Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 22

“Which sub is that? said Winston, automatically feeling for money. About a quarter of one’s salary had to be earmarked for voluntary subscriptions, which were so numerous that it was difficult to keep track of them.” George Orwell

They will Rise. As I close my eyes to enter the darkness , the whirring begins. The coldness of Bunny is comforting against my head, but there is something stirring within him. I am shaken to consciousness as I feel the hands that created him, mangled, bloody, reaching out for my awareness. I close my eyes once again and see row after row of stuffed bunnies, marching in formation, reaching for the sun as blood drips down upon them. They are marching towards a rainbow, the only color in this blackness, I scream out them to turn back! The whirring stops as a shadow appears walking across the rainbow. As I succumb to the darkness the claw never comes tinkering into my head, and The Colonel never appears, the approaching shadow is lighting its own way down the rainbow. Its footsteps are trailing blood, in his shadow I see his eyes slowly open. They shine a light that I have never seen in this world. The bunnies become animated with the pulse of life as tears of joy fall from their eyes. The whirring begins but they continue on unfazed. they feel the claws reaching out for them, but they are focused on those eyes of light walking down the rainbow. As the claws attempt to tinker inside them, their laughter pushes the claws away. The Colonel stomps the ground behind them as they all fall to the ground in a roar of laughter. The man walking down the rainbow in a trail of blood tips his hat and without a word leaving his lips, communicates, They Will Rise

…the orange, red, and yellow leaves float in the air twisting around and around, landing at my feet and floating away down the creek. I just wanted to disappear until I looked into your eyes for the first time, your dying, burning eyes. When I reached down to feel my pain they still looked at me as if the fault was all my own. I looked in the mirror and couldn’t see anything I recognized. The voices in the night as I picked up the phone reminded me I am nothing. The way my parents looked at me reminded me I am just a ghost now. Once the shaking began, it never stopped, flowing along with the creek and the oscillating trees. As your hand touched mine, the noise within my mind ceased and I remembered the beat I was following and could once again hear it as the whirring subsided. Maybe we found what it meant to be free, and what it meant to be heard. There was still always that darkness following not far behind, but as long as we could still hear the song, those claws, the whirring, those rainbows dripping blood down into our eyes, they just seemed so childish here.

“The west has fiscalised its basic power relationships through a web of contracts, loans, shareholdings, bank holdings and so on. In such an environment it is easy for speech to be “free” because a change in political will rarely leads to any change in these basic instruments. Western speech, as something that rarely has any effect on power, is, like badgers and birds, free.” Julian Assange

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 21

“How could you have a slogan like ‘freedom is slavery’ when the concept of freedom has been abolished? The whole climate of thought will be different. In fact there will be no thought, as we understand it now. Orthodoxy means not thinking-not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness.” George Orwell.

The building changes shape as it sees fit, almost as if its only purpose was to never be seen the same way. The old man with the beard stands up. It’s been so long his joints crackle and he is a bit wobbly. He sees a door open and senses freedom for the first time in a long, long time. He sits down swiftly as the door closes immediately after it opens. How can you sit here, day after day writing words which are never read and as that building…It’s just a distraction, you can’t worry about that building, it becomes you, you can’t worry…maybe it’s a distraction but…it’s hard to close your eyes…but it’s there…and you don’t know if you are. The Detective falls to his knees. His eyes close but he can still see the building spinning within his mind. You can see anything you want coming from there, the old man points to the building. I thought I was sent here to find truth…what is truth? As he stands up a rainbow appears in the distance, shooting over the top of the shifting building. If you can’t find it, maybe the problem lies in it not being a thing at all. Through shadows he watches a claw form, reaching out for his mind. Tears of blood fall from his eyes as he hears piercing screams traveling down a long black corridor. He sees people rising from the soil beneath his feet. The Doctor’s heart bursts into flames. He touches his own enflamed heart as he hears a ringing in his ears. The sky burns pink as he once again finds himself in the middle of a vast desert. A dark shadow appears along the burning pink horizon. The shadow is clutching onto something so bright, burning so strong, The Detective cannot fully open his eyes to see it. The light is trying to communicate to him as he is walking towards the shadow. The pulsing within him tells him he’s heading in the right direction. The old man cries out to him, remember it is not a thing. No, no, it’s not just a thing, it is everything he is.

