Rejoice, I am dying! Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. Wave your arms in the air! Dance with stomping feet! Praise my return to nothingness! With each passing day and with each passing hour, I am getting closer to my grave. I am getting old and tired. I have approached the legal age of twenty-one but my mind has reached the ripe age of sixty-four and my soul has wandered around the multiverse for countless aeons, many infinitillions, nulillions, zebrillions, dandellions, jillions, sicillions, quadriltillions, lilmildillions, panrilfillions, bezdillions, gazillions, billions and millions of years. In my previous lives I was an angel, a Martian, a dinosaur, a mammoth, a priest, a poet, a philosopher, a drunkard, a martyr, a zealot, a harlot and an infinite number of more ideas, dreams and beings. But I was never a king, never a ruler, because I despise all power and all glory.
I am getting sick though my Apollonian physique is in a most excellent shape like a grand sculpture of Discobolus. I am blind like an eagle and weak like a bear. Wisdom is trying to enter the corridors of my brain but madness won’t allow her to enter. Only nothingness finds her abode in me. Only death loves me. Only she understands me completely to the elements of my being, to the very marrow of my bones. Oh death, you pleasing and watchful one! Oh death, you affectionate and gentle one! Oh death, you motherly and tender one! Oh death, you warm and protective one! Oh death, you comforting and kind one! Oh death, you keeper of secrets and creator of peace! Oh, how sweet you are, you queen of non-existence! How pleasant is thy everlasting sleep without the sudden and terrible disturbance of light and sunrise! How wonderful is thy amaranthine silence! How radiant is thy blissful darkness!
I am nearing fast my death. I cannot wait to close my eyes, my ears, my mouth, my nostrils and everything else forever. To see nothing, to hear nothing, to taste nothing, to smell nothing, to feel nothing! Oh, what a blessing! Imagine only – as that old and now dead beetle John of Lenons once wrote – no breath, no pulse, no blood, no worries! Death is like a paradise. No, what am I saying, it is not like paradise, it is the heavenly Zion itself. We have to be precise here and choose our words carefully when we describe this abode of gods. By the holy sandals of Simeon Stylites, it is pure undiluted ecstasy. It lasts forever, without interruption, beyond the spacetime continuum. (Yes, I like to incorporate fancy words in my verbal repertoire and to sprinkle my arguments with highly-charged concepts, so that I may sound convincing and scientific. Spacetime continuum is one of those high-sounding concepts, to be exact. I could name you a few more: transcendence, quantum leaps, paradigm shifts, ground of being. He he 🙂 ) And according to the utilitarian calculus, death is by far the greatest pleasure we should strive for and aim in life. Death should be our only goal and our only target. Death should be our meaning of life. Oh, those vain and empty-headed moralists who preach that death should be avoided by all means, that we should postpone that holy sting and elixir of Shangri-la as far as possible. Oh, you filthy hypocrites and liars! I will strip you from your masks and unveil your reptilian faces. Death is not the greatest sin, it is the greatest virtue. Death is not the greatest evil, it is the greatest good. Hear me out, oh learned and clever misanthropes! Death is the divine love personified. See, how lovingly she embraces every living and non-living atom! If this isn’t love, then I don’t know what is! Do not listen to those Delphic oracles, corrupted spirits and other daimon-possesed minds who command you to know thyself. Do not lend your precious ears to those pretentious windbags. Remember, my friends, if you value truth and wisdom, you should never know thyself. For the maxim of the wise and the truthful is the opposite one – Do not dare to know thyself! Know nothing! As Goethe said: “If I knew myself, I’d run away.” Be nothing and you will spare yourself a lot of foolish hours! Strive for death first!
Where are the hidden secrets of mortality? Allow me to plunge into the fountain of old age. Hide away the philosopher’s stone. Assure me that I will die one day. Say that I will never come back as a reincarnated prince. Make me believe that I possess no immortal soul. Compel my heart into thinking that I am a bundle of atoms, strung accidentally together. Nothing more. Remind me that I was created by a roll of a dice. Show me how insignificant are the atoms I so proudly call in my name! Never promise me seventy-two virgins and joy everlasting. Make me averse to the illusionary delights of life. Do not relieve me from my pains but proclaim that the end is near. Soon I will be dead, never to return, never to regain consciousness, never to open my eyes, never to walk the Elysian fields and the valleys of shadows, never to dream, never to breathe, never to doubt, never to live. Death is the real pursuit of happiness!
When a member of our vain species dies, I am overflown with a feeling of great happiness. It gives me a great pleasure to visit a grave of a fallen hero and to put a bucket of flowers on it. Sometimes I light a candle in an orthodox church in remembrance of the deceased, shed a tear and say a prayer or two. Of course, all this and more superstitious nonsense I do for the benefit of my non-existent soul. And so it happens that as I meet death on every corner of Earth wherever I set my foot on, I am condemned to find myself in a perpetual state of bliss. People die unceasingly, at all times and in all places. Thus I am not only happy, but also overwhelmed by a feeling of solidarity, that is to say, I am encouraged to follow the good example of my comrades and friends and to die off myself. But I feel that my mission is to inspire others – those less fortunate fellows who cannot view the world through my eyes, taste strawberries with my tongue and breathe air through my noble nostrils – to fasten up their death without much hesitancy and to open their minds to one thing only – nonexistence – that great peacemaker and lover. “You should follow your higher calling in life!”, I preach to them. “You should fulfill your true destiny!”, “You should realize your hidden potential!”, I remind them constantly. Do a service for humanity. Engage yourself in a holy cause! Be unselfish! Follow the path of Christ! Go now and die! What Jesus once said to Judas, now I am saying to you: “Hurry and do what you have to do.” Don’t disappoint me. Make daddy proud! Marry the dark Queen! Find your grave! The sooner the better. Go now, you photons, protons, neutrons, electrons, quarks and bosons, you strings of the universe, you who read these lines, die away like a fruit fly! Die away like a moth in a flame! Die like a seed thrown on a rocky ground! Die like seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades, centuries, millenia! Die like life. It is happening already. Lo and behold, time is ticking! Quietly and softly. Can you hear the sound of music, that is to say, the sound of your death? It is your heartbeat. How rhythmically it pulsates. Tick tock. Tick tock. Like a clock. These are the footsteps of death. She is coming! Welcome her majesty inside!
Time is another word for death. She has many words. In fact, all words point to death. All language, all signs, all thoughts, all music, all books, all art, all life point to her. Yes, my friends, everything points to death! Inevitably and absolutely! You too are pointing to death! Yes, you are dying now. How does it feel? Sweet, is it not? It gets better with each passing hour! Enjoy while you can.
Do not hide in the woods, but embrace death with every single fibre of your being! Do not hold onto the ropes of Allah. Cease all the mad fighting and surviving! Give up! Do not resist her loving affection! Be not afraid! Don’t be terrified! She only wills good towards you. Don’t be scared out of your wits if she wants to lie beside you! For she is your only lover. She will hold you tightly in her grips. She will never let you down. She is a trusted friend. You can rely on her. She will never cheat on you. She will never lie to you. Moisten your lips with wine and honey, prepare for an unforgettable kiss. How wonderful it is to die. You will never be limited anymore, because you will not exist. Only life has limitations and boundaries. Death means freedom. Death is the ultimate spirituality. Practice death! And rest in peace! Shoot your bullet in the sky. Shoot your arrow in the clouds. Throw your boomerang against the wind. Soon it will fall down. Soon. Very soon, indeed. Any year. Any month. Any day. Any hour. Perhaps, now.
Homo est Machina 