The Ninth Day (2016)
Published in Statement, vol. 67, 2017.
When the universe was in-itself and timeless, and nature was welter and waste and darkness over the deep and the breath of being hovering over the void, and all was one, as if a mind had said “Let there be light” there was light. And there was heat and there was expansion. And a mind would have seen it and seen that it was good, but there was no mind. And the ‘verse was filled with roiling clouds of burning hydrogen. And if they had been perfect clouds, clouds they would have remained, but perfect they were not, and around their lumpy imperfections they collapsed and condensed and coalesced into stars. And the void was filled with stars, and they reached for each other with tendrils of radiant light. And they bathed in their shared splendor. And there was being, and there was no nothingness. And there was day and there was no night, first day.
And the stars fell toward each other into swirling galaxies, and the galaxies fell toward each other into churning clusters, and the clusters fell toward each other into a lace web of ever-flowing celestial rivers that were their own source and their own end. And stars died into blossoming nebulae of gold and silver and bronze and iron. And if they had been perfect clouds, clouds they would have remained, but perfect they were not, and around their lumpy imperfections the nebulae collapsed and condensed and coalesced into stars and into planets. And a mind would have seen it and seen that it was good, but there was no mind. And the stars reached for their planets with tendrils of radiant light, but they touched only half their planets’ faces, and the other halves were in darkness. And there was being, and there was no nothingness. And there was night and there was day, and it was evening and it was morning, second day.
And there were more planets than stars, and the planets fell around their stars. And the planets were made of rock, or they were made of gas, or they were made of liquid. And they were near their star, or they were far. And the planets that were far from their stars froze, and the planets that were near their stars burned, and the planets that were neither near nor far cooled but did not freeze, warmed but did not burn. And they were many, but one was special. And into this one crashed an errant wanderer of rock. And it absorbed the wanderer, and ejected a plume of molten rock from itself, and the plume collapsed and condensed and coalesced into a moon, and the moon fell around the planet. And the planet was molded and shaped and reshaped by asteroid rains. And into it comets crashed and brought water, and on its surface the water collected and condensed and coalesced into lakes and seas and oceans. And the planet gathered about itself a cloak of gas. And the oceans were filled with the chemicals that were the seeds of life, and the sun touched the seeds with tendrils of radiant light, and the planet warmed the seeds with heat from its heart, and the seeds sprouted and became uncreated-recreators, replicating-replicators that filled the ocean with their infinitesimal being. And a mind would have seen it and seen that it was good, but there was no mind. And there was being, and there was no nothingness. And it was evening and it was morning, third day.
And the uncreated-recreators, the replicating-replicators were fruitful and multiplied, and as they multiplied they changed, for they were imperfect and their world was harsh. And their form was changed, and their essence was changed, and from one form came many, and from one essence came many. And some drifted and drank the sun’s tendrils of radiant light. And some swam and swallowed those that drifted and drank. And some darted and devoured those that swam and swallowed. And they forced each other to become more complex, and they grew. And they dove deeper into the ocean, and they spread across its floor, and they leapt above its waves, and some crawled up onto the place where the floor rose above the waves, and those brought life to the barren land. And a mind would have seen it and seen that it was good, but there was no mind. And there was being, and there was no nothingness. And it was evening and it was morning, fourth day.
And they were fruitful and multiplied, and as they multiplied they changed, for they were imperfect and their world was harsh. And the land was filled with grass, plants yielding seed, and trees bearing fruit. And across the land roamed crawling things and wild beasts. And above the land flocked winged beasts. And the beasts grew larger and larger and larger until the land and sky and sea were ruled by great and terrible lizards. And the land split and drifted, and mountains rose and flowed and died like waves, and the planet warmed and cooled, and volcanoes blanketed the world in ash, but the terrible lizards were not dethroned. And a mind would have seen it and seen that it was good, but there was no mind. And a rock fell from the heavens, and where it fell it shattered the land and burned the sky and boiled the sea, and it cloaked the world in darkness and in death. And the reign of the terrible lizards came to its end. And some plants did not die. And some creatures of the sea did not die. And some small creatures of the land did not die, and they crawled out of their caves and inherited the wasteland. And there was being, and there was no nothingness. And it was evening and it was morning, fifth day.