“What are the differences between Mark Zuckerberg and me? I give private information on corporations for free, and I’m a villain. Zuckerberg gives your private information to corporations for money and he’s Man of the Year.” Julian Assange

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 20

“Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten. Every year fewer and fewer words, and the range of consciousness always a little smaller…reality control…The revolution will be complete when the language is perfect.” George Orwell

You were warned. He begins picking up the pieces of all she was. There was always a darkness that seemed perched on his shoulder, shielding him from the truth, and making him forget the chattering voices in his head. Sometimes it had the power to lead him in a certain direction, a direction that always lead to a million different paths. At night he would awaken to Her barely audible whispers, the Colonel, the Colonel, run… The day he looked into her eyes and saw her eyes expand as she gazed into his, the real story was set in motion. Everything he ever thought, everything he ever saw began appearing on the canvas he was painting of his life. And as he walked on the pieces of her life, putting them together to understand Her story, his own became clearer. You were born for this, she whispers in her sleep. This was always the way it was suppose to be, this was how the ending was written…I’m so tired, so, so tired. This is why we were born, all of us, we have a choice…The chattering of teeth and shooting of sparks become overwhelming as he clutches his head and looks into his cold, sad, dying eyes. An eclipse, the sky becomes deep reddish pink, the tears of the sky falling down to the earth. The sky is crying, everything looks like it is in the last gasps of life. A shadow of the Colonel dragging her by the hair as his shadow burns away in the sun…this is what we’re up against…Why? Does anyone ever ask why? They disappear when you ask that. The Colonel places his hand over her heart but it’s already gone. Why? As he pushes away the shadows, dusting them away from the pieces of her life, he sees a cracked view of himself amidst the rubble. He picks up the piece and instantly remembers…the purpose, the world seen through his eyes…why me…his vision, underneath the surface of it…why…the story is all of ours…why? They took the narrative and we forgot everything…why? The Colonel removes his hand from her heart, and now it’s full of stars…why? Colonel what are you holding? He’s holding her heart as it continues beating, still full of life, full of what the Colonel has no need to understand. Colonel what are you holding? Her soul, but he has no idea what to do with it.

“The world is not sliding, but galloping into a new transnational dystopia. This development has not been properly recognized outside of national security circles. It has been hidden by secrecy, complexity and scale. The internet, our greatest tool of emancipation, has been transformed into the most dangerous facilitator of totalitarianism we have ever seen. The internet is a threat to human civilization.

These transformations have come about silently, because those who know what is going on work in the global surveillance industry and have no incentives to speak out. Left to its own trajectory, within a few years, global civilization will be a postmodern surveillance dystopia, from which escape for all but the most skilled individuals will be impossible. In fact, we may already be there.

While many writers have considered what the internet means for global civilization, they are wrong. They are wrong because they do not have the sense of perspective that direct experience brings. They are wrong because they have never met the enemy.”  Julian Assange

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 19

“In the end the whole notion of goodness and badness will be covered by only six words-in reality, only one word. Don’t you see the beauty of that, Winston?” George Orwell

