Work in Progress

Eternity, philosopher. Does that word have any meaning? Do philosophers use it? Is it respectable? Is it the kind of word you use?

I don’t know what it means. I don’t know what I’m saying when I say the word, eternity. Is it nonsense? Does it mean anything? Do all words have to mean things?


Are we in God’s hands, philosopher? Or are we in Mother’s hands? Whose hands are we in? Who are we held by? I suppose you believe that we’re not held by anyone at all.


Is it God’s word: eternity? Does it belong to God? What does it mean for a word to belong to God?


We’re walking along the shore. Is that supposed to mean something? Is it supposed to be About something, capital A?


What if all this was just an offering to God, all this? You and I. And everything we say. And think. And feel. What about that, philosopher?


It’s what I feel. Does what I feel mean anything to you? We feel all sorts of things, don’t we?

Are we just fools, philosopher? Are we deceived, all the time? Do we lie to ourselves and to each other? Are we in disguise? Do we live behind masks? Then how can we take them off: our masks? How can we show who we are?

Who are we? Who, today, tomorrow? Who were we yesterday, and the day before that?

And what are these words we use? To … express ourselves. To express ourselves: those words feel wrong.

The words we use. The words that use us to speak them. The words we speak. The words that speak through us. These words.

Are they God’s words, too? Does God speak through our words, too? And what does God say? What is God saying – even now? Even with my words?

What is it, language? What does it allow? What does it let us say, and prevent us from saying? Does language stand in our way? Where is it leading us, language? Where is it taking us?


Nothing has to happen the way it does. This moment doesn’t have to follow that one. We needn’t have been here, today, at the coast. We didn’t have to be here, and together. We didn’t have to meet not today, and not at any time. This didn’t have to happen, any of this.


Here we are, at the coast. Whitley Bay beach. On the promenade.

Why did we have to be here? What’s the good of our being here? Does God want us here? Did God bring us here? Were we following God’s … orders? Were we meant to come here? For what, philosopher? For what?


The question questions. It’s asking. There’s an asking. We’re part of the question. And it’s as though the whole world were asking. As though everything were asking. It’s as if it were all asking, and we were all asking.

Everything asks the question of itself: is that a stupid thing to say, philosopher? Is it an unphilosophical thing to say?


What about God, philosopher? The question of God: is that a thing? The question that belongs to God?

I feel very close to God, you know. Isn’t that stupid? Isn’t it stupid that I would feel close to God? But I do. I feel close to God.

And God is close to me. And God is close to us. And God is watching us. And maybe Mother is, too.

Maybe Mother is God, a version of God. Who says God has to be a he? Couldn’t God be a mother, too? There’s the mother-God in Hinduism, isn’t there?


Have we been false to God? False to ourselves? I want to pray, philosopher. I want to say words in prayer. I want to pray to the Most High God. Do you understand that?

It’s a beautiful word, prayer. It’s as beautiful as the word, God.

Where is God, philosopher? Does God still listen to us? Does God still walk with us, with the whole of humankind?

If I ask him, will he speak to me? Will we show that he was already here? That he’s always been here. That he will always be here.



Are we false to him? Do we lie to him? Do we lie to ourselves? Are our lives lies? Are what we are just lies? Untruths?


Can we re enter Paradise, philosopher? Can we return to Paradise? But seraphim guard the gates with flaming swords. We can’t go back. We have to go forward. We have to wander the earth. Looking for a way back. Looking to return to Paradise.

But perhaps Paradise is here, too.

This is Hell. We live in Hell.

Perhaps what you call Hell is part of Paradise.


I don’t know what I’m saying. I don’t know what’s guiding me. Maybe I’m just saying stupid things. And maybe that’s not so bad, saying stupid things. Maybe the things that need to be said have to be stupid.

I’m repeating myself. These words are repeating themselves. These words … the rhythm of these words. That seems more important … at least as important as what is said. As what I am saying.


God’s Word: is it like our words? Does God speak like we do?


Are we still alive, philosopher? How could we tell? Is this a real life or a false life? Are we in a real world or a false world? And what about those other worlds – what are we doing in them, the other worlds?

Are we walking on the shore? Are we at Whitley Bay? Are we together, you and I? Are we talking you and I? And what are we talking about in those other words, you and I?

Are we happy, in those other worlds? Happier, anyway, philosopher. Are you happy? Are you a philosopher or a would-be philosopher or whatever it is you are?

