm happy because I'm sacrificing my life
for those I love. And do you think that the people who love us want to
see us suffering for their sakes? Fight your superficiality, your
shallowness, so as to try to come at people without unreal expectations,
without an overload of bias or hope or arrogance. Well, many a time
People aim for the stars, and they end up like goldfish in a bowl. I
wonder if it wouldn't be simpler just to teach children right from the
start that life is absurd. I know not if this earth on which I stand is the
core of the universe or if it is but a speck of dust lost in eternity. I know
not and I shouldn’t care if at all. For I know what happiness is possible to
me on earth. And my happiness needs no higher aim to vindicate it. My
happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end. It is its own goal. It is
its own purpose.
XII
Roads Go Ever On, over rock and under tree, by caves where never sun
has shone, by streams that never find the sea; over grass and over stone,
and under mountains in the moon, the Roads go ever on. Under
cloud and under star. Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone, and I must follow, if I can, pursuing it
with eager feet, until it joins some larger way, where many paths and
errands meet. But who can say what's best? That's why you need to grab
whatever chance you have of happiness where you find it, and not worry
about other people too much. My experience tells me that we get no
more than two or three such chances in a life time, and if we let them go,
we regret it for the rest of our lives.
The Road goes ever on and on Down from the door where it began. Now
far ahead the Road has gone, and I must follow, if I can, pursuing it with
weary feet, until it joins some larger way, where many paths and errands
meet. And whither then? I cannot say. The Road goes ever on and on Out
from the door where it began. Now far ahead the Road has gone. Let
others follow, if they can! Let them journeys new begin. But I at last with
weary feet will turn towards the lighted inn, my evening-rest and sleep
to meet. Still round the corner there may wait a new road or a secret
gate, and though we pass them by today Tomorrow we may come this
way and take the hidden paths that run towards the moon or to the sun.
Home is behind the world ahead and there are many paths to tread
Through shadows to the edge of night until the stars are all alight then
world behind and home ahead We’ll wander back to home and bed Mist
and twilight, cloud and shade Away shall fade! Away shall fade! Fire and
lamp and meat and bread and then to bed! And then to bed! Half the
night I waste in sighs, Half in dreams I sorrow after The delight of early
skies; In a wakeful dose I sorrow For the hand, the lips, the eyes, For the
meeting of the morrow, The delight of happy laughter. The sweet smell
of a great sorrow lies over the land plumes of smoke rise and merge into
the leaden sky a man lies and dreams of green fields and rivers but
awakes to a morning with no reason for waking
XIII
In times of grief and sorrow I would hold her and rock her
And take her grief and make it my own.
When she cried I cried and when she hurt I hurt too.
But in her eyes was a silence, a most frail gesture that enclosed me,
Which I could not touch.
Love, anger, sadness, promise, and fear, whirling together.
Does she want me to be happy? But if she could, would she?
But what can I do, a slave, to my fate is shackled
For when love beckons to me, I but follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep,
I marvelled at the softness of her skin,
The gentleness I saw in her eyes.
Keep your secrets; Keep your silence dear heart
It is better a gift than truth…
Upon dreary rainy nights I pondered, weak and weary,
over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore.
I try to hold back the tears and despair,
But I can listen no longer in silence.
As she pierce my soul with agony and hope.
I thought of her, called her an angel.
Painted her image with colours celestial.
Made her into a vision so beautiful that it can only live in the mind.
The way her breath escaped her lips when touched.
How her eyes close and her jaw tightened as she gave pleasure a home.
If only these thoughts could save a life
So sad that we will never … And this too shall be gone forever.
...And then I felt sad because I realized that I was broken
Never be fixed.
XIV
Years steal Fire from the mind as vigour from the limb, and life's
enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim. We say we love the truth, but
in reality we want to believe that which we love is true. We live our lives
on a ledge. Surprisingly it takes little to push us over, but Never let
success hide its emptiness from you, nor achievement its nothingness, toil
its desolation. And so...keep alive the incentive to push on further, that
pain in the soul which drives us beyond ourselves. Some have too much,
yet still do crave; little have I, and try to seek no more: They are but poor,
though much they have. Am I rich with little store? When we're
incomplete, we're always searching for somebody to complete us. When,
after a few years or a few months, we find that we're still unfulfilled, we
blame our partners and take up with somebody more promising. This can
go on and on until we admit that while a partner can add sweet
dimensions to our lives, we, each of us, are responsible for our own
fulfilment. Nobody else can provide it for us, and to believe otherwise is
to delude ourselves dangerously and to program for eventual failure. For
When we are mired in the relative world, never lifting our gaze to the
mystery, our life is stunted; we are filled with yearning for that paradise
that is lost when, as young children, we replaced it with words and ideas
and abstractions of merit, of past, present, and future - our direct,
spontaneous experience of the thing itself, in the beauty and precision of
this present moment. Well, Stories, they point you in the right direction
but they can't take you all the way there, because people crave the beauty
of not-knowing, the excitement of suggestion, and the sweet tragedy of
mystery as it glimmers in the night sky. Identification is why the reader
reads and why the writer writes. We all want to identify with a
character, so that we can, in turn, identify with ourselves. Do you have
yourself all figured out? Is your self-knowledge so complete? We delight
to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but
completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation. It is not out
of compliment that lovers keep on telling one another how beautiful they
are; the delight is incomplete till it is expressed. Do you know yourself so
well that you'll never do anything stupid or make a fool of yourself?
When it comes to knowing ourselves, we are incomplete, lacking, and
