A Reality Picnic

In the twilight, my sweat pours and my body tenses in the act of pleasurable torture. As I look down at my lover writhing with the pain of ecstasy from my penetration, I see she is smiling. Smiling for whom? Smiling for someone lost in the midst of the cranial organ, fighting to be released in a passionate climax.

I touch her body and it moves with my caresses. We are one together and our souls merge with the energy of a star. We implode and I push myself against her, to search deeper and feel her convulsions. Holding tight, the naked flesh echoes in the evening air. The skin has a radiance flowing into the ocean. I have caught the sun in my hands and tamed it. Now I am the master, my lover the mistress.

The dawn breaks our embrace and my skin ceases in its torrid flow of tears. The warmth, oh, how welcoming! I place my lips on her breast and drink at will from her fortune. I have taken a large slice from the forbidden fruit and any punishment will be gratefully received. Pulled close with open arms until she is overwhelmed by my splendour.

My inner conscience as been tattooed with the memory of a synchronised act of love. Now, I shall enter the water of life and drink until I have conquered my thirst.

I return to see her lying on the bed of roses, reflecting the light in her eyes to paint a spectrum of colours across the whole room. In her hand, tentatively she holds a cigarette, which glows almost as brightly as she.

The smoke dances a dance of seven veils and the sensual movement of the smoke captivates me, for a moment; it glides through the air on a mission.

In. Out. Her breathing so regular, etching more pictures with the smoke it is releasing.

I return to bed and glances of youthful lust are exchanged along with cigarette. I too taste the Heaven of tobacco. A utopia has returned and is climbs into bed alongside us.

Laura, my lover, senses my trepidation. It's the circling smoke; she retrieves the cigarette from my trembling fingers. My eyes have seen but my mind has closed its inner eye in disbelief.

I chew on the thought for a split second before spitting it forth into the gutter; but it keeps on climbing up to yield, in the inner sanctum of my mind, an unnerving precipitation of ideologies. I await its next move.

Meanwhile, I attempt to dam the fast flowing river.

I return to my lover's breast and slowly move down to take us into the far reaches of Heaven and Hell.

We drown in each other.

We share another cigarette and revel in the glory of our lovemaking; basking in the spiralling rays of sun as it pulls itself up into the sky, heaving itself into eternity. Laura leaves to go to the bathroom and left behind is a void, yearning to be filled.

Her poisonous charms cascade from her as she walks, staining the floor with rainbows. I pick them up and fill the void with the jigsaw pieces. The chasm holds no fear for me now and I draw on the cigarette with relief.

But, the smoke: it dances differently. The conductor of the orchestra has changed the tempo of its tune. It has lost its informal theme. The backbone has been broken, snapped in two by hands that feel not for delicate things. I am pensive.

I try to call to Laura, but I have swallowed a desert and I reel from the images taking refuge in my head. The smoke will rise no more as the invisible extractor fan pulls it into the black hole.

The world stops and waits.

I take a large bite from the reality sandwich. The taste is sour in my mouth as I masticate. My surroundings spin on an accelerating Ferris wheel. I grip the bed in desperation, trying hard not to be flung off into oblivious obscurity. I clench my eyes shut to the razorblade apparitions and hope and pray that these ghosts will have vanished when I reopen them. I lift one eyelid.

The tension so thick in the air I fight to breathe. The smoke is still the same. The fan is still on full and is trying to take me with it.

My fear departs and curiosity arrives with the force of a lightning bolt. What is going on? Someone please tell me, as my threadbare assumptions provide no substance.

Substance, was there ever any?

I think out loud: what is substance? What is reality? If I look closer at the spot where the smoke stops and the indecision starts will I find the answer? I peruse the room, collecting thoughts from the trees, taking care to pick only those that are ripe.

I sink back into the bed and wait for my wounds to heal; I contemplate my next move. I am exhausted and exalted. My tenuous grip that once was is now more assertive.

Laura returns and takes her place next to me. She kisses me with a fragrance burned from the sun and then turns over, as she is hungry for sleep. Famished.

I am wide awake, but it will be strenuous to stay that way. However, this experiment needs to be resolved. This hypothesis-thirst needs to be quenched and I am ready to drink until the tap runs dry.

A cigarette is ceremoniously lit and I sacrifice my want for nicotine and swirl within the smoke itself.

I feel as though I am in a crowd, suffocating in my claustrophobia, unable to push away the hands that are holding me down. Do I really want to swim free from the covering bandages? I think I am ready to drown, just to experience the sensation of the other side. Substance again? To answer this I must persist in this relationship with the smoke. To give up now would admit defeat; to persevere would be the ultimate revenge against reality. I am still impounded by apprehension, but I will surely break through with further advancement into the quivering abyss.

