near-life experience

yes by all means
go into the light
look around in there
it’s all very nice
it’s all very neat
it’s fake

the light is a trick
the light is a confabulation
the light is there to trick the rubes
the moths and the rubes
cheap glitz to wow you
and then you’re zapped

go into the light and look deeper
don’t just fall for the light
don’t buy into it all at once
look around a little bit
get to know the light
find this one little spot inside
there’s one dot inside the light
of darkness
it’s so dark it isn’t even black
it’s gone around on itself again
it’s so black that it’s indigo blue again
if you’re ready
if you’re willing to really see where you stand
dive into that darkness

throw yourself into that tornado of nothing
so nothing that it is somehow something again
something different but something
hang on
hold on tight
keep yourself together
it is a hell of a place
it is powerfully frightening
it is frighteningly powerful
quest around in there for a while
in the little inky hole inside the fake light
that opens up around you into something
far larger than the cheap white light ever could be
maybe it’s getting bigger
maybe you’re getting smaller
maybe nothing’s changing at all
and the neon fraud is just fading away

down there
down there somewhere
at the very heart of the storm
there is a light
if you look inside the darkness
the endless universe of darkness
hidden inside the tacky-carpeting bullshit light
there is a real light
it is tiny and pure and
it is not blinding
it is the opposite of blinding
it will let you see
who you really are
what this really is
and it is not vast
and it is not cheap
and it is not terrible
and it is not bracing with winds like knives
it is real
and it is really hard to find

yes go into the light
that’s fine
that’s just the first step
you’ll have miles of midnight to go through
tangled up in indigo blue
before you get to the real light
the real tiny fragile beautiful light
but if you get there
if you survive
man
that is the good stuff
that is the good stuff