deficient. Each of us is our own ongoing problem until the day we die. If
there is a state where the soul can find a resting-place secure enough to
establish itself and concentrate its entire being there, with no need to
remember the past or reach into the future, where time is nothing to it,
where the present runs on indefinitely but this duration goes unnoticed,
with no sign of the passing of time, and no other feeling of deprivation or
enjoyment, pleasure or pain, desire or fear than the simple feeling of
existence, a feeling that fills our soul entirely, as long as this state lasts,
we can call ourselves happy, not with a poor, incomplete and relative
happiness such as we find in the pleasures of life, but with a sufficient,
complete and perfect happiness which leaves no emptiness to be filled in
the soul.
XV
I glanced at her and took my glasses off—
They were still singing.
Her voice belled forth, and the sunlight bent. I felt the ceiling arch.
Dark burly hair and the breathtaking eyes,
Her inquiring glance that left me undone
"I am your own way of looking at things," She whispered.
"When you allow me to live with you, every
Glance at the world around you will be
A sort of salvation." and I took her hand.
(Sigh!) The day I met my muse.
But time does not bring relief; you all have lied
who told me it would ease me of my pain!
I miss her in the weeping of the rain;
I want her at the shrinking of the tide
But that last bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, with old thoughts abide.
A hundred places I fear to go –
So with her memory they brim.
And entering with relief some quiet place
where never fell her foot or shone her face
I say, 'There is no memory of her here!'
And so stand stricken, so remembering her.
And the dead leaves lie huddled and still,
No longer blown here nor there;
the last lone flower is gone;
the heart is still aching to seek,
But the feet question 'Where?'
Ah, when to the heart of man
was it ever less than treason
to go with the drift of things,
to yield with a grace to reason,
and bow and accept the end
of a love or a season?
XVI
These bloody days have broken my heart,
my lust, my youth did them depart.
For your wit alone many men would bemoan,
and since it is so, many still cry aloud.
It is a great loss that you are dead and gone,
a time you had above your poor degree,
before whereof your friends may well bemoan,
a rotten twig upon so high a tree has slipped your hold
and you are dead and gone.
These bloody days have broken my heart,
my lust, my youth did them depart.
And blind desire of ambitious souls,
who haste to climb, seeks to revert and about the throne
the thunder rolls.
These bloody days have broken my heart…
- THOMAS WYATT
XVII
Seven times I have despised my soul:
The first time when I saw her being meek that she might attain height.
The second time when I saw her limping before the crippled.
The third time when she was given to choose between the hard and the
easy, and she chose the easy.
The fourth time when she committed a wrong, and comforted herself
that others also commit wrong.
The fifth time when she forebode for weakness, and attributed her
patience to strength.
The sixth time when she despised the ugliness of a face, and knew not
that it was one of her own masks.
And the seventh time when she sang a song of praise, and deemed it a
virtue.
- KHALIL GIBRAN
XVIII
They flee from me that sometime did me seek
with naked foot stalking in my chamber.
I have seen them gentle, tame, and meek,
That now are wild, and do not remember
That sometime they have put themselves in danger
To take bread at my hand; and now they range,
Busily seeking with a continual change.
Thanked be to Fortune, it hath been otherwise
Twenty times better; but once in special:
In thin array, after a pleasant guise,
When her loose gown did from her shoulders fall,
and she me caught in her arms long and small,
Therewith all sweetly did me kiss
And softly said, "Dear heart, how like you this?"
It was no dream, -I lay broad waking.
But all is turned, thorough my gentleness,
Into a strange fashion of forsaking:
And I have leave to go of her goodness,
And she also to use new-fangledness.
But since that I unkindly so am served,
I would fain know what hath she now deserved.
- THOMAS WYATT
XIX
Only once in your life, I truly believe, you find someone who can
Completely turn your world around. You tell them things that you’ve
Never shared with another soul and they absorb everything you say and
Actually want to hear more. You share hopes for the future, dreams that
Will never come true, goals that were never achieved and the many
Disappointments life has thrown at you. When something wonderful
Happens, you can’t wait to tell them about it, knowing they will share in
Your excitement. They are not embarrassed to cry with you when you are
Hurting or laugh with you when you make a fool of yourself. Never do
they hurt your feelings or make you feel like you are not good enough,
but rather they build you up and show you the things about yourself that
make you special and even beautiful. There is never any pressure,
jealousy or competition but only a quiet calmness when they are around.
You can be yourself and not worry about what they will think of you
because they love you for who you are. The things that seem insignificant
to most people such as a note, song or walk become invaluable treasures
kept safe in your heart to cherish forever. Memories of your childhood
come back and are so clear and vivid it’s like being young again. Colours
seem brighter and more brilliant. Laughter seems part of daily life where
before it was infrequent or didn’t exist at all. A phone call or two during
the day helps to get you through a long day’s work and always brings a
smile to your face. In their presence, there’s no need for continuous
conversation, but you find you’re quite content in just having them
nearby. Things that never interested you before become fascinating
because you know they are important to this person who is so special to
you. You think of this person on every occasion and in everything you
do. Simple things bring them to mind like a pale blue sky, gentle wind or
even a storm cloud on the horizon. You open your heart knowing that
there’s a chance it may be broken one day and in opening your heart, you
experience a love and joy that you never dreamed possible. You find that
being vulnerable is the only way to allow your heart to feel true pleasure
that’s so real it scares you. You find strength in knowing you have a true
friend and possibly a soul mate that will remain loyal to the end. Life
seems completely different, exciting and worthwhile. Your only hope
and security is in knowing that they are a part of your life.
- ROBERT NESTA MARLEY
"Forgiveness is not about forgetting. It is about letting go of