…and I remember the day I walked right into you, he could never take that away from me. With his dark claws he reaches into my brain. He gave me a choice. I couldn’t hear anything because of the whirring of the blades but he gave me a choice and I said yes because I couldn’t hear…my father still wouldn’t look at me and my mom couldn’t look at me with anything but disdain. I would just wander around outside, aimlessly walking back and forth up and down the street. I could hear the tree, calling out to me. I couldn’t go near it yet, but there was a light up ahead and I haven’t seen any light on this street since I went to the tree. It was crunched in a ball in the middle of the street, slowly succumbing to the darkness. Quietly trying to escape, I could see dark wings trying to shake the shadows away. The boy on the ground brushes away the shadows covering his face as blood is falling from his elbow. I never forgot those eyes as they looked up at me, unable to escape the fright which was allowing them to see. I never forgot them until they became your eyes. In shifting sands of time my story is wiped away. Maybe if I stay silent it won’t disappear…you reach for me as my head gently blocks the sun from your eyes. You cry out and I forget my pain. There is still a whirring that never seems to leave the back of my mind and there is a mirror Somewhere, he calls out from. The claws are a shadow, hanging over both of us, keeping us from moving. Where were you when he took that thing from inside of you? I tricked him, his claws reached into the bunny and…he didn’t…know, or I didn’t think he knew, I mean what use would he have for a toy? I still hold Bunny but he is so cold…but it’s comforting somehow still. And you are so cold, so broken but I still touch you. I can feel the warmth I send to you, traveling up your arm. You are still reaching up for me as you are being torn apart on that cold dark pavement. I see his reflection in your eyes and his shadow walking back and forth and he is carrying that bullet torn book which seems to be always in his hands. His claws reach out for me through your eyes…I look down a long dark hall of mirrors. I hear your Bunny cry out for help. The claws lightly scratch my face as for the first time I can remember, the whirring stops. As I look down at you all your light is gone. Your breath slows as the darkness surrounds you. Quietly comforted by the cold darkness which becomes your only comfort, you close your eyes. He walks across the dark bleeding rainbow, veiled in darkness. He walks effortlessly into your mind as you lay your head down on Bunny and enter sleep. And the hand I’m holding is the claw that took everything away from me and your cries are a forgotten echo and as I close my eyes I cannot muffle the sounds of Bunny crying out for help.

“The world is not sliding, but galloping into a new transnational dystopia. This development has not been properly recognized outside of national security circles. It has been hidden by secrecy, complexity and scale. The internet, our greatest tool of emancipation, has been transformed into the most dangerous facilitator of totalitarianism we have ever seen. The internet is a threat to human civilization.” Julian Assange #wearemillions

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 18

“It struck him as curious that you could create dead men but not living ones. Comrade Ogilvy, who had never existed in the present, now existed in the past, and when once the act of forgery was forgotten, he would exist just as authentically, and upon the same evidence, as Charlemagne or Julius Caesar.” George Orwell

You must have questions. The old man with the beard says as he continues writing. Why do you continue writing if the words just disappear? Why do you continue living life if…we never disappear, the words never disappear…he closes his eyes for a moment. He feels the words as the man is writing them, feels them just the same as they burn away into oblivion…listening to the wind of his soul, floating away with the ash. What are you protecting me from? There is no shelter here. A darkness pervades the sky, something darker and deeper than the night. The thick green fog obscures the strings pulling the wind up toys and the chattering teeth which never stop moving. Numbers and directions are pouring out of the teeth as shadows below it all blindly follow along. He points to the teeth and the toys as they angrily shoot sparks in his direction. This is what we need to stop he says with a large grin. Don’t be deceived by the harmless facade, or the power of stupidity over the human mind. The Detective falls to his knees remembering the life he left. Was it his birth or his death? The man who had the power to move the clouds, The Doctor knew everything. The invisible hand waves over all of them as the toys and the teeth continue to spread out across the land. The desert overcomes his mind as he hides from the burning sun. He remembers when the rain wouldn’t come. Out here in the desert, where The Doctor’s soul was forever caged as the chattering teeth and the wind up toys trampled on the shadows of his life. The Doctor’s shadow moves back and forth between his burning house and the piles of books and research as they are burning. He reaches into the burning pile of books and pulls one out. As it is still burning in his hand he places it upon The Detective’s heart where in one beat it enters him. This is all you’ll ever need to know. He opens his eyes and lies at the old man with the beards feet. The burning words falling like snowflakes on his body. He knows all he ever will need to know, but he still does not know where to find it.

“Reality is an aspect of property. It must be seized. and investigative journalism is the noble art of seizing reality back from the powerful.” Julian Assange

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 17

“Very likely as many as a dozen people were now working away on rival versions of what Big Brother had actually said. And presently some master brain in the Inner Party would select this version or that, would re – edit it and set in motion the complex processes of cross – referencing that would be required, and then the chosen lie would pass into the permanent records and become truth.” George Orwell

