restruction (part 1)
What does it take to make a comeback? Where's the magic to it? Where is that kind of inspiration.
Traditionally, inspiration is a spark. Just something that gets someone going. The way I like to think of it: it's like finding something to swing at. Like a fastball over the plate that isn't fast enough or a man disrespecting another man's woman. Whether you're doing it to get what you want or protect what you have it's still the same driving force.
I've been using the words injuries and ambitions. Some can say it's hurt and hunger/thirst. It means the same things. Both can give a boat something to float on. They can take something away from a man, making him miss what is gone. And they can also give a man sight of what he doesn't have, making him hate what he has going in his name. The boat can still sink.
And the boat doesn't have to sink, you can fall over the edge yourself. Too many injuries and too many ambitions makes the mind see the most fucked up complication of all, the real world. And so you look to lighten the load. Inspiration sits at the shore watching you sail to the sunsets without it.
And now the captain stands in the midst of his deck staring upward to the congress of stars. With every dot his eye connects he feels a little more stranded in his thought process. He is so speechless that the crew of the ship doesn't know what to do. In order to have a task to do, the crew-mates await the captain's actions.
They wonder about him. How he's been getting quieter and quieter. Perhaps it's the growing consumption of rumming and drugging that has silenced his throat. Perhaps it's being so long out in the ocean without female involvement- I don't need to say how messed up that is. But some of the crew members with seniority know better. The ones who have crossed the ungenerous seas to the ends of the continents may not entirely know what's wrong but they know what's up.
The captain has not been painting. And he has not been reading. They know he hasn't seen an image in his mind nor had he been filled with any. And there was certainly more than a bible in his quarters. The mind was no longer keeping him busy.
But the captain still had fresh spots and stains of green, brown, red, and blue paint over the faded smirs on his coat. But the crew knew that nothing was being made. The captain crossed his arms behind his back and stood with a little more silence.
It's a tough thing to think about. Making a comeback without going back. Back was a state of being that stood an inch taller. The "Back" referring to a place he physically once stood in the past no longer existed.
How can a home away from home become a home? How do we learn to love again?
How do we bring a fight instead of just looking for one to get into? How can we channel the energy to beat it up as bad as we are beat up?
For the captain, if he had only brought a mirror. Maybe he could have seen it. The answer surely would have reflected back to him. He might have seen something in himself. Something from the past. Maybe he could bring something "back" without being "back".
He plotted points on his map using his geometric and magnetic compasses. With a new course the ship would dock at a nearby nation with a language he could speak. He paid the crew a little extra with direction for them to "wine and dine". It looked like he had bought them a few days with a good nightlife but he was actually buying time for himself.
Is the town the answer?
Maybe we'll see when I feel like continuing this story.
Maybe.