another person's throat......Forgiveness does not create a
relationship. Unless people speak the truth about what they
have done and change their mind and behavior, a relationship of
trust is not possible. When you forgive someone you certainly
release them from judgment, but without true change, no real
relationship can be established.........Forgiveness in no way
requires that you trust the one you forgive. But should they
finally confess and repent, you will discover a miracle in your
own heart that allows you to reach out and begin to build
between you a bridge of reconciliation.........Forgiveness does
not excuse anything.........You may have to declare your
forgiveness a hundred times the first day and the second day,
but the third day will be less and each day after, until one day
you will realize that you have forgiven completely.
XX
Ah, love, let us be true to one another! The world, which seems to lie
Before us like a land of dreams, so various, so beautiful, so new, Has
Really neither joy, nor love, nor light, nor certitude, nor peace, nor help
For pain; on the surface, I was calm: in secret I was waiting for
Something. Her return. How could I have been waiting for that? So must
One be resigned to being a clock that measures the passage of time? Must I
Go on living here then, among the objects we both had touched, in the air
She had breathed? In the name of what? In the hope of her return? I
Hoped for nothing, and yet I lived in expectation. Since she had gone,
That was all that remained. I did not know what achievements, what
Mockery, even what tortures still awaited me. I knew nothing, and I
Persisted in the faith that the time of cruel miracles was not past, when
Life was sweet because you called it sweet. O my brethren Love is a fire,
But whether it is going to warm you or burn you, one can never tell. It
Takes courage to love, the world is indeed full of peril and in it there are
Many dark places. But still there is much that is fair. And though in all
Lands, love is now mingled with grief, it still grows, perhaps, the greater.
So be not afraid of pain that you shut yourselves up like clams in a shell
And, giving out nothing, receiving nothing and therefore shrink until life
Is a mere living death. It is a decision, it is a judgment, and it is a promise,
Not only a feeling. For if it were there would be no basis for the promise
To each other forever. A feeling comes and it may go. How can I judge
That it will stay forever, when my act does not involve judgment and
Decision? If only it were possible to love without injury – fidelity isn’t
Enough: many a time you will be faithful and yet injure another. The
Hurt is in the act of possession: we are too small in mind and body to
Possess another person without pride or to be possessed without
Humiliation. Always, everywhere, there is some voice crying from a
Tower. In secret we meet, in silence we grieve, that our hearts could
Forget, and our spirits deceive, but we are born to love as we are born to
Die, and between the heartbeats of those two great mysteries lies all the
Tangled knots of our tiny lives. There is nowhere to go but through. And
So we walk on, lost, and lost again. So be with me always - take any form
- drive me mad! Only do not leave me on this endless street, where I
Cannot find you! Oh, God! It is unutterable! I cannot live without my life!
I cannot live without my soul
XXII
What is family, If not the people who claimed you? In good, in bad, in
parts or in whole, they were the ones who showed up, who stayed in
there, regardless. It wasn't just about blood, but something wider,
something bigger. I have had many families over time. Of origin, one I
created, and the groups you moved through while all of this was
happening: friends, lovers, sometimes even strangers. None of them
perfect and I couldn't expect them to be. I couldn’t make any one person
my world, but only take what each could give and build my world from
it, so forgive me if I am not an angel, I am just a small boy in a big world,
please don’t tell me where I want to go, not just any road will lead me
there. I could will myself to earn my bread without dignity and hope, or I
could earn my bread like a man who commanded respect. But I have a
vision that will live forever; they were my family, and God my punisher,
some will groan over their sins, but I accept mine. What is obvious to a
child is that life is simply a collection of little lives, each lived one day at
a time. That each day should be spent finding beauty in flowers and
poetry and talking to animals. That a day spent with dreaming and
sunsets and refreshing breezes cannot be bettered. But most of all, I
learned that life is about sitting on benches with my hand on her knee
and sometimes, on good days, for falling in love. But well, some things
don't last forever, but some things do. Like a good song, or a good book,
or a good memory that you can take out and unfold in your darkest times,
pressing down on the corners and peering in close, hoping you still
recognize the person you see there. But o, what a wicked world it is that
drives man to sin.
(Che cosa è la famiglia, se non la gente che vi ha sostenuto? Nel bene, nel
male, in parte o in tutto, erano quelli che si presentò, che rimase lì, a
prescindere. Non è stato solo di sangue, ma qualcosa di più ampio, qualcosa
di più grande. Ho avuto molte famiglie nel corso del tempo.D'origine, ho
creato uno, e dei gruppi si è spostato attraverso mentre tutto questo stava
succedendo: amici, amanti, a volte anche sconosciuti. Nessuno di loro è
perfetta e non potevo pretendere che siano. Non ho potuto fare una sola
persona il mio mondo, ma solo ciò che ciascuno possa dare e costruire il
mio mondo da esso, quindi perdonatemi se io non sono un angelo, io sono
solo un ragazzino in un grande mondo, per favore non dimmi dove voglio
andare, non solo ogni strada mi porterà lì. Potrei verrà a me stesso di
guadagnarmi il pane, senza dignità e la speranza, o potevo guadagnarmi il
pane come un uomo che incuteva rispetto. Ma ho una visione che vivrà per
sempre, erano la mia famiglia, e Dio mio Punisher, alcuni gemito per i loro
peccati, ma accetto la mia. Ciò che è ovvio per un bambino è che la vita è
semplicemente un insieme di piccole vite, ognuno ha vissuto un giorno alla
volta. Che ogni giorno dovrebbero essere spesi trovare la bellezza nei fiori e
nella poesia e parlando con gli animali. Quel giorno trascorso con il sogno
e tramonti e di brezze rinfrescanti non può essere migliorato. Ma più di
tutto, ho imparato che la vita è di circa seduti sulle panche con la mia
mano sul suo ginocchio ea volte, nei giorni buoni, per innamorarsi. Ma
anche, alcune cose non durano per sempre, ma certe cose fanno. Come una
buona canzone, o un buon libro, o una buona memoria che è possibile
portare fuori e si sviluppano in tempi più oscuri della tua, premendo sugli
angoli e peering in stretta, sperando di riconoscere la persona che si vede
lì. Ma o, quanto un mondo malvagio è che spinge l'uomo al peccato.)
XXIII
Life moves on, whether we act as cowards or heroes. Life has no other
discipline to impose, if we would but realize it, than to accept life
unquestioningly. Everything we shut our eyes to, everything we run away
from, everything we deny, denigrate or despise, serves to defeat us in the
end. What seems nasty, painful, evil can become a source of beauty, joy, and
strength, if faced with an open mind. Every moment is a golden one for him
who has the vision to recognize it as such. The consolation of fairy stories,
the joy of the happy ending; or more correctly, the good catastrophe, the
sudden, joyous "turn" (for there is no true end to a fairy tale); this joy, which
is one of the things that fairy stories can produce supremely well, is not
essentially escapist or fugitive. it is a sudden and miraculous grace, never to
be counted on to reoccur. It does not deny the existence of sorrow and
failure, the possibility of these is necessary to the joy of deliverance. Giving a
fleeting glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief.
We who fight for our dreams suffer far more when it doesn't work out,
because we cannot fall back on the old excuse: 'Oh, well, I didn't really want
it anyway.' We do want it and know that we have staked everything on it.
When we first begin fighting for our dream, we have no experience and
