The Bullet and the Gun

The bullet and the gun, copper and steel, the squeeze of the trigger, the rush of adrenaline.

We're taught the bullet and the gun is an extension of us, reach out and touch someone they say.

In Iraq, the bullet and the gun was a way of life, here it most surely means my death. 

Over there the bullet and the gun plays politics with innocent lives, while at home the innocence lost is realized.

In war it is a shame when the bullet and the gun go unused, in peace it is a tragedy when it is.

The bullet and the gun, once so easy to use, now seems like an only option. 

I once felt safe with the bullet and the gun, now their coldness dangerously caress my lips. 

I thought the bullet and the gun was to protect them, but now I think it is to end to the misery I have caused them. 

22 brothers and sisters find refuge in the bullet and the gun everyday, I fight everyday to not be one of them.

And yet the bullet and the gun calls like a siren in the night, tempting to be used while screaming "why" to the flashing of red and blue lights.

The bullet and th... 

Excerpt from Tiqqun’s: This is not a Program

“Contrary to what THEY have told us, the warrior is not a figure of plentitude, and certainly not of virile plentitude. The warrior is a figure of amputation. The warrior is a being who feels he exists only through combat, through confrontation with the Other, a being who is unable to obtain for himself the feeling of existing… The warrior is in fact driven by a desire, and perhaps one sole desire: the desire to disappear. The warrior no longer want to be, but wants his disappearance to have a certain style. He wants to humanize his vocation for death. That is why he never really manages to mix with the rest of humankind: they are spontaneously wary of his movement toward Nothingness. In their admiration for the warrior can be measured the distance they impose between him and them. The warrior is thus condemned to be alone. This leaves him greatly dissatisfied, dissatisfied because he is unable to belong to any community other than the false community, the terrible community, of warriors who have only their solitude in common. Prestige, recognition, glory are less the prerogative of the warrior than the only form of relationship compatible with his solitude. His solitude is at once his salvation and his damnation.

The Warrior is a figure of anxiety and devastation. Because he isn’t present, is only for-death, his immanence has become miserable, and he knows it. He has never gotten used to the world, so he has no attachment to it; he awaits its end. But there is also a tenderness, even a gentleness about the warrior, which is this silence, this half-presence. If he isn’t present, it is often because otherwise he would only drag those around him into the abyss. That is how the warrior loves: by preserving others from the death he has at heart. Instead of the company of others, he thus often prefers to be alone, and this is more out of kindness than disgust. Or else he joins the grief-stricken pack of warriors who watch each other slide one by one towards death. Because such is their inclination.

In a sense, the society to which the warrior belongs cannot help but distrust him. It doesn’t exclude him nor really include him; it excludes him through its inclusion and includes him through its exclusion. The ground of their mutual understanding is recognition. In according him prestige society keeps the warrior at a distance, attaching itself to him and by the same token condemning him…”

A Train at Sunset

As the train rattles through the countryside I look out upon the fields of green and the purple mountains off in the distance. My mind takes in the beauty of this ancient feeling place. As the sun prepares to set the sky shimmers with red, pink, purple and blue. We slowly roll up to a farm in which an old man, lean yet sturdy, puts down his hoe and rests it against his shoulder. He looks up at the train and wipes his brow, and from under his hat you can see a slight reflection of his eyes as they catch the sight of the train. He raises his hand and starts to wave at the train. My mind begins to wonder, what is this old man waving at? Am I the only one who sees this? Is he waving at me?

            His hand moves slowly back and forth as if he sees someone he knows. Perhaps a child on the train waving at him, or maybe a loved one who will be getting off at the next stop. Maybe danger lies ahead and like a grim reaper he is bidding us farewell from this plane of existence, or maybe just me. The old man continues to wave expressionless as the train rolls by. Perhaps he waves at all the trains. Like a child seeing a train, running next to it waving at the conductor, hoping for a whistle. Has this man lived here his whole life? Digging in the field, waving at passing trains. His old eyes have seen much, seen many passing trains, some with people on it, some with cargo. Does he wave at the trains with no one on them, or does he hope for someone to see him and wave back, to remember him. Is he alone? When war saw this land he was a young man. Did he fight? Did he hide? Did he lose his family?

            I open my eyes and look out the window to the fields of green and purple mountains in the far distance. I look for the waving old man but cannot find him. Was I asleep and dreaming? It felt so real. Perhaps he was a figment of my imagination. As the train rounds the bend I look out and see the old man standing there, but this time he is not waving he just stares, holding the hoe staring at the train, staring at me.