One of my better ideas, eh wot?
Turning in a piece of oh-so-original writing in reaction to the French Revolution - specifically, the bit of it named Maximilien Robespierre - on the basis of little research and no grammar to Mumbleburton, that is. Genius, really. I'm looking forward to her reaction. =D Except I won't... actually... see it. Huh. Smallish problem. But never fear! Maybe I can set a video recorder in her office? Hmm... *contemplates*
Good old original, post-modernist, and dubiously punctuated self-expression; you're an old friend, and you've served me well, and I'll NEVER LET YOU GO. MOO HA HA HA.
And since I'm a nice person I attached the shocking wossname in question. You know you want to try and dig through its mess of useless adjectives, tenuous metaphors, and lame use of dependent clauses. Do not attempt to resist the call of Liberty. And Property. And Resistance to Oppression. *wisenod*
Only you have to pronounce it right first. Go on. Get those significant pauses in.
Right?
Right.
Of LIBERTY & PROPERTY & RESISTANCE to OPPRESSION
In the city of lights, revolution hangs on the high-wire threads that criss-cross and make treacherous the deceitful air of desperate men. Change slips through the streets like a sigh on the lips of the dead. None comprehend it; all wonder. (The force that drives the world? Brute inhuman unrest? Which? Why one? - Rather both).
One such, at the outskirts of the city: a man, young and wide-minded, his eyes open and vacant, the soul behind them asleep, empty, content in promise unfulfilled. A mind also; and this lives where the soul is yet a passing fancy, and knows tremulous hunger, that wells up fervent and grotesque in him, ridiculous - he is in all ways sufficed for, and he starves, insides gaping like the unclouded sky, like the gateway to Hell. He takes neat steps and his boot-heels click on stone, an affirmation of everything he should be click, clack, click, clack, ordered lines, immaculate and without purpose or beauty. He should be. He should be this - the even letters between the even streaks of ink, neither more or less.
But; but; for this he is not, for this he cannot be what he should be. This: this is: between the slip-cut moments, when he reads; an ocean away and across the street the world is restless and great men walk with their hearts in their mouths and papers under their arm, concealed close and dry against their new-rough skin, flimsy armor against private and public riches; velvet and silk kept not at arms' length but at voice's length, they walk, and though they are rich their coats hang thin on their backs and their feet are bare, because they are vessels and voices, not beings, and their purpose is to walk barefoot in the rain with secret manuscripts and words. Great men tread lightly, slinging ink like paint in great lashes of liquid pouring down the walls, the messages of a thousand frightened, blossoming ideas, the writing on the walls, with names meaningless more meaningful than anything. (Rousseau. Voltaire. Chosen falsehoods, they roll off the tongue.) Liberté, they whisper, and he also, their pages fragile beneath his splayed fingers, but the letters clear fine-printed unwavering - his spectacles are perfect, flawless, the candle bright as a god's hand, splotching brilliance with impunity across the parchment.
He reads here, in the cellar, what is prohibited, aloud or silent as the whim takes him, surrounded by his fellow empty, aloud or silent, who now with desperate shaking hands fill themselves, not graceful bowls or fluted glasses but prim porcelain cups, the new generation of bourgeois aspiration towards refinement, pathetic in their wigs and lace/their porcelain, now aching with vivid incongruity for blood, or wine, translucent china desirous of bloated bellies too heavy to lift, bloated not with ice water or cream but with blood, or wine, or blood, and wine, the crimson overflowing, and through it, the words magnified, because not all need be a lens to show truth.
He whispers along with them: liberté. The book is passed onwards, and his wrists grow strong on air, clutching as he does at what he has read and filed away and is for all that lost. Lost. The murmurs of revelation in his ears, cooling his hands and the soft skin of his throat. What desire this? What lust? Great men write, great men die, he stands in the crowded cellar at the center of a conspiracy shameful and halting and insignificant, this that shall be remembered only for what emerges from its maw. And he wipes the sweat from his spectacles, and he ascends the stairs.