make many mistakes. The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to
get up eight times. So why is it so important to live our personal calling if we
are only going to suffer more than other people? Because, once we have
overcome the defeats--and we always do--we are filled by a greater sense of
euphoria and confidence...If you believe yourself worthy of the thing you
fought so hard to get, then you become an instrument of God, you help the
Soul of the World, and you understand why you are here. But along the way
you will be required to do wrong no matter where you go. It is the basic
condition of life, to be required to violate your own identity for the struggle
is always worthwhile, if the end be worthwhile and the means honourable;
foreknowledge of defeat is not sufficient reason to withdraw from the
contest, but there is suffering in life, and there are defeats. No one can avoid
them. But it's better to lose some of the battles in the struggles for your
dreams than to be defeated without ever knowing what you're fighting for.
Well, the future of the world no longer disturbs me; I leave that to God. Not
that I have acquired more confidence and faith in human wisdom; the
contrary is true. Life is atrocious, we know. But precisely because I expect
little of the human condition, man's periods of felicity, his partial progress,
his efforts to begin over again and to continue, all seem to me like so many
prodigies who nearly compensate for monstrous mass of ills and defeats, of
indifference and error. Catastrophe and ruin will come; disorder will
triumph, but order will too, from time to time. Peace will again establish
itself. The biggest defeat in every life is to forget, especially the things that
have done you in, and to die without realizing how far people can go in the
way of crumminess. When the grave lies open before us, let’s not try to be
witty, but on the other hand, let’s not forget, but make it our business to
record the worst of the human viciousness we’ve seen without changing one
word. When that’s done, we can curl up our toes and sink into the pit. That’s
work enough for a lifetime…… when Narcissus died; the Goddesses of the
Forest appeared and found the lake, which had been fresh water,
transformed into a lake of salty tears. "Why do you weep?" the Goddesses
asked. "I weep for Narcissus," the lake replied. "Ah, it is no surprise that you
weep for Narcissus," they said, "for though we always pursued him in the
forest, you alone could contemplate his beauty close at hand." "But..... Was
Narcissus beautiful?" the lake asked. "Who better than you to know that?"
the Goddesses said in wonder, "After all, it was by your banks that he knelt
each day to contemplate himself!!" The lake was silent for some time. Finally
it said: "I weep for Narcissus, but I never noticed that Narcissus was
beautiful. I weep because, each time he knelt beside my banks, I could see, in
the depths of his eyes, my own beauty reflected."
XXIV
Did you ever, as a little child, endure your parents’ warnings, only to wait
for them to leave the room? When you were big enough to cross the street,
did you ever wait for a signal, hear the frenzied approach of a fire truck and
feel like stepping out in front of it? When you were almost grown, did you
ever wonder if the expected rush might somehow fail you? And now, do you
ever dangle your toes over the precipice, and dare the cliff to crumble? I
never thought but, for you, and for any dear to you, I would do anything. If
my career were of that better kind that there was any opportunity or
capacity of sacrifice in it, I would embrace any sacrifice for you and for those
dear to you. So try to hold me in your mind, at some quiet times, as ardent
and sincere in this one thing. The time will come, when new bonds around
you shall be formed about you–ties that will bind you yet more tenderly and
strongly to a home you will so adorn–the dearest ties that will ever grace and
gladden you, with the little picture of a happy father’s face looking up in
yours, when you see your own bright beauty springing up anew at your feet,
think now and then that there is a someone who would give a life, to keep
the life you love beside you!
FROM THE CORNER OF HIS EYE
Not one day in anyone’s life is an uneventful day, no day without profound
meaning, no matter how dull and boring it might seem, no matter whether
you are a seamstress or a queen, a shoeshine boy, or a movie star, a
renowned philosopher or a Down’s-syndrome child. Because in every day of
your life, there are opportunities to perform little kindnesses for others, both
by conscious acts of will and unconscious example. Each smallest act of
kindness—even just words of hope when they are needed, the remembrance
of a birthday, a compliment that engenders a smile—reverberates across
great distances and spans of time, affecting lives unknown to the one whose
generous spirit was the source of this good echo, because kindness is passed
on and grows each time it’s passed, until a simple courtesy becomes an act of
selfless courage years later and far away. Likewise, each small meanness,
each thoughtless expression of hatred, each envious and bitter act, regardless
of how petty, can inspire others, and is therefore the seed that ultimately
produces evil fruit, poisoning people whom you have never met and never
will. All human lives are so profoundly and intricately entwined—those
dead, those living, those generations yet to come—that the fate of all is the
fate of each, and the hope of humanity rests in every heart and in every pair
of hands. Therefore, after every failure, we are obliged to strive again for
success, and when faced with the end of one thing, we must build something
new and better in the ashes, just as from pain and grief, we must weave
hope, for each of us is a thread critical to the strength—to the very survival
of the human tapestry. Every hour in every life contains such often-
unrecognized potential to affect the world that the great days and thrilling
possibilities are combined always in this momentous day.
- D.K
XXVI
Why can't we get all the people together in the world that we really like and
then just stay together? I guess that wouldn't work. Someone would leave.
Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say good-bye. I hate good-
byes. I know what I need. I need more hellos. Good-byes always hurt,
pictures never replace having been there, memories good or bad always
bring tears, and words can never replace those feelings, So Promise a kiss on
my brow when I am dead. For we laughed until we had to cry, we loved
until we said goodbye, and to say goodbye is to die a little. But if you never
stop when you wave goodbye you just might find, if you give it time, you
will wave hello again. Well as you trod along don’t concern yourself with
being right in others’ eyes. And don’t secretly hope that their lives will fall
apart so that your opinion will be vindicated. Instead, concentrate on
obeying God in your own life and, when possible, helping others to obey
Him as well. You don’t have to prove others wrong to continue on your
course. This is not a goodbye, my darling, this is a thank you. Thank you for
coming into my life and giving me joy, thank you for loving me and
receiving my love in return. Thank you for the memories I will cherish
forever. But most of all, thank you for showing me that there will come a
time when the world shall throw us apart and afar, and someday I can
eventually let you go, and I shall have to plant my own garden and decorate
my own soul instead of waiting for someone to bring me flowers. I close my
eyes, thinking that there is nothing like an embrace after an absence,
nothing like fitting her face into the curve of my shoulder and filling my
lungs with the scent of her. In time, in time they tell me, I'll not feel so bad.
I don't want time to heal me. There's a reason I'm like this. I want time to set
me ugly and knotted with loss, marking me. I won't smooth you away.
Gather the stars if you wish it so, the songs and keep them, the faces and all
the years, for I can't say goodbye.
THE DREAM
A man lay on his bed at the end of his life waiting to die.
His dream came to pay his last respects
and bid farewell to the man who had never used it.
As it entered the room the man looked down in shame.

