Part Three
In the time before the machine
I walked. I ran. I crawled. There was no difference. The distance was as it had always been. Infinite and unsolved. As it should be.
It wasn't ours. It belonged to the chemistry of flesh. To the pleasures we worshiped. To the lies we used to tell us.
Our bodies careening through the moments in a relentless surrender to the yoke of desire.
In the time after the machine
I sat. I chewed on the knots. As they tightened. Grieving centuries of superstition. As it overtook us. Mourning the fatalities of belief. As they made us narrow and sharp. Until hurt was all we could feel.
In the time of the machine
I listened. I remained silent as the truth was spread. Our superiority eclipsed by our ignorance.
All that was left to do was escape. Disregard what we had become. Attempt to imagine what we could've been.
I had numbers. Bent needles lingering in the fists of eternity. I had memory. Flesh scratching against the chalkboard of circumstance.
Forward vanished first. Back was gone next.
Our machine returned us to the place we had begun.
But it wasn’t the same as we had left it.
Cat purrs.
Inside our broken box.
Or maybe it wasn’t broken at all.
We were exactly where we had always been. Two travelers having been everywhere. Sunken liars hopelessly bartering with truth’s soiled remains.