I touch the air above the smoke of the cigarette and watch my fingers slowly disappearing. I pull away, choking with disgust. I count my fingers to make sure they all exist still. Relief follows as I count four.

Substance exists in this world but from that point, it ceases to be so. The magnetic pull of sleep has been repelled to make way for this new scene in the play for reality. The substance I am defining is split into two parts:

1. That I can see and feel


2. That which exists in my mind

After appearing to touch another dimension I prefer the substance I can smell, touch, taste. The substance in my head is what I want to grasp but I know not how. I think about waking my lover, Laura, to question myself further, but my thoughts race in the direction of the smoke and the time has come to step into the unknown.

I reach out, grab at the air with both hands, and give a slight tug. To my surprise – and wonder – the air starts to give way. Am I in a play? My senses on full alert, I begin to peel away the "scenery" around me. The air begins to fold back like badly pasted wallpaper. The substance does exist! It is the real within the unreal!

My excitement is growing, the adrenalin pumping so hard in my veins I am afraid they may explode. The anticipation is holding them back.

I am breaking the cage of reality, out, into another place. The outside world.

As I pull harder, I notice that the smoke is spinning in circles, slowly, almost at a standstill. It has grabbed me by the throat so that my eyes take a closer look. The fist of reality has punched me hard.

I examine the small aperture to assure my conscience that it is real. I turn to Laura and realise her breathing, her consciousness has become slower also. A snail's pace. What is happening?

I'm not sure, but it is too late to go back now. Something is urging me on; another part of me that I cannot see, hear, smell, taste nor question is attempting to pull me back. I look at the clock.

It has stopped.

Now that I know the second substance is a reality, I must stop rational thought and carry on with my work. Am I mad? I do not feel sane but no one is around to tell me either way.

I widen the aperture further so that I can gaze through it into the illogical.

I take a deep breath, releasing it with care and stand up to press my eye into the space within space. The substance within substance.

My naked flesh shivers with excitement, apprehension, fear. I spurn these feelings, for they may make me neglect my task. Completing this has gone far beyond necessity. Countless thoughts scamper through my head, but one remains, fixed: I MUST ESCAPE.

The implications of my breakout are not known and they do not cross my mind. Consequences, consequences... more substance.

I spy through the air keyhole into a chamber, an unknown, unseen catacomb: a labyrinth of absolution. My head proceeds further into the space beyond space beyond. I scream at the sight.

My pupils dilate and encompass the whole eye. I am scared.

Frightened by the horror before me, I try to reel from the scene, but something keeps my eyes glued to the stage in the theatre of pain. A force lifts my arms up to the hole and I pull harder. I've got to break from this cage, got to get out.

I am not in control anymore, something has infiltrated my body and this is no longer funny. I am out of control. Under the influence. I am not me. Me has no substance of any kind.

The white-coated men are running back and forth, scurrying like disturbed rats. There is a line of test tubes on a white bench in this bland whitewashed room. There is no substance here, either. With the last of my strength, I scan the room. Test tubes. TEST TUBES.

This is a test, an experiment. That is why there is no substance. But why? Why me? I catch sight of a large bottle on the end of the bench. This is the final part of the experiment and the bottle has my name on it. The organism at the bottom, it's me. ME! I am nothing. My whole life has always been nothing but a vacuum. It is time to get in and save myself before it's too late.

The white coats are milling around me but to them I am far away. I lumber into the laboratory, blinded by the glare from the lights. The doctors look worried now that I have shattered any illusions they may have had.

Except one. He has a hypodermic needle in his hand and, like a kamikaze pilot, he is coming in for the kill. I have to reach myself before he does. He is quick, I'll give him that, but I hope to be quicker. The alarm bells are loud. The lights in my head are flashing with severe intensity and the cutting glare of the lights is making me dizzy.

There is a stabbing pain flowing through my body and a picture of pain suddenly burns my vision. It feels as though I have swallowed broken glass, which is multiplying. The final plunge of the hypodermic commits the end obliteration. It, me, is finished.

The doctor in the white coat moves towards me. The last thing I see is my own face pasted on to the no-substance body of my death inflictor. Substance was the beginning and no substance was the killer blow. I have just committed suicide and I had no control over my own actions. Time stopped for a reason... no substance.

-*-

"Hello James. How are you this morning? You gave us quite a fright last night. We had to sedate you. You were clawing at the air and now you'll have to be strapped down for your own protection; at least until Dr. Francis says it's okay for them to be removed. Now, time for another shot."

"How is he this morning nurse?" Dr. Francis asked.

"Fine now, Dr, but he keeps on mumbling. Best we keep an eye on him?"

"Yes, yes. Thank you. Keep me informed."

Substance. Suicide. Men in white coats. My lover... my lover... I am the master and she the mistress.