“Why did you not realize me?” the dream asked.
“Because I was afraid,” the man said.
“Afraid of what,” said the dream.
“I was afraid I would fail.”
“But haven’t you failed by not attempting to use me?”.

“Yes I did, but I always thought there would be tomorrow.”
“You Fool!” said the dream” Did it never occur to you
that there was only ever today? The moment that you are in right now?
Do you think that now that death is here

that you can put it off until tomorrow?”.
“No”, said the man, a tear gently rolling down his cheek.
The dream was softer now, because it knew that there were two types of
pain,
the pain of discipline and the pain of regret,
and while discipline weighs ounces, regret weighs pounds.
Then the dream leant forward to gently wipe away the tear and said,
” You need only have taken the first step
and I would have taken one to meet you,
for the only thing that ever separated us
was the belief in your mind that you couldn’t have me”.
Then they said goodbye and they both died.”
- MARK BAKER
XXVIII
White lines that never fade

she live here in a photograph
No sound and no regrets
She lies down alone but she don't mind
Questions that never breathe
She makes herself at home
God it's better than her place
She loves the little things
God we all need something,
Walking Through a hallway with a broken light
I can't relate to a world that only knows her by her face
She’ll marry the night Dance with the pain, she doesn’t mind.
More footsteps to hold onto and corners to be turned
like weeping violins, she trembles and she shakes.
She talks in her sleep like there's nothing more to lose.
Late again Guilt free in the middle of the pouring rain
Hair's a mess she said would you mind if I spent the night alone?
‘Cause she can’t dwell on the future for its miles away,
A long hallway with a broken light.
She takes her clothes off and she says
is it alright if I stay the night?
I don't remember what I said, is it alright?
It must been around midnight, There's a ghost at the door
She said please go slowly because we've all been here before.
3am she's upset, it’s not you and it never was packs her things she's gone where?
That place I'll never know, I awake to a letter, saying everything was a mistake.
It's never alright to push away, and I'm tired of all that is
and I know that this time it's not all in my head,
She look a little unhappy, 'bout the way the world is turning
is there anything I could do to take your mind off
your troubled hearted kind? And she whispered maybe, just maybe.
'Cause I understand, I could tell everything's not fine
The colours on the wall, are all faded And all that's left is a hope for another day.
XXIX
Listen to the mustn’t, my friend. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn’t,
the impossible, the won’t. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me...
Anything can happen, my friend. Anything can be. There is neither
happiness nor unhappiness in this world; there is only the comparison of one
state with another. Only a man who has felt ultimate despair is capable of
feeling ultimate bliss. It is insane but somewhat necessary to have wished for
death in order to know how good it is to live, the sum of all human wisdom
will be contained in these two words: Wait and Hope. You have brains in
your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction
you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And you
are the one who'll decide where to go, for there is no greater agony than
bearing an untold story inside of you. As for success and failure, we all are
well conversant with the tale of the man and his dream. Success is not final,
failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts. Well, if you
think you are a failure, you probably are. What's wrong with that? In the
first place, if you've any sense at all you must have learned by now that we
pay just as dearly for our triumphs as we do for our defeats. Go ahead and
fail. But fail with wit, fail with grace, fail with style. A mediocre failure is as
insufferable as a mediocre success, and as for I, I only dare to fail greatly to
ever achieve greatly. And if you're very, very lucky, there are a very few
blazing hot little pains you feel when you realize that you are standing in a
moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth
which at the same time cannot possibly last - and yet will remain with you
for life. Everyone is down on some pain, because they forget something
important about it: Pain is for the living. Only the dead don't feel it. Do your
utmost, for it is a part of life. Sometimes it's a big part, and sometimes it isn't,
but either way, it's a part of the big puzzle, the deep music, and the great
game. Pain of struggle does two things: It teaches you, tells you that you're
alive. Then it passes away and leaves you changed. It leaves you wiser,
sometimes. Sometimes it leaves you stronger. Either way, it leaves its mark,
and everything important that will ever happen to you in life is going to
involve it in one degree or another, but don’t be like So many people who
walk around with a meaningless life. They seem half-asleep, even when
they're busy doing things they think are important. This is because they're
chasing the wrong things, so Go forward in life with a twinkle in your eye
and a smile on your face, but with great purpose at heart, for The purpose of
life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and
without fear for newer and richer experience. I was always of the mindset
that whatever will be, will be. We can only just try to control our own lives,
that because our lives are so hopelessly entangled in the choices of others,
we can never have full control over our destiny or fate or purpose or
whatever you want to call it, We plan our lives according to a dream that
came to us in our childhood, and we find that life alters our plans. And yet,
at the end, from a rare height, we also see that our dream was our fate. It's
just that providence had other ideas as to how we would get there. Destiny
plans a different route, or turns the dream around, as if it was a riddle, and
fulfils the dream in ways we couldn't have expected. So my friend, unto the
giver of life, the Owner of the day, pray for strength, for a straight back and
clear eyes, so when life fades, as the setting sun, your spirit may come to
Him without shame
XXIX
How can I lose faith in the justice of life, when the dreams of those who
sleep upon feathers are not more beautiful than the dreams of those who
sleep upon the earth? Advance, and never halt, and do not fear the thorns in
the path, for they draw only corrupt blood. Bake not bread with
indifference, for you bake bitter bread that feeds but half mans hunger, for
what are your possessions but things you keep and guard for fear you may
need them tomorrow. You often say,’ I would give, but only to the
deserving. The trees in your yard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture.
They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish. Surely he who is
worthy to receive his days and his nights, is worthy of all else from you. And
he who has deserved to drink from the ocean of life deserves to fill his cup
from your little stream. Oftentimes have I heard you speak of one who
commits a wrong as though he were but a stranger unto you, an intruder
upon your world?
But I say that even as the holy and the righteous cannot rise beyond the
highest which is in each one of you, so the wicked and the weak cannot fall
lower than the lowest which is in you also.
And as a single leaf turns not yellow but with the silent knowledge of the
whole tree, so the wrong-doer cannot do wrong without the hidden will of
you all. Like a procession you walk together you are the way and the
wayfarers. And when one of you falls down he falls for those behind him, a
caution against the stumbling stone. We came not into this life by exile, but
we came as innocent creatures of God. You have been told that, even like a
chain, you are as weak as your weakest link; this is but half the truth. You
are also as strong as your strongest link. To measure you by your smallest
deed is to reckon the power of ocean by the frailty of its foam. To judge you
by your failures is to cast blame upon the seasons for their inconstancy. I
have learnt silence from the talkative, tolerance from the intolerant, and
kindness from the unkind; yet strange, I am ungrateful to these teachers. So
my friend, I am not what I seem. Seeming is but a garment I wear, a care-
woven garment that protects me from your questionings and you from my
negligence. The "I" in me, my friend, dwells in the house of silence, and
therein it shall prefer to remain, unperceived, unapproachable.
I would not have you believe in what I say nor trust in what I do.
Oftentimes we call Life bitter names, but only when we ourselves are bitter
and dark. And we deem her empty and unprofitable, but only when the soul
goes wandering in desolate places and the heart is drunk with over
mindfulness of self. Life is deep and high and distant; and though only your
vast vision can reach even her feet, yet she is near; and though only the
breath of your breath reaches her heart, the shadow of your shadow crosses
her face, and the echo of your faintest cry becomes a spring at her breast,
Life is veiled and hidden, even as your greater self is hidden and veiled, but
When she sings, the deaf hear and are held; and when she comes walking,
the sightless behold her and are amazed and follow her in wonder and
astonishment.
XXX
It is the mission of each true knight...

