Chrysalis – Salau Anthony
September 4, 2024
“we hope, we lose hope, we move closer to death and finally we die, sand to sand, born again, tabula rasa, the Genesis effect, birthed into the mud hut we had previously died to escape from”
the schizoid entity resumes
“look at your life from the perspective of an old woman about to die, or a flame at the bottom of the matchstick, beholding its trail and acknowledging the duality of its existence…..”
static. the television dies.
I run my hands through my hair and stand up. I begin walking towards the door, and I hear a whisper.
the bees do not hum, it is the goats
I look around, I am alone in this room.
the goats do not hum, it is the scriptures
breathless whispering, hurried, staccato.
the four legged ruminant is the disciple, mud baptism your form becomes incorruptible, fountain
The voice sounds closer to me now. I sense another, watching, masked in exposition, bursts of hot breath crash against my neck and cause it to ache. I begin walking towards the door, my house cannot house another because I am all there is, me in the flesh and me in the walls and I know this already, for some reason I seek escape, it will be better outside. I take one last look around and I see hanging, a painting of a young woman fading into sand, she is entombed in an hourglass. she appears as though she is pleading for respite, she will begin to weep soon, i look closer and i see the grains falling, i do not recall the acquisition of this, who is she and why is she here, did I imprison her or is she here willingly?
help
the painting pleads, fainter than a whisper.
I step outside, me in the casa non existentia.
chrysalis.
the streets are dimly illuminated by the purplish moonlight, the world is eggplant. a hyperpop song plays faintly in the distance. Rosaries and burnt out cigarettes are scattered all over the sidewalk. There is a man lying face down with a Bible between his thighs and a woman lies by his side. He is muttering some words to himself. I make them out and I recognize them to be a chapter from Corinthians. I pass them by and keep walking.
the melody is nearer now.
a man walks by me. He appears to be conversing with the air, he is grunting and cackling and speaking in a low tone. He walks a few metres past and runs back to me, his gaze condescending.
do you believe in God?
he has stitches all over his face and the strands of thread appear to be holding his right eye in its socket. his left socket is nothing but eerie blackness, i gaze within for a second and a splitting headache envelops my head, he has yellowed teeth and he is dressed in torn clothes, barefoot, bald headed, inquisitive, owl eyed.
do you believe in God?
he asks again, harsher this time
“me or the deity?” i ask
his lips widen to reveal crooked teeth. pure smile snake venom. he fumbles in his back pocket for a few seconds, his gaze trained on me, unflinching, he pulls his hand out and hands me a black linen cloth. i take a step back and he takes two steps forward, directly in my face. our gazes meet. he takes my hand and places the cloth inside it, closing my trembling fingers. then he says,
doing undoing, proliferation in decay, sojourner.
without another word or stare, he turns around and walks away, his humming becomes radio static and his image blends into oversaturated purple.
chrysalis.
the sleep of sorrow and the dream of joy.
I stand up from my bed and walk to the mirror. i have brown circles under my eye, my walls began to unearth yesterday. the room is covered in dirt and sand, i spat soil into the sink when I brushed yesterday. i rinsed my mouth and with the water came my pharynx and molars, mouthfuls of sand, water and fluoride. i feel the dread beginning to fester, my fingers tremble when i pick up the pen and I must breathe seven times before I speak, goodbye to language, my friend drowned himself three weeks ago, baptism without the priest is unholy indulgence, homicidal, eartheater, make your death into a snuff film and be humanity’s messiah, goodbye to language and literature and love and sandcastles, we must walk into an oven, read a poem and pick at our scabs if we want to live, semblance of some verisimilitude this is no animated film, i let my lips flutter after her spit wets them and lilies grow from within me, does this happen to everyone too or is it my anatomy? this is not disjoint, it belongs here as much as your incarcerated heart in its cell of bones and anguish, maybe if i became a hearteater i would not drown in the bathroom drainage and the trees would have to bury an empty casket, no tears would be shed for fear of germinating the seeds etched into your cheeks, do plants take greatly to salinity or is it a murder sentence to them too?
chrysalis.
the pop song sounds closer now. the synth waves more audible, i see a woman tied to a chair, she is placed directly in front of a car. Its headlights flash erratically in her eyes and she bleeds from them. i am somewhat far from her but I feel the sting from the jarring intensity of the lights. there is a slight tingle at the base of my neck and my palms begin to tremble and sweat. she struggles to break free but the cords holding her down do not budge. she is clothed in a full length gown and she appears as though she were a film actress from the technicolor era. i walk briskly, hoping to save her, hoping to grant her respite. i shield my eyes from the luminal assault and stop behind her.
move no further
says the schizoid entity standing by her.
her’s is her undoing
“but she is dying, she is anguished”
she is free, like you will be too
i try to shove him aside and save her but I am overpowered by two men who appear from nowhere, the car begins moving, it screeches as it accelerates and crashes into the woman, she is hurled into the air and gasps escape the unseen onlookers, my mouth is wide open but I shut it and cover my eyes when the sand begins to pour. sandy soil sacred spirit.