Outside, the ignorant city knows nothing of him, knows only its own oppressive thirst, and he cannot but feel contempt through the windows, sated as he is, glutted on thought. Contempt, for mud and cupped palms and children ground into the streets, for his new gods. La liberté attend, he tells them; Liberty awaits, he tells them, a faint shadow strange on the panes that separate - but not for long, the first stone is coming, is coming, and a burning rag about its heavy weight to immolate himself upon should he so choose, but he shall not choose, what is to come, prophecy completed, being too dear to him - pourquoi pleurez et vous lamentez-vous? - Why do you whine and weep? (do as I have done, unspoken) - he demands, severe and old even in his wide-minded youth, line of back and calves unyielding to even hypocrisy, the waistcoat he never will forgo, ripe falsehood of good black fabric to reward his passion, and ignored all.
He speaks to no one; the People; himself, by the window, before the words of underground rooms become the words of the mob, and fire joins wine, and candle-light blood, all dilute for this. There is change in the air and the revolution is coming, say those who will be overthrown, incomprehending, says he, while those who will overthrow die in the streets, and think of: bread, not words, incomprehending. The young man believes them gods, not yet worthy of his prayer at the window-altar through which he aspires to their degradation that he might become them, the people the People the country the awakening call to his soul. Contempt for them he treasures, shrouds his arms in, something to cling to his fine sleeves, and it covers him and invades him. It soaks into his spare flesh and fornicates with hypocrisy in his breast to birth some strange amalgam, some merged biting disdain, for they who will become his gods, who are his gods, for whom contempt shall soon be burned away, and for whom - while that contempt is still savored in his fluttering heart - why, contempt shall be the priest for him, the leveler that allows him to ascend and degrade himself all at once, in service of the People's cause and liberty.
He presses his forehead to the window, and closes his eyes at last, that what is behind them may stir and peruse for a little while what its slave bears to it, the casualties - the prizes gilt - of war outlined in fragile pages beneath splayed fingers. The corners of his mind close in, and thought and spirit commune, in the dark underground place that his fair pampered skin stretches to conceal. How otherwise? For he has read, and learned freedom; he believes, he is finished, liberty is waiting, his gods are waiting, in the streets, and what is read is not read but done, from ink to flesh, now and forever, revolution turning the world around again against his window, the street lights of the city lights of the city light of cities - are guttering. Liberty awaits.
Good old original, post-modernist, and dubiously punctuated self-expression; you're an old friend, and you've served me well, and I'll NEVER LET YOU GO. MOO HA HA HA.
And since I'm a nice person I attached the shocking wossname in question. You know you want to try and dig through its mess of useless adjectives, tenuous metaphors, and lame use of dependent clauses. Do not attempt to resist the call of Liberty. And Property. And Resistance to Oppression. *wisenod*
Only you have to pronounce it right first. Go on. Get those significant pauses in.
Right?
Right.
Of LIBERTY & PROPERTY & RESISTANCE to OPPRESSION
In the city of lights, revolution hangs on the high-wire threads that criss-cross and make treacherous the deceitful air of desperate men. Change slips through the streets like a sigh on the lips of the dead. None comprehend it; all wonder. (The force that drives the world? Brute inhuman unrest? Which? Why one? - Rather both).
One such, at the outskirts of the city: a man, young and wide-minded, his eyes open and vacant, the soul behind them asleep, empty, content in promise unfulfilled. A mind also; and this lives where the soul is yet a passing fancy, and knows tremulous hunger, that wells up fervent and grotesque in him, ridiculous - he is in all ways sufficed for, and he starves, insides gaping like the unclouded sky, like the gateway to Hell. He takes neat steps and his boot-heels click on stone, an affirmation of everything he should be click, clack, click, clack, ordered lines, immaculate and without purpose or beauty. He should be. He should be this - the even letters between the even streaks of ink, neither more or less.