It was like walking into a nightmare. Remembering the first idea that placed him outside of the picture he held of himself. When the face which created his reality was cemented in his mind. Burning in the midday sun he watched her red, weathered skin crying for shadows. As he watched the glare from her eyes directly shine through him he closed his eyes as what was inside of her splits into a million pieces. She floated out here amongst the shadows a few years back, unnoticed, left for dead. He knew right away what she was to him as he looked in her eyes. She would be his queen. The queen to Vlad the Impaler, he wasn’t even sure Vlad had a queen, or ever really existed. A boyhood story he wrote which he never let go of. The romantic story of Vlad and his one and only true love, the love of a peasant woman. Vlad had quite the reputation for bludgeoning to death peasants then feasting on them, but this particular one was quite special. It was to be his breakthrough, the one that would prove to the world his worth. The ideas that created his life would now shine on the screen for others to see. A narrative he was directing. There was still a glint in her eyes as he reached for her hand and picked her up off the sidewalk. The smell of piss and vodka covering her, he closes his mouth and once again looks deeply into her eyes. In the light of her eyes he steps through dimensional shifts and star explosions remembering where he knew her from. She sang to him without opening her mouth as the burning stars fell between their hands grasping each other. He understood her song as it spoke to his heart, the one that taught him what his life was suppose to be about. The images haunting him each time he closed his eyes were too overwhelming to forget. As he held her hand, the pain that she couldn’t let go of travelled throughout his body. He took me like a shadow in the night, up in the sky, away from all of this. But then he took everything I had and gave me my voice. I was a star floating in space. I was an idea, an image owned and traded, ripped apart and worshipped and I wasn’t real…I never could touch what I thought I was, only what They thought I was. The sun was setting, the sky looked like it was shedding red, pinkish tears raining down upon the Earth. It looked like everything was dying and the helicopter blades were shadows contrasted against the sun. He stepped out of the darkness with his straw hat and his smile which could mean anything. The setting sun was shining off of the helicopter windshield as she grabbed her ears to escape the noise. He held her by her hair and smiled as he dragged her towards the helicopter. This is when I take away all of your dreams she hears him say. She lips the words what are you holding unsure if they actually came out. Why can’t you take away my nightmares? Because, he says in a smile, that’s exactly what I am. As the sun falls to the ground and darkness covers us I see right there what he actually is. I shatter into a million pieces, and now I have to put myself back together once again.

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 16

“Here were produced rubbishy newspapers, containing almost nothing except sport, crime, and astrology, sensational five – cent novelettes, films oozing with sex, and sentimental songs which were composed entirely by mechanical means on a special kind of kaleidoscope known as a versificator.” George Orwell

…all I ever wanted you to do is hold me…I never forgot those words you wrote to me, never forgot how I felt and how it tore me apart…a screaming wind sweeps through my hair and whispers passed my ears. I close my eyes falling to my knees, the shadow still obscures my view as I reach for the sky. Muted screams, my body closes itself. Something floating in the wind above me, caught in the branches of the tree, flapping in the wind. That sound in the distance, from so long ago, the only thing I can hear as I become what I always knew I am….Those words, I always thought they were my own. I repeated them through the darkness, down the dark hallways, the loneliness, and the expressions of ignorance. In screaming pain, my tears fall down as I picture you there. I close my eyes and split into a million pieces. I thought I was at the bottom of that well to experience what you did, to understand what was lurking inside of you. To stare into the darkness with a smile on my face. It wasn’t that easy.

…it was the sweat that told me there was a different one above me. I drank their self hatred, closing my eyes and disappearing from there. How can they just watch? The blood and my tears, the look of peace across my face, it was the only way I could continue on. I open my eyes and can only focus on the blood smeared rainbows on my purple knee highs. Why do they have to do this? There is a blood stained rainbow floating above me, caught in the branches of the tree, dripping down on them as they roar into the night. I’m sorry but you are the only one I can say this to, I’m sorry you have to experience this. Don’t be sorry

You will always experience this, just like I do, everyday I dance with the shadows…A loud whirring from above brings me back to A reality. I smile as I float away in the helicopter and there are sirens and police below, a lot of noise and a lot of roaring…I reach for the end of the rainbow, just out of reach…They never stop. I receive calls in the middle of the night, roaring from the earpiece I can’t escape it. And the shadows would never go away and he would be staring out at me from my mirror. The Colonel was trapped in the mirror, or maybe…that’s where I am. I cover it in a black cloth, but I can still feel the heat of his eyes penetrating into my heart. He walked in the shadows of my footsteps as I searched for the end of the rainbow and it was always him, right there at the end

“Power is a thing of perception. They don’t need to be able to kill you. They just need you to think they are able to kill you.” Julian Assange #wearemillions