What kind of people are we in the other worlds? Did we leave Paradise in the other world? Did we Fall, in the other world? Imagine, if we could have just stayed forever in Paradise …

Are we as wretched over there, in the other world? Are we damned, in the other worlds? Are we hated in the other words? Do we hate, in the other worlds?

Are we weeping, in the other worlds? Do the tears run over our sore eyes, in the other worlds?

Do we know peace in the other worlds? What does that word mean, philosopher: peace? Does it mean anything, the word, peace?

What does the word rest mean, philosopher? Does it mean anything, the word, rest?

Or are we just falling and falling and falling?

Disgust as insight. As gnosis. Disgust as knowledge.


We have to taste the horror.

Tasting is knowledge. Like, visceral knowledge. Tasting is gnosis.


The wine’s confirming what we already know. It’s reminding us of what we know. It’s deepening the knowledge. It’s driving it home. Intensifying it.


It’s, like, embodied knowledge. Lived gnosis. It’s not abstract. It’s not propositional. You can’t convey it in words. You taste it. You’re disgusted by it.


It’s ontological. It’s ontological disgust. It’s absolute disgust. A revulsion at being itself.


There’s knowing and knowing. We have to KNOW, in capitals. We have to be reminded. We have to keep the knowledge alive. Keep the gnosis burning.


The disgust is awakening us. Drunken disgust.


Where’s it supposed to lead us, our disgust? Out of Hell?

More deeply into Hell. It’s more descent. It’s making us descend further. Go deeper.


We’re sinking. And have to sink further still. To the bottom of the world. Not just some Victorian tunnel.


A gnosis of what? Not of a higher, better world. A knowledge of what? Only that this world sucks.


There’s nothing to cure us, nothing to save us, nothing to lift us up, nothing but the void and the void isn’t anything, the void won’t help us, the void won’t come to our aid.


All we can do is live against it all. Which means live in our idiocy. In our unholy idiocy. The idiocy that’s fallen to us. That’s the only thing that is ours.

And not even a scream. And not even a breath. And everything Falling and Falling. And everything Plunging. We Sink. We Fall. With the flailing of the world. With the sinking of the world. With the decay of the world and of all things. That have lived too long.

We’ll know that we’re Wrong and that it’s all Wrong. That we’re Poisoned and that it’s all Poisoned. And there’s no one to save us. And that there is no Right and there is no Cure, at least not in this world.

We know that we’re made of sin and stupidity. Of the sins of stupidity. And that’s worse is that even though we know that we’re idiocy through and through, this knowledge doesn’t rise above idiocy, but is part of it.

We don’t even scream. We don’t even cry. Tears aren’t even rolling down our cheeks.

We don’t mean what we say. I don’t mean what I say. I haven’t said a single sincere word. A single honest word. I haven’t said anything true.

It’s like I’m defiling language. Like I’m saying the wrong thing, and all the wrong things. Language itself … these words themselves … Everything I’ve ever said. And we’ve ever said.

These words. I hate words. I hate speaking. I hate all the things I say with my mouth. I hate my mouth. I hate the hole into my inside. And all the things that spew from my mouth.

Why should I deserve to speak? Shouldn’t I just keep quiet? Shouldn’t I keep quiet forever? Shouldn’t I just stop speaking and writing? And saying things, saying all these things? Saying all these words?

We have to be disgusted with … our ability to speak. We don’t deserve to speak – maybe it’s that. We don’t deserve words. To be able to use words. Saying things is wrong. We’re destroying language. Polluting language. We shouldn’t say another word. A vow of silence! Silence! And wouldn’t we spoil that, too?

Abasement. Abomination. Lower and lower. All the way down.

This is the katabasis, right? A farcical katabasis. A decent that isn’t a descent, not a real one. Not to the centre of the earth. Not all the way to hell.

The tunnel, echoing with our stupidity. Just sounding out our stupid words.

My God what are we? What have we become?

How did we live? How did we think? Were those thoughts? Could we even call them thoughts?

What did we do with philosophy? With the philosophy we inherited? With the whole history of ideas that was passed down to us?

What did we do, with all the books we read? With all the books about books that we’ve read? With all the introductory guides to the books about books that we’ve read?


How we’ve failed ourselves. How we’ve failed everything. How we’ve failed philosophy – and the great philosophers, who burn above us, in their firmament. Who burn in their constellations above us, in the philosophical sky.