And they were fruitful and multiplied, and as they multiplied they changed, for they were imperfect and their world was harsh. And the last of the terrible lizards shrank and grew wings and were covered in feathers and took to the sky. And the sea teemed once more with life that ate, and life that was eaten. And the land grew once more green with grass, and plants yielding seed, and trees bearing fruit. And the small creatures of the land grew and changed, and some swung through the trees, then went down onto the ground and walked on four feet. And they reared up and walked on two feet, and they shed their fur and lost their tails, and their skulls swelled as their brains grew and sprouted holes in being, and through these holes being fell toward self, and through these holes being fled the past-self that it was toward the future-self that it was to be, and the fall and the flight created minds. And the minds were what they had been, and they were not what they were, and they were what they were not. And the minds were revelations of being, internal nihilations of being, relations to being, desires of being, choices of being, but they were not being. And so did being sprout nothingness. And as being and as nothingness man and woman awakened to the world. And they cast their eyes upon the world and awakened it, and saw it, and saw that it was good. And the sun set, and the stars came out, and man and woman looked up at them, and awakened them, and saw that they were good. And man and woman wondered who had made the stars. And they turned their minds back upon themselves and awakened themselves and saw that they were incomplete, and that the incompleteness was a lacking, and that the lacking was themselves. And they wondered who had made them, and they wondered who could complete them.
And the humans created gods in their image
in the image of humans they created them
male and female they created them.
And it was evening and it was morning, sixth day.
And they were fruitful and multiplied, and as they multiplied they changed their world, for it was harsh, and they were strong. And they gave themselves dominion over every beast of the land and sea and sky. And they were of one existence, but not one essence. And they were freedom, but did not know it. And they desired freedom for self, but they desired oppression for others, for they imagined that through oppression they could have freedom. And each was a self, and each was an other. And they fought and colored the land and sea red with the others’ blood. And when their arms wearied of slaughter, they rested and remembered the stars. And when they grew restless, they returned to their self-butchery. And when one cried for peace, another slit his throat. And they built beautiful things, and they built terrible things. And they studied the ‘verse, and learned its language. And they read each other, and they read themselves. And they worshipped the gods they forgot they had made. And the greater they became, the lowlier they felt, for they had forgotten they were the makers of gods. And the sun set, and the stars came out, and they remembered. And they looked to the stars and wondered if there were other minds looking up at them. And it was evening and it was morning, seventh day.
And they built ships and went among the stars and found they were alone. And wherever they went they awakened being with nothingness. And they were fruitful and multiplied, and as they multiplied they changed, for the ‘verse was harsh, and they were imperfect. And they were changed by the stars that were not their own, and by the planets that were not their own, and by the genes that were not their own. And they were made different, and they made themselves different. And they mastered the language of the ‘verse, and with the alphabet of existence they wrote with their own flesh poems and prose of utility and of expression. And their form was changed, and their essence was changed, and from one form came many, and from one essence came many. And as a tendril of white light enters a prism and disappears into a rainbow of light that is less itself and more itself, so did humanity prism into a spectrum of species, less itself and more itself, that spread through the ‘verse and awakened the ‘verse with a polychrome rainbow of being and nothingness that saw itself and saw that it was good. And these minds turned back upon themselves and awakened themselves and saw that they were incomplete, and that the incompleteness was a lacking, and that the lacking was themselves. And they knew who had made them, and they wondered who could complete them. And they desired freedom for human, and they desired oppression for alien, for they imagined that through oppression they could have freedom. And each was human, and each was alien. And they fought and colored the planets and stars and celestial rivers red and green and blue with humalien blood. And it was evening and it was morning, eighth day.
And--