His duty... nay, his privilege!
To dream the impossible dream,
To fight the unbeatable foe,
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go;
To right the unrightable wrong.
To love, pure and chaste, from afar,

To try, when your arms are too weary,
To reach the unreachable star!
This is my Quest to follow that star,

No matter how hopeless, no matter how far,
To fight for the right
Without question or pause,
To be willing to march into hell
For a heavenly cause!
And I know, if I'll only be true

To this glorious Quest,
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm
When I'm laid to my rest.
And the world will be better for this,

That one man, scorned and covered with scars,
Still strove, with his last ounce of courage,
To reach the unreachable stars!"
- Miguel de Cervantes (Don Quixote)

XXXI – Remember, Remember
Remember, remember, the Fifth of November, the Gunpowder Treason and

Plot. I know of no reason why the Gunpowder Treason should ever be
forgot... But what of the man? I know his name was Guy Fawkes and I know,
in 1605, he attempted to blow up the Houses of Parliament. But who was he
really? What was he like? We are told to remember the idea, not the man,
because a man can fail. He can be caught, he can be killed and forgotten, but
400 years later, an idea can still change the world. I've witnessed firsthand
the power of ideas, I've seen people kill in the name of them, and die
defending them... but you cannot kiss an idea, cannot touch it, or hold it...
ideas do not bleed, they do not feel pain, they do not love... And it is not an
idea that I miss, it is a man... A man that made me remember the Fifth of
November. A man that I will never forget.
Sex and Race, because they are easy, visible differences, have been the
primary ways of organising human beings into superior and inferior groups
and into the cheap labour on which this system still depends. We are talking
about a society in which there will be no roles other than those chosen, or
those earned....
Beneath this mask there is more than flesh. Beneath this mask there is an
idea, and ideas are bulletproof.
We're oft to blame, and this is too much proved, that with devotion's visage
and pious action we do sugar on the devil himself.
But on this most auspicious of nights, permit me then, in lieu of the more
commonplace sobriquet, to suggest the character of this dramatis persona.
Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim

and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity,
is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous
visitation of a by-gone vexation, stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish
these venal and virulent vermin van-guarding vice and vouchsafing the
violently vicious and voracious violation of volition.
[carves V into poster on wall]
The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not in vain, for
the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the
virtuous.
[giggles]
Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add
that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call me V.
Good evening, London. Allow me first to apologize for this interruption. I

do, like many of you, appreciate the comforts of every day routine- the
security of the familiar, the tranquility of repetition. I enjoy them as much as
any bloke. But in the spirit of commemoration, thereby those important
events of the past usually associated with someone's death or the end of some
awful bloody struggle, a celebration of a nice holiday, I thought we could
mark this November the 5th, a day that is sadly no longer remembered, by
taking some time out of our daily lives to sit down and have a little chat.
There are of course those who do not want us to speak. I suspect even now,
orders are being shouted into telephones, and men with guns will soon be on
their way. Why? Because while the truncheon may be used in lieu of
conversation, words will always retain their power. Words offer the means
to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the
truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn't there?
Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had
the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have
sensors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting

your submission. How did this happen? Who's to blame? Well certainly
there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held
accountable, but again truth be told, if you're looking for the guilty, you
need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were
afraid. Who wouldn't be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of
problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your
common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to the
now high chancellor, Adam Sutler. He promised you order, he promised you
peace, and all he demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent. Last
night I sought to end that silence. Last night I destroyed the Old Bailey, to
remind this country of what it has forgotten. More than four hundred years
ago a great citizen wished to embed the fifth of November forever in our
memory. His hope was to remind the world that fairness, justice, and
freedom are more than words, they are perspectives. So if you've seen
nothing, if the crimes of this government remain unknown to you then I
would suggest you allow the fifth of November to pass unmarked. But if you
see what I see, if you feel as I feel, and if you would seek as I seek, then I ask
you to stand beside me one year from tonight, outside the gates of
Parliament, and together we shall give them a fifth of November that shall
never, ever be forgot.
...A building is a symbol, as is the act of destroying it. Symbols are given
power by people. A symbol, in and of itself is powerless, but with enough
people behind it, blowing up a building can change the world.
Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici.- By the power of truth, I, while living, have
conquered the universe.
“A desperate disease requires a dangerous remedy.” - GUY FAWKE

XXXII- Con te partiro

Quando sono solo When I'm alone
Sogno all'orizzonte I dream on the horizon
E mancan le parole And words fail;
Si lo so che non c'?luce Yes, I know there is no light
In una stanza In a room
Quando manca il sole Where the sun is not there
Se non ci sei tu con me, con me. If you are not with me.
Su le finestre At the windows
Mostra a tutti il mio cuore Show everyone my heart
Che hai acceso Which you set alight;
Chiudi dentro me Enclose within me
La luce che The light you
Hai incontrato per strada Encountered on the street.
Time to say goodbye Time to say goodbye,
Paesi che non ho mai To countries I never
Veduto e vissuto con te Saw and shared with you,
Adesso si li vivro. Now, yes, I shall experience them,
Con te partiro I'll go with you
Su navi per mari On ships across seas
Che io lo so Which, I know,
No no non esistono piu No, no, exist no longer;
It's time to say goodbye. With you I shall experience them.
Quando sei lontana When you are far away
Sogno all'orizzonte I dream on the horizon
E mancan le parole And words fail,
E io si lo so And yes, I know
Che sei con me con me That you are with me;
Tu mia luna tu sei qui con me You, my moon, are here with me,
Mio sole tu sei qui con me My sun, you are here with me.
Con me con me con me With me, with me, with me,
Time to say goodbye Time to say goodbye,
Paesi che non ho mai To countries I never
Veduto e vissuto con te Saw and shared with you,
Adesso si li vivro. Now, yes, I shall experience them,
Con te io li rivivro. With you I shall re-experience them.
Con te io li rivivro. With you I shall re-experience them.
Con te partiro I'll go with you,
Io con te. I with you.
XXXIII
My sweetest, let us live and love,
And though the sager sort our deeds reprove,
Let us not weigh them.
But soon as once set our little light,
then must we sleep one ever-during night.
If all would lead their lives in love like we,
Then bloody swords and armour would not be;
But fools do live, and waste their little light,
And seek with pain their ever-during night.
When timely death my life and fortune ends,
Let not my hearse be vexed with mourning friends,
But let all lovers, rich in triumph, come
And with sweet pastimes grace my happy tomb;
And my sweet, close up thou my little light,
And crown with love my ever-during night.

XXXIV
I care not for these ladies that must be wooed and prayed.
Give me a kind, the wanton country maid.
Her beauty is her own,
A garden in her face,
where roses and white lilies grow,
a heavenly paradise beneath her feet,
wherein all pleasant fruits do flow.
And as her lute doth live or die,
Led by her passion, so must I:
For when of pleasure she does sing,
my thoughts enjoy a sudden spring,
But if she does of sorrow speak,
Even from my heart the strings do break.
Who when we court and kiss, she cries “in truth, let go!”
But when we come where comfort is, she never will say no.
Come; Sing smoothly thy sweetly gracing, silent music.
These dull notes we sing need help to grace them;

