The world is spinning on a tenuous thread attached to the murky forces of the underground. In the caves beneath the soil, the rats are scurrying around trying to find exits that wont let them out in the bright daylight.
The State coffers are emptied of all contents, the blood of the enemy is seeping into the cracks of the walls and slowly covering the ground in the caves, the rats are roaring like wounded tigers. The age of darkness has arrived and nothing can be seen, no light is getting through to the interior of the cave from the outside world.
From far off, a faint beating of a drum can be heard, a beat thats getting more and more distinct, a drum beat of life amidst all the sordid darkness and blood and the shrill squeaking of the rats. The beat is getting stronger every second. It seems as if several drums have joined the one lone drum that was heard from far away at the beginning.
And now the entrance to the cave is broken down by a hoard of people armed with nothing but their fists and their drum beat. The daylight is coming back, its seeping through the door and the rats are getting blinded. They are scurrying around like doomed beasts, trying desperately to find an exit in some dark corner.
Outside in the light of the rising sun a procession of marching people has formed and they are moving unstoppably across hills and valleys, across rivers and through forests. The procession is growing in size every minute and the drum beat is steadily getting louder. The masses of people sweep up everything in their way.
They are singing now, singing first hesitantly, then more and more assured. Old people and children have joined them in their march. The procession is moving forward and its growing and growing. Its getting wider and longer and it is finally covering the country. The people build bridges over the waters, they walk across mountains and through deserts. They are leaving behind the rats in the cave who are quivering in fear and they keep marching, keep gathering strength and numbers, keep marching, keep marching. And the drummers keep drumming louder and louder. The people come from the mountains and they come from the flatlands, they come from the forests and they come from far away valleys.
They are in the hundreds, they are in the thousands, they are in the millions. Finally they are in the hundreds of millions. They are covering the ground, the mountains, the valleys, the horizons. They are pushing ahead, ahead, towards the light thats freedom, to stop the furious spinning of the world.
The rats have nowhere to go. They are deafened by the drum beat, hypnotized by the masses of people. They cower, they get blinded by the light, they shrivel to foul pieces of crumpled flesh and the people march over them, not even seeing the squalid lumps of dirt that get kicked into the ditches.
They are at last getting hold of the thread thats holding the world, the world that is spinning and spinning in a desperate attempt to make us believe that its the normal way of life. The world is spinning at a crazed rhythm and the masses of people are finally seeing that it didnt have to be like this. The world can slow down. The world can wait for us, the people. The world can count us all in. It can take us all in under its huge roof. The bleeding can stop. We dont need any more slaughter.
We dont need the rats any more, the rats who made us feel so desperately scared. The rats who kept telling us There is not enough food, there is not enough water. There is not enough room for everyone. We have to go on plundering, conquering, destroying mountains to find the gold thats buried underneath. We have to go on accumulating. We have to go on, go on, go on.
The rats couldnt see that life is just living. Thats all there is to life. Its living for us and for all those who are coming to replace us when we are gone. What life is all about is just living.
Copyright 2005 by AxisofLogic.com
Siv ONeall is an Axis of Logic columnist, based in France. She can be reached at siv@axisoflogic.com.
Read her biography and additional articles by Axis Columnist, Siv ONeall
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