A Single Beauty

Beauty is a strange creature.

It's such a delicate sensation, yet so fucking powerful. Little molecules of wonderful travelling, through the air, across oceans and against all winds (and odds) to find you when you least expect it. Every breath momentarily stops, the pulse quickens, flesh instantly heats up, like charcoal from within could be threatening to toast the see-through skin of the stunned "victim". A slight tremble eases the shock into the body, which is otherwise helpless to resist the effects of such monumental power. Time stands still, as if it was supposed to pause at this precise moment, since the beginning of everything. This is so much more than mere coincidence. Fate seems instrumental in bringing you to this specific place and time, so that you can be exposed to this weapon, at the EXACT moment when you least expect it, and at the EXACT instant you would be powerless to react. One millisecond before or after, your defences would be raised and the weapon would be rendered useless. That however is not the case. Timing is everything in times of war, and beauty is the master enemy. It knows all tricks of the trade and its armoury is spread out into the abyss of infinity. There is no soul that can resist such a formidable foe. Certainly not mine. Like a spider approaching a paralysed and immobile fly, beauty penetrates every single defence the body the mind and the soul all combined could ever have against it. Like a strong smell in a tiny room you can't escape from cause there's nowhere to go, nothing to do to avoid it, it WILL get you. All you can do is hold your breath and watch it slowly surround you, envelop your every pore as you are powerless to resist. You're falling and you can do nothing to stop your free fall. As soon as the oxygen runs out, you will be forced to inhale, and finally the inevitable will be upon you. Beauty will insert itself through your nose and infiltrate your lungs with an intoxicating essence that slowly makes every cell inside you go numb. Don't get me wrong, all this takes a VERY short while to happen, it just seems like forever. Remember: time has no meaning here, and space is merely what beauty allows it to be. It's inside you now, everywhere you are, everything you be, you are now, both at One. Not a slave. Not a drone. Not even a possessed body, taken by an external spirit. Beauty is SO much stronger than any of these. It has now transformed you into itself. You cease to exist. You are now one with your enemy. If it moves, so do you. If it rains, you do too. If it dies, so will you. It doesn't simply own you or hold you. It has forced you to become it. It's your master and servant all at once. You HAVE free will, you CAN do whatever you want, you MAY say whatever pleases you. Only, there is NO you any more. All that was, now isn't. You are one with beauty and you sway in the corridors of matter, back and forth, right and left, according to its every whim, thinking at every step of the way, that you are a sovereign human being. What a joke! Of course such a notion is utterly ridiculous to beauty.  Beauty KNOWS you have ceased to exist and proceeds to extract every ounce of  the precious life-force inside you, draining your energy and your dreams, faster than electrical lightning. It's not hostile, it cares not to show off its powers, the notion itself is silly. Would an elephant parade its strength in front of an ant? Beauty knows you are nothing against its brutal force, so it clearly has the luxury of appearing to be friendly. Kidd yourself not: It is NOTHING OF THE SORT. Its sole purpose in this universe is to consume you whole, and after every aspect of your being is withdrawn from your dimension, it will still ask for more. "Ask" being a euphemism, there is NO kindness or gentleness in the way beauty moves or acts or in how it finally gets what it wants. It's like an avalanche that does not need to excuse or explain itself to the suffering mountain underneath. It WILL get what it wants out of your sorry little excuse for a homo sapient. It WILL swallow you and digest you, while at the same time, you are still dizzy, lost and evaporating inside a spiral flight towards paradise. You are grateful for this slow extermination of your soul. You are smiling and feeling elated as your every molecule is slowly disappearing in beauty's bottomless pit of a mouth. You feel blessed and content, as you are fulfilling your purpose in the universe, which is to obey and deliver your spirit wholeheartedly. Don't be a fool and believe for any second that you have ANY choice in the matter. That's preposterous. You don't choose beauty, beauty chooses you. And ONCE you are chosen, it's a done deal. Time begins the moment beauty lays it's magnetic eyes on you, and it stops within a fraction of a second later. So when finally beauty is done with your sorry arse, and you have nothing more to give, it is now ready to spit you out into the abyss again, a pathetic little remnant of your former self. You don't realise it at the time as you are floating within a light blue cloud of all that is exquisite, having finally become what you were designed to be, i.e. beauty's food. Unbeknownst to you, you have by now been fully digested and are at this point "launched" into your "real" world again. At this stage you simply have no concept of the time that has "actually" passed. It could be moments. Might as well be centuries. You don't understand what just happened, but you don't really give a shit. You think you actively participated in this whole process, your taste and appreciation a mere cloak beauty uses to successfully manipulate your every notion of free choice. Beauty is already gone by this point, swiftly writhing away, its thorny eyes already set upon a different target, still chasing after the life-juice of yet another. And then another. You are merely excrement in its eyes, and you cease to exist. Beauty has just flushed you down the toilet, while you STILL believe you were the Chosen One. This is when reality SLAMS you in the face and you begin to suspect what really took place, but the power of denial is probably the 3rd most powerful force in the cosmos (after Love & Beauty). You resist ALL notions of self-doubt, and proceed to live inside your fairytale. But somewhere deep inside you, WAY deep, the scars beauty has left, will haunt you forever, and you'll never be the same again. Oh the agony! This is the ultimate penalty. You instantly crave it again. You can never be but a shadow of who you were a few seconds before, and you are dreading to be alone without it for the rest of your days inside this fleshy form. As you slowly linger in this tormenting thought, your stomach begins to swirl, and a sickening nausea is overwhelming you. You are like a junkie that has been ruined forever, always aching to its core for a taste of the ultimate fix: to be inside beauty's clutches once more. Nothing else matters. Everything else you do, will come second to your REAL craving. You WANT to be one with it again. You DESPERATELY want to be manipulated and consumed and spit out like tasteless chewing gum, on the dirty pavement, in the falling rain, being stepped upon by all the muddy shoes of passers-by. You don't really care. Just as long as you can slowly ignite the life-force inside you again, which will eventually relight your energy, replenish your fuel, just up to the point where your pores will once again begin to reek of your desperate craving that will alert beauty that there is more to "eat". And your life will only go on, until this open invitation will once again be answered, in a viciously vicious circle that will see you to the end of your days. And possibly beyond.

Beauty is a strange creature.