only beauty purely loving Knows no discord,
XXXV
For the sake of a few lines one must see many cities, men and things.
I would like to beg you to have patience with everything unresolved in your
heart.
Feel how the birds fly and know the gesture with which the small flowers
open in the morning.
And try to love the questions themselves; don’t search for answers
which could not be given to you now because you would not be able to live
them.
think back to roads in unknown regions, to unexpected meetings and to
partings which one had long seen coming, to days of childhood that are still
unexplained, to parents that one had to hurt when they brought one some
joy and one did not grasp it (it was joy for someone else);
to days in rooms withdrawn and quiet and to mornings by the sea, to nights
of travel that rushed along on high and flew with all the stars-and it is not
enough if one may think all of this.
far from the splendor and squalor of hurrying cities do not worry if briefer
days grow briefest,
One must have memories of many nights of love, none of which was like
the others,
And not be sorry of sun and rain, for my life is the life of the reaper and the
sower;
my prayers, those of earth's own clumsy striving; finding and losing and
laughing and crying, children who’s any sadness or joy is my grief or my
gladness
But one must also have been besides the dying; one must have sat beside the
dead in the room with the open window. And still it is not enough to have
memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many, and one
must have the great patience to wait until they come again.
Do not worry if longer nights grow longest; and do not be sorry when
silence becomes singing (welcoming humbly the light and proudly the
darkness of the days yet to come). O How poor are they that have not
patience! What wound did ever heal but by degrees?
Patience, with charity, with quietness of heart, with lives we have lived.
Mancante.
There are a hundred things she has tried to chase away the things she won't
remember and that she can't even let herself think about because that's
when the birds scream and the worms crawl and somewhere in her mind it's
always raining a slow and endless drizzle.
You will hear that she has left the country, that there was a gift she wanted
you to have, but it is lost before it reaches you. Late one night the telephone
will sign, and a voice that might be hers will say something that you cannot
interpret before the connection crackles and is broken.
Several years later, from a taxi, you will see someone in a doorway that looks
like her, but she will be gone by the time you persuade the driver to stop.
You will never see her again.
Whenever it rains you will think of her.
XXXVI
O you who’ll always be named the first among my friends,

You above all who thought it right to make my fate your
Own.
Who were the first, the most dear, I remember
To dare to sustain me with words when the bolt struck,
Who gave me the calm advice to go on
When my wretched heart was filled with desire to cease,
Truly you know whom I mean, by these tokens of your
Name,
Nor are you unaware, friend, of the service you rendered.
These things will always be fixed in my very marrow,
And I’ll be an eternal debtor for the life that’s mine,
And my spirit will melt away in the empty air,
Leaving my ashes on the cooling pyre,
Before the memory of your merit leaves my mind.
And loyalty fades away through the long years.
You who read shake this hand of mine without malice,
May you reach life’s goal without hindrance.
And may my prayers that are yet to be fulfilled,
Have a good word for you!
O you the foremost of my dear friends,
Who proved the sole altar for my fortunes,
Whose words of comfort revived this dying spirit,
You’ll have many friends while you’re fortunate:
But Ants never head for an empty granary,
So be wary of the fickle crowd that chases the glow of fortune
I pray this might always prove false for you.
I’d certainly show you honour,
And unite your rare loyalty with fame.
But I fear my verse of thanks might harm you,
An untimely honouring of your name might obstruct you.
This you can do (and it’s safe): delight in this inwardly,
That I’ve remembered you and you’ve been loyal,
And, as you have, bend your oars to bring me help,
So may your fortunes ever go forward,
May you need no help, and yet help your own,

May your wife equal her husband’s endless kindness,
And your union meet with no complaints:
And may that brother always love you,
Your young son be like you, and all
Recognise that he’s yours by his character:
And so may your daughter’s torch light you
While you’re young.
XXXVII
There is a determined though unseen bravery that defends itself foot by foot in
the darkness against the fatal invasions of necessity and dishonesty. Noble and
mysterious triumphs that no eye sees, and no fame rewards, and no flourish of
triumph salutes. Life, misfortunes, isolation, abandonment, poverty, are
battlefields that have their heroes; obscure heroes, sometimes greater than the
illustrious. For when it is all said and done, it's the doers that change this world.
And when they do that, they change us, and that's why we never forget them.
In God we are expected to have faith and determination and enough trust in
Him to keep moving, keep living, and keep rejoicing. In fact, we are expected to
not simply to face the future (that sounds pretty grim and stoic); but to embrace
and shape it if at all--to love it and rejoice in it and delight in our opportunities.
I believe God is anxiously waiting for the chance to answer your prayers and
fulfil your dreams, just as He always has. But He can't if you don't pray, and He
can't if you don't dream. He can't if you don't believe..... “I have always,
essentially, been waiting. Waiting to become something else, waiting to be that
person I always thought I was on the verge of becoming, waiting for that life I
thought I would have. In my head, I was always one step away. In high school,
I was biding my time until I could become the college version of myself, the
one my mind could see so clearly. In college, the post-college “adult” person
was always looming in front of me, smarter, stronger, and more organized.
Then the married person, then the person I’d become when we have kids. For
twenty years or so, literally, I have waited to become the toned version of
myself, because that’s when life will really begin.
And through all that waiting, here I am. My life is passing, day by day, and I am
waiting for it to start. I am waiting for that time, that person, that event when
my life will finally begin.
I love movies about “The Big Moment” – the game or the performance or the
wedding day or the record deal, the stories that split time with that key event,
and everything is reframed, before it and after it, because it has changed
everything. I have always wanted this movie-worthy event, something that will
change everything and grab me out of this waiting game into the whirlwind in
front of me. I cry and cry at these movies, because I am still waiting for my own
big moment. I had visions of life as an adventure, a thing to be celebrated and

