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Sine sole nihil sum. For everything is a mask. —Karel Toman, “The Sun Clock”
What hurts is true
the eyes of the Czech nation gazed from Petřín Hill as space shuttle JanHus1 launched from a state-owned potato field.
The peculiar relation of potatoes and space exploration
Leaving the vessel to its new fate in the heavens, the chattering citizens then descended Petřín Hill to quench their thirst for beer.
The organization of religion is self-defeating, a trap for sin. Hus does not speak with hatred, but with the soothing composure of a prophet—a man who knows. And the people listen. Students gather with quills in hand and their hearts are moved. Bohemia must be freed from the tyranny of religious institutions.
“Perverts didn’t occupy the country for sixty years,” Grandpa says. “They’ve occupied the planet since the dawn of days,” Grandma says.
floated to the glass and again the object passed, this time so close I recognized a small canine snout, a white line leading up the dark forehead fur, ears perked up, black eyes wide-open and reflecting the blinking lights of infinity, a slim body bloated at the stomach, strapped into a thick harness. I softly pulled the eyelid from my eyeball, felt a parting pop—a trick my grandmother taught me to determine whether I was conscious. I was awake, and this was real. It was her, the outcast of Moscow, the first living heroine of spaceflight, a street bandit transformed into a nation’s pride. It
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The comrade engineers cried for her as she died in agony, and the nation built her a statue to repent for its sins.
the human heart is content when distracted by war.
The universe deceives us with its peace. This is not a poetic abstraction or an attempt at twopenny wisdom—it is a physical fact. The four layers of Earth’s atmosphere rest in their respective places like a four-headed Cerberus, guarding our precious skins from the solar poison thrown in our direction every second of each day. They are stoic guardians, as invisible as they are unappreciated by everyday thought.
“It inspires you, the road,” he said. “In life, you should travel as far as you possibly can, get away from everything you were ever taught. What do you think?” And he coughed, the same smoker’s roar as my grandfather. “What if everything you love is right where you are?” I asked. “Then you find new things to love. A happy person must be a nomad.” “You haven’t loved, then,” I countered. “If what you love gets away from you, in the end you are only walking in a labyrinth with no exits.”
Was it a betrayal to my grandfather that I sat next to this man, spoke to him? He couldn’t blame me for wanting to understand. To know every bit of influence that had gotten me here.
Wanting understanding