countless people appear from what seems like nothingness and begin to applaud, howl and sing praises of the director. a man clutches his camera and pans in on the sandcastle at my feet, he is the director is the tape is the script, the woman is flesh no more and has reverted to her truth, her gown sprawled over the grains, the man who films gets the perfect angle and grins in contentment, they continue to applaud, hordes of people applaud and the melody is deafening, I can still hear the pop song, muffled, humans are everywhere i look and the applause does not end, until it does. abruptly. the man with the camera says to the congregation
and that is a wrap!
he trains his camera at my face and takes a photograph. the flash blinds my vision temporarily and i begin to bleed from my eyes, i double over in pain and try to clean my eyes, i want to stand up and walk over to him and sock him in the throat and ask him who he is. hold that thought.
they had all vanished into the blackness from whence they came. the applause ends. the pop song ends. the heartbeats end. the purple skies die. the ire welling up in me dissipates. there is only me. me in the flesh and me in the absence. me in the nothingness. me in the crimson and me in the forced equanimity. me in the abyss. me in the blackness. me in the void. me in me.
chrysalis.
lumina.
blackness. an abyss. formless. a flute can be heard, and its soothing, mellifluous tunes are accompanied by a jarring staccato. i am clutching the black linen cloth that faith gave me earlier, despair is a clothed sandcastle alive only in my memory, the wind and the tape of the filmmaker, maybe in God’s heart if the entity owns one, tears well in my eyes for them both, my legs begin to feel numb and i am toppling over, a flashlight turns on in the distance and begins to flicker erratically, I hear it whisper my name and my heart flutters, it calls out to me louder now and i instinctively clutch the linen cloth in my right arm, a moth hovers around the unstable light for a minute and finally decides to seek solace in it, no sooner had it touched the flame when it burnt to ashes, deafening shriek, grain dissipating in the blackness and silence. the light continues to flicker, flicker, flicker, call my name, flicker, the luminous mysteries are being recited in its circuitry, i am on the floor now and I can feel my legs beginning to distend, it is fading, sand blowing into nothingness by nothingness, toes, femur, light bleeding, legs withering into dust, slowly making its way to my torso, i groan and look ahead, the light flickers, flickers, another shines and I make out a human underneath it, human, schizoid entity, its sobs reverberate in the expanse of the nothing, my thighs are flesh no more, i am withering into sand, nothing in nothing, everything in everything, flowers begin to bloom where my remains fall and they too whisper my name, i must touch the flame, liberation is a lightbulb, the schizoid entity is pulled into the flame despite its apprehension and refusal, another flame awakens in the distance, three in the nothing, nothing in the three, there is a man with red skin and another, both utterly bare, they hover in the nothing and do not cast me a glance, they ascend into the flame and are consumed by it, my spine is dust, i am crawling towards the light, the light, another awakens in the distance, ethereal thrumming, three women stand bare, they are not aware of the flames alive overhead, they are drawn into the flame, perplex intrigue too sudden to decipher, i groan loudly and stretch my hand out, rottening, rottening, consuming rot and the flowers bloom in my trail, whisper my name, our father who art in inferno, wings forming from my back, flamelust, whisper my name, pixelated vision, heartbeat staccato, ecdysis.
chrysalis.
baptisté.
we hope, we lose hope, we move closer to death, finally we die, born again, tabula rasa, begin from the end, birthed into the mud house we previously died to escape from
the entity continues
look at your life from the perspective of an old woman about to die, or a flame at the bottom of the matchstick, beholding its trail and acknowledging the duality of its existence, birth and inexistence, exhausting, yet exhausted
the entity continues, his voice begins to trail off
look at me
i do
he is a blur, colour wheel in human outlines glitching like bad television
do you want to see the light
i do not respond
a goat stands on two legs, it is clothed in white robes and it is reciting beads on a rosary. the entity gestures to it, it steps forward and looks at me, an uncanny sadness in its eyes. it has a crucifix on its forehead, a light shines through its chest and it is muttering the “Our Father” imperceptibly. it places its hooves on my chest and leans me backwards, i am in a fountain and people stand in the distance, all around everywhere i look, all of them strokes of light in eerie dark, metaphysical chiaroscuro. i am in the water, swirling, swirling, enveloped in the current. i try to gasp but I have no mouth, i am still clutching the black linen cloth, i am submerged in water and its hooves hold me firmly in place, prayers are being recited in the nothing above, the water begins to brown, slight discoloration transmutes into mud bath, i am sand and the water rushes into my eyes and nose and heart, swirling, swirling, it is painless, i disintegrate and the fountain is mud now, the flutes begin, eggplant skies, life in me and me in water, world overhead becomes a distant echo, echo, echo, echo, echo, echo, echo, echo, echo.
it ends.