But; but; for this he is not, for this he cannot be what he should be. This: this is: between the slip-cut moments, when he reads; an ocean away and across the street the world is restless and great men walk with their hearts in their mouths and papers under their arm, concealed close and dry against their new-rough skin, flimsy armor against private and public riches; velvet and silk kept not at arms' length but at voice's length, they walk, and though they are rich their coats hang thin on their backs and their feet are bare, because they are vessels and voices, not beings, and their purpose is to walk barefoot in the rain with secret manuscripts and words. Great men tread lightly, slinging ink like paint in great lashes of liquid pouring down the walls, the messages of a thousand frightened, blossoming ideas, the writing on the walls, with names meaningless more meaningful than anything. (Rousseau. Voltaire. Chosen falsehoods, they roll off the tongue.) Liberté, they whisper, and he also, their pages fragile beneath his splayed fingers, but the letters clear fine-printed unwavering - his spectacles are perfect, flawless, the candle bright as a god's hand, splotching brilliance with impunity across the parchment.
He reads here, in the cellar, what is prohibited, aloud or silent as the whim takes him, surrounded by his fellow empty, aloud or silent, who now with desperate shaking hands fill themselves, not graceful bowls or fluted glasses but prim porcelain cups, the new generation of bourgeois aspiration towards refinement, pathetic in their wigs and lace/their porcelain, now aching with vivid incongruity for blood, or wine, translucent china desirous of bloated bellies too heavy to lift, bloated not with ice water or cream but with blood, or wine, or blood, and wine, the crimson overflowing, and through it, the words magnified, because not all need be a lens to show truth.
He whispers along with them: liberté. The book is passed onwards, and his wrists grow strong on air, clutching as he does at what he has read and filed away and is for all that lost. Lost. The murmurs of revelation in his ears, cooling his hands and the soft skin of his throat. What desire this? What lust? Great men write, great men die, he stands in the crowded cellar at the center of a conspiracy shameful and halting and insignificant, this that shall be remembered only for what emerges from its maw. And he wipes the sweat from his spectacles, and he ascends the stairs.
Outside, the ignorant city knows nothing of him, knows only its own oppressive thirst, and he cannot but feel contempt through the windows, sated as he is, glutted on thought. Contempt, for mud and cupped palms and children ground into the streets, for his new gods. La liberté attend, he tells them; Liberty awaits, he tells them, a faint shadow strange on the panes that separate - but not for long, the first stone is coming, is coming, and a burning rag about its heavy weight to immolate himself upon should he so choose, but he shall not choose, what is to come, prophecy completed, being too dear to him - pourquoi pleurez et vous lamentez-vous? - Why do you whine and weep? (do as I have done, unspoken) - he demands, severe and old even in his wide-minded youth, line of back and calves unyielding to even hypocrisy, the waistcoat he never will forgo, ripe falsehood of good black fabric to reward his passion, and ignored all.
He speaks to no one; the People; himself, by the window, before the words of underground rooms become the words of the mob, and fire joins wine, and candle-light blood, all dilute for this. There is change in the air and the revolution is coming, say those who will be overthrown, incomprehending, says he, while those who will overthrow die in the streets, and think of: bread, not words, incomprehending. The young man believes them gods, not yet worthy of his prayer at the window-altar through which he aspires to their degradation that he might become them, the people the People the country the awakening call to his soul. Contempt for them he treasures, shrouds his arms in, something to cling to his fine sleeves, and it covers him and invades him. It soaks into his spare flesh and fornicates with hypocrisy in his breast to birth some strange amalgam, some merged biting disdain, for they who will become his gods, who are his gods, for whom contempt shall soon be burned away, and for whom - while that contempt is still savored in his fluttering heart - why, contempt shall be the priest for him, the leveler that allows him to ascend and degrade himself all at once, in service of the People's cause and liberty.
He presses his forehead to the window, and closes his eyes at last, that what is behind them may stir and peruse for a little while what its slave bears to it, the casualties - the prizes gilt - of war outlined in fragile pages beneath splayed fingers. The corners of his mind close in, and thought and spirit commune, in the dark underground place that his fair pampered skin stretches to conceal. How otherwise? For he has read, and learned freedom; he believes, he is finished, liberty is waiting, his gods are waiting, in the streets, and what is read is not read but done, from ink to flesh, now and forever, revolution turning the world around again against his window, the street lights of the city lights of the city light of cities - are guttering. Liberty awaits.