Prophet Song

by Paul Lynch

Larry, how much of our constitutional rights can they suspend under these emergency powers? I don’t know, not this much, not like this, any powers of detention are still subject to the law but what is the law if this kind of thing is going on,

We are both scientists, Eilish, we belong to a tradition but tradition is nothing more than what everyone can agree on – the scientists, the teachers, the institutions, if you change ownership of the institutions then you can change ownership of the facts, you can alter the structure of belief, what is agreed upon, that is what they are doing, Eilish, it is really quite simple, the NAP is trying to change what you and I call reality, they want to muddy it like water, if you say one thing is another thing and you say it enough times, then it must be so, and if you keep saying it over and over people accept it as true – this is an old idea, of course, it really is nothing new, but you’re watching it happen in your own time and not in a book.

who else will stand up for our constitutional rights if the teachers don’t stick it to them?

For an instant she sees the past held in the open gaze of the mirror as though the mirror contains all it has seen, seeing herself sleepwalking before the glass, the mindless comings and goings throughout the years, watching herself usher the children out to the car and they are all ages before her and Mark has lost another shoe and Molly is refusing to wear a coat and Larry is asking if they have their schoolbags and she sees how happiness hides in the humdrum, how it abides in the everyday toing and froing as though happiness were a thing that should not be seen, as though it were a note that cannot be heard until it sounds from the past, seeing her own countless reflections vain and satisfied before the glass while Larry waits impatiently in the car, he is standing in the hall taking off his raincoat, he is shouting for his slippers as he slides out of his green boots.

sometimes not doing something is the best way to get what you want, sometimes you have to be quiet and keep your head down, sometimes when you get up in the morning you should spend more time choosing your colours.

it is not even the words spoken, Eilish thinks, but the speaking of their bodies, for here before the world there is no place to hide. Bailey is watching the protest on a phone and she sees their image giant and alive and can sense her fear has gone, that her fear has become its opposite, wanting now to surrender to this, to become one with the larger body, the single breath, feeling her might grow in the triumph of the crowd.

Soon he will walk and then he will run and the hand that pulls on the hand of the mother is the hand that will pull to let go.

She turns watching the faces that surround her, the faces pained with the vertigo of staring into sudden abyss, all of these people the very same, every one of them clothed yet naked, sullied and pure, proud and shameful, disloyal and faithful, all of them brought here by love.

Fear attracts the very thing it is afraid of,

No, Mam, you need to listen to me now, I want you to hear what I have to say, I no longer have my freedom, you need to understand, there is no freedom to think or to do or to be when we give in to them, I cannot live my life like that, the only freedom left to me is to fight.

There is memory in weather.

the dust laying itself down upon the years of their lives, the years of their lives slowly turning to dust, what will remain and how little can be known about who we were, in the closing of an eye we will all be gone.

grievance is grief dressed in the clothes of hope.

you either learn or win,

the world become some void of darkness

i wonder what's happening in the rest of the world right now

people are entitled to live their lives, people are entitled to some small moment of peace.

she knows that once they walk across this line the weight will begin, that what is left behind will not be left behind at all but will continue to grow in weight and be carried forever on their backs.

I think what I’m trying to say is that I used to believe in free will, if you had asked me before all this I would have told you I was free as a bird, but now I’m not so sure, now, I don’t see how free will is possible when you are caught up within such a monstrosity, one thing leads to another thing until the damn thing has its own momentum and there is nothing you can do, I can see now that what I thought of as freedom was really just struggle and that there was no freedom all along,

we are here now aren’t we and so many other people are gone, we’re the lucky ones seeking a better life, there is only looking forward now, isn’t that right, perhaps there is a little freedom to be found in that thought because at least you can make the future your own in your thoughts and if we keep looking back we will die in a way and there is still some living to be done,

to stay would be to remain in this dark when she wants for them to live,