We didn’t do anything good with our lives. We didn’t do anything right. And now here we are, in our Wrongness. We who should never have been here. We who were brought here as a joke. (A joke played on what. On who?)

And we can’t even laugh at ourselves properly. Our laughter isn’t loud. We don’t laugh from our chest. From our guts. Our laughter doesn’t reach all the way down. Our laughter doesn’t encompass everything. Our laughter isn’t a laughter at everything, and ourselves included.


And now we’re deep beneath the world. Now we’re deep under all things. The world should crush us. And we should feel crushed. And we should feel destroyed. We should feel done for.

We haven’t risen to disgust. Our disgust isn’t complete. We haven’t reached it, disgust. We haven’t gone all the way.

Even now, even underground … Even buried down here … Even interred down here … It’s not complete, it’s not finished, our disgust. We haven’t died to ourselves, as we should have. We haven’t risen anew from our completed disgust. In our finished despair.


The horror doesn’t roll through us. The horror at the poison. The horror isn’t thunder inside us. We haven’t sunk to the very bottom.

There’s still room in our despair. We can still stretch our limbs, walk about, in our despair. Our despair’s still capacious. Still big enough. We can still breathe in our despair, and we shouldn’t be able to breathe. We should still be feeling suffocated by our despair. We should be gasping.

And the lies. The lies aren’t intolerable enough to us, not yet. The lies don’t disgust us enough. We still speak. We shouldn’t be able to speak. With these words. With all the words.

Because all the words are foul. Because all the words are contaminated. And we should just sit in silence forever. We should just die. Not even die – just perish. Just … wink out.


And not even the grandeur of a death. Not even the dignity of a death. We shouldn’t be able to die. Death’s too good for us. Death’s something we can’t attain. We can’t rise to its level or sink to its level, death.

We should just … decay … just rot to vileness. Just bubble in foulness. Just froth, bubbling and frothing. Like the froth from the mouth of a rabid dog.

Everything in my body, everything in my taste buds. Everything in my brain is saying, don’t drink this.


I really shouldn’t be drinking this, I know that. This is straight poison, nothing else.
Do you think Livia wants to poison us? Did she want to kill us?


Deep foulness. It can’t get any worse, can it? This can’t be good for us, can it?


Ah, the lessons of vileness. Like we actually need to become more Gnostic.


We’re abasing ourselves, as usual.

Livia’s abasing us. From a distance. From wherever she is.


We’re pushing abasement to the max. Defilement. But why? What’s it for?


It’s a joke – don’t you see? Livia’s joke. That we would look to the disgusting for salvation. The joke’s on us. On you, anyway – on you guys. Who are just Livia’s … imitators. Her fan boys and girls.

I’m not drinking this, and nor should you. Look at you all, passing round the bottle. Can’t you be your own people?


What are we tasting?

General putrescence. Rotting.

The rotting of what?

I don’t know … the universe.


Inside the horror: that’s where she wants to put us. We’re drinking from inside the horror.

Auto purgation. Auto catharsis. An enema of the mouth.

What we’re disgusted by is important.

We’re made by our disgusts. Founded upon them.

Vomiting – that’s the overcoming of disgust.

Disgust is a state of emergency. Of the soul. Of the body.

I’m disgusted, therefore …

Therefore, what?


God. All these different ways to be repulsed. All these different disgustings. All the foulness.


Is this what the end of the world tastes like? Is it end of the world wine?

It’s the endless end of the world, which is worse.


What is this wine becoming inside us? What is in changing us into?

There’s some deep process at work. Some deep … fermentation. As though we were living barrels.


It’s fallen wine. Wine for the fallen. For the fallen to drink.

The baseness of all things. The rotting of all things. The putrescence of it all.


The great disgust. I can taste it. The self-disgust of the world. The way the world doesn’t want to be. Its … self-repulsion. Its hatred of itself. Its infestedness. Its infestation – of itself.


Auto disgust, basically. The whole festering sore. The great wound. What we know, what we taste, is what knows that it should not be. That none of this should exist at all.


We’re drinking the catastrophe, don’t you see? To intensify the horror. And the disgust. To increase it. To deepen it, even.


Yes, we’re horrified by what we’re drinking. But that’s as it must be. Because we’re horrified by our living. By our continuing to live. By our being alive. By our still being alive in this world! Amidst the poison! And the lies!