Saturday, November 01, 2008

Comet Spirit

He likes to imagine the trajectory of his life as a wayward comet moving relentlessly toward its inevitable end in some unknown, unmapped corner of space. Distant, aloof, almost mystical in its alluring power and inaccessibility, the comet makes for a compelling metaphor, but the reality is that a life is more like a leaf tumbling to the ground. Where the comet is as old as Universe, the leaf is young, short-lived, and eventually destined to be disassembled and absorbed by the elements of Earth. There is no question that he would prefer to be the comet, with all its power and celestial majesty. In his mind, the physical aspect, the biochemical aspect of his reality, would work wonderfully as the comet's icy vapor trail. After all, the physical is temporary and in a perpetual state of decay. In his mind's eye, a vision of the ghostly cloud trailing off behind a brilliant, glowing comet as it rushes through space is the perfect metaphor for physical life. Tiny bits of its mass are shed through time and space, leaving behind fragments that become anonymous components of the infinite ether.

Yes, being a comet would be a fine thing. One could set one's self off in a direction without worry or anxiety about what lie ahead. The movement would be the thing. Progress, all of existence would be about progress. Not necessarily progress toward a goal, so much as a perpetual, forward progression. The concept makes such intuitive sense, he argues. This world, this life within this world, these things are three dimensional and irresistibly forward in their nature. Even the Buddhist who declares there is no when but here and now must recognize that the physical state of here and now is perpetually changing, so that there is no constant but change, with history being a snapshot of the self at that moment which is left behind and discarded, even as it is still developing. In this way we leap from moment to moment, depositing our own cosmic dust as the perpetual motion machine that is time, or physical decay, advances apace.

With every grain of icy dust, the ball of ice gives itself over to a finite contrail beginning at birth, and exhausting at death, with chronological life lived in between. Being a physical thing, the material self, like the comet, is subject to collisions, interference, and transformation. One day, the material self is healthy and powerful, then in the blink of an eye, or the passage of several decades, that same mass of molecules and energy dissipates and becomes a diminished artifact of some previous moment. In this way, the comet spirit sees its Earthly self as an eroding sandcastle in which it must attempt to grow comfortable.

The motorcycle's exhaust pounds its voice back into his consciousness. This must be what it sounds like to be an artillery shell flying aware from a battery at full song. Each explosion instigated by an eager spark plug agitating the indifferent air and gasoline occupying the machine's heart. Could this be the sound of a comet soul making its way through this multidimensional world. It certainly stirs his spirit in ways he does not always understand, but at the moment, it might simply be the last sound he ever hears, should he fail to get his mind back in the here and now.

"Goddamn I'm a mess", he muses to the inner lining and membranes of his skull. With bleary eyes he focuses on the road ahead with almost no hope of being able to be right now for a long time.

Perhaps we are not comets after all, but merely tree leaves flipping and flopping to our respective grand finales in the dirt. He would rather not find out today, so he points two wheels toward home and pushes the infinite nothingness that contains every thing from his active mind.

Posted by Erik @ 11/01/2008 10:40:00 PM