experienced, but all I was doing was going to work and coming home, and that
wasn’t what it looked like in the movies.
John Lennon once said, “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other
plans.” For me, life is what was happening while I was busy waiting for my big
moment. I was ready for it and believed that the rest of my life would fade into
the background, and that my big moment would carry me through life like a
lifeboat.
The Big Moment, unfortunately, is an urban myth. Some people have them, in
a sense, when they win or become the next Idol. But even that football player
or that singer is living a life made up of more than that one moment. Life is a
collection of a million, billion moments, tiny little moments and choices, like a
handful of luminous, glowing pearl. It takes so much time, and so much work,
and those beads and moments are so small, and so much less fabulous and
dramatic than the movies.
But this is what I’m finding, in glimpses and flashes: this is it. This is it, in the
best possible way. That thing I’m waiting for, that adventure, that move-score-
worthy experience unfolding gracefully. This is it. Normal, daily life ticking by
on our streets and sidewalks, in our houses and apartments, in our beds and at
our dinner tables, in our dreams and prayers and fights and secrets – this
pedestrian life is the most precious thing any of us will ever experience."…..
And, of course, that is what all of this is - all of this: the one song, ever
changing, ever reincarnated, that speaks somehow from and to and for that
which is ineffable within us and without us, that is both prayer and
deliverance, folly and wisdom, that inspires us to dance or smile or simply to go
on, senselessly, incomprehensibly, blissfully, in the face of mortality and the
truth that our lives are more ill-writ, ill-rhymed and fleeting than any song,
except perhaps those songs - that song, endlessly reincarnated - born of that
truth, be it the moon and June of that truth, or the wordless blue moan, or the
rotgut or the elegant poetry of it. That mystery train, - same journey, same
miracle, same end and endlessness.
XXXVIII
Joy, sorrow, tears, lamentation, laughter -- to all these music gives voice, but
in such a way that we are transported from the world of unrest to a world of
peace, and see reality in a new way, as if we were sitting by a mountain lake
and contemplating hills and woods and clouds in the tranquil and fathomless
waters. Child, the troubles and temptations of your life may be many; but
you can overcome and outlive them all if you learn to feel the strength and
tenderness of God’s mercies. The more you love and trust in Him, the nearer
you will feel to Him, and the less you will depend on human power and
wisdom. His love and care never tire or change, can never be taken from
you, but may become the source of lifelong peace, happiness, and strength.
Believe this heartily, and go to God with all your little cares, and hopes, and
sins, and sorrows, as freely and confidingly as a child comes to its mother
XXXIX
“In secret we met, in silence I grieve, that thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive. If I should meet thee after long years,
how should I greet thee? -With silence and tears?" So sung the poet.
Alas! The great art of life is sensation, to feel that we exist, even in pain.
I have not loved the world, nor the world I, but let us part fair foes;
I do believe, though I have found them not, that there may be words which
are things.
Hopes which will not deceive, and virtues which are merciful,
Or weave snares for the failing:
I would also deem over others grief that some sincerely grieve;
That two, or one, are almost what they seem,
That goodness is no name, and happiness no dream.
Near this spot are deposited the remains.
Of one who possessed beauty without vanity,
Strength without insolence, courage without ferocity,
And all the virtues of man, without his vices.
This praise, which would be unmeaning flattery
If inscribed over human ashes & dust, is but a just tribute to a memory
That lies buried in a heart and this tomb.
She takes him in with her crying eyes
then all at once you have to say goodbye.
Stood on all corners, hoping the wind would blow away all his old ways
But o! To him she seemed so beautiful, so alluring,
So different from ordinary people, that he could not understand why no one
was as disturbed as he by the clicking of her heels on the paving stones,
Why no one else's heart was wild with the breeze stirred by the sighs of her
veils,
Why everyone did not go mad with the movements of her braid,
The flight of her hands, the gold of her laughter.
He had not missed a single one of her gestures,
Not one of the indications of her character,
But he did not dare approach her for fear of destroying the spell.
Some things are just too good they are be whispered
Lest they vanish.
XL
Silent and starving, I prowl the streets.
I hunt the measure of your steps.
I hunger for your laugh, your hands
the pale stones of your fingernails;
I want to eat your skin.
I am but a parcel of vain strivings tied
by a chance bond together.
I do not love you except because I love you;
I go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your smile,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,
I pace around hungry, sniffing the twilight,
hunting for you, for your beating heart,
I love you only because it's you the one I love;
I hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.
Maybe light will consume my heart with its cruel
Ray, stealing my key to true calm.
In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love
Because I love you, I crave you.
XLI
You ask the impossible: “love me forever”.

Love you when all desire is gone?
Love you with the single mindedness of a monk?
When the world in its entirety and all that i hold sacred advise me against it:
Love you still more?
For you love me without knowing how, or when, or from where.
You love me simply, without problems or pride:
You say you love me in this way because you do not know any other way
Of loving but this, in which there is no you nor I.
So intimate that my hand upon your chest is your hand,
That when I fall asleep your eyes close.
So when rage fills me and has no name: love you?
When each step from your door tires me: love you?
When everyone i see is more beautiful than the last,
Shall I Love you as i always have? Not as admirer or judge,
But with the compassion i save for myself in my solitude.
Shall I Love you as i relish my loneliness, the anticipation of my death?
Mysteries of the flesh, as it tears and mends?
“Love me as your most treasured childhood memory”, you say
“And if there is none to recall, imagine one, place me there with you”, you ask.
Shall I Love you withered as i loved you new?
“Love me as if I was forever and I will make the impossible a simple act,
by loving you, loving you as I do” you gently whisper.
If I knew that today would be the last time I’d see you,
I would hug you tight and pray the Lord be the keeper of your soul.
If I knew that this would be the last time you pass through this door,
I’d embrace you, kiss you, and call you back for one more.
If I knew that this would be the last time I would hear your voice,
I’d take hold of each word to be able to hear it over and over again.
If I knew this is the last time I see you, I’d tell you I love you, and mean it.
And would not just assume foolishly you know it already.
Therefore my beloved, love your solitude
Try to sing out with the pain it causes you.
For those who are near you are far away
Be happy about your growth, and be gentle with those who stay behind;
Be confident and calm in front of them

And do not torment them with your doubts
And do not frighten them with your faith or joy,
Which they wouldn't be able to comprehend.
Seek out that simple and true feeling
Love life in a form that is not your own
And be indulgent toward those who are growing old,
Who are afraid of the aloneness that you trust
And don't expect any understanding;
But believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance,
And have faith that in this love there is strength and a blessing
So large that you can travel as far,
Far as you wish without ever having to step outside of it.

Soliloquies of Mahinda Vito

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Soliloquies of Mahinda Vito

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The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit

shall lure it back to cancel half

"Forgiveness is not about forgetting. It is about letting go of

FROM THE CORNER OF HIS EYE

As it entered the room the man looked down in shame.

“But haven’t you failed by not attempting to use me?”.

Do you think that now that death is here

Then they said goodbye and they both died.”

White lines that never fade

It is the mission of each true knight...

To love, pure and chaste, from afar,

This is my Quest to follow that star,

And I know, if I'll only be true

And the world will be better for this,

- Miguel de Cervantes (Don Quixote)

XXXI – Remember, Remember

Remember, remember, the Fifth of November, the Gunpowder Treason and

Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim

Good evening, London. Allow me first to apologize for this interruption. I

sensors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting

“A desperate disease requires a dangerous remedy.” - GUY FAWKE

XXXII- Con te partiro

And though the sager sort our deeds reprove,

Let us not weigh them.

But soon as once set our little light,

then must we sleep one ever-during night.

If all would lead their lives in love like we,

Then bloody swords and armour would not be;

But fools do live, and waste their little light,

And seek with pain their ever-during night.

When timely death my life and fortune ends,

Let not my hearse be vexed with mourning friends,

But let all lovers, rich in triumph, come

And with sweet pastimes grace my happy tomb;

And my sweet, close up thou my little light,

And crown with love my ever-during night.

These dull notes we sing need help to grace them;

O you who’ll always be named the first among my friends,

May you need no help, and yet help your own,

big moment. I had visions of life as an adventure, a thing to be celebrated and

You ask the impossible: “love me forever”.

Be confident and calm in front of them

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