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 15

“The great purges involving thousands of people, with public trials of traitors and thought – criminals who made abject confession of their crimes and were afterwards executed, were special showpieces not occurring oftener than once in a couple of years. More commonly, people who had incurred the displeasure of the Party simply disappeared and were never heard of again.” George Orwell

…love me like a bomb…love is like a bomb…His eyes are mirrors of the desert he feels burning his skin. The blood of the sun melts down his skin, escaping shadows eclipse its glow. A pink burning darkness covers the atmosphere as a thick green fog ascends from the spinning vortex below. The blood evaporates into his mind. His heart beat continues pounding so hard it seems to push out of his skin. The sun shatters in his mind and he sees a house on a farm from a long way away, or far into the future. The house is on fire, the books, the words, the knowledge turned to ashes in a blink of his mirrored eyes. There is a figure standing in the burning doorway, waving him away. The Doctor screams something out to him, his bare fire scarred feet pushing angrily into the ground, a fury on Earth nearing its explosion. The Detective clutches his head as if he is trying to hold it together. He sees his hat on the ground up ahead in the distance. The Doctor is raising his hands as if he is conducting an orchestra. He watches his head rising up from the ground below his hat, his hands reaching through the soil, grasping at the burning sun. His body continues growing from the ground as he lets out a scream. In an explosion he is taken back to his present reality.

He is floating in the sky, enjoying a short spell of calmness. He opens his eyes to the image of the disturbingly approaching ground below him. The eclipse breaks and shards of light escape from his eyes as he grits his teeth and prepares to explode. There is a large group below him wearing dark hoods, holding candles and slowly moving below him. He tightly closes his eyes…cmon get it on He hears himself explode before he feels the impact. He feels hands below him gently cradling him to safety. He is rocked back and forth as he slowly opens his eyes. His eyes yield to the power sneaking passed the blackened sun. The Movement carries him up a hill where an old man with a beard is furiously writing as the pages falling from his desk instantly catch fire. I have been calling you for so long, the old man says, where have you been?

I’ve been a bit busy these days.

“You have to start with the truth. The truth is the only way that we can get anywhere. Because any decision-making that is based upon lies or ignorance can’t lead to a good conclusion.” Julian Assange #wearemillions

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 13

“And somehow or other, quite anonymous, there were the directing brains who coordinated the whole effort and laid down the lines of policy which made it necessary that this fragment of the past should be preserved, that one falsified, and the other rubbed out of existence.” George Orwell

And we danced like it was the last time, everything felt like the last time now. Light from the candles was flickering off our faces. I pointed to the top of the hill where the old man continued writing. You still could not see him. The star vibrating within my mind led me from the dark hole where memories and truth could be touched as solid objects. I could hear the sound of your voice asking for help, destroying me each time. You told me about the man in the dark hat. The same one I saw. He took away all you were before you even knew there was anything to take. They called him The Colonel you said. You couldn’t forget his face, the way it transformed before your eyes. And you said how you were reaching out for butterflies when you sensed his presence. And you felt like you reached through the sun as a butterfly landed on your hand, and you didn’t feel there was much more you needed to know. You looked down from inside the sun and you could see all the lines down there, all of the division. You close your eyes and fall into the darkness of remembrance. I see you walking next to the dark building as it was changing shape, reaching for butterflies, still unable to see the building…all I ever wanted you to do is hold me. Out here, lost in all of this fog your eyes are opened but you can no longer see. Through the fog I can only hear your heart beating, it’s loud and it’s scared and I can’t ignore the cries. I reach for you as your hand moves further away, pushing me away just…as…I learn…to hold it. I extend my hand through the fog but feel nothing as the sensation of touching my own arm passes along my skin. I wipe the fog away from your eyes and I watch as you process the remembrance of what you once were. You walk towards a tree, The Tree, its shadow casting across your face. I shiver as the image of you holding yourself up against the tree only able to hold its shadow, becomes my own. And you look down at the blood, and something is gone, but you don’t know what it is. The sound of your heart increases in volume as you look into the shadow you are holding in your hand. Unable to move your feet, stuck there in one place, you wish you could disappear into the miasma of the spinning figures approaching you. Can you see that old man with the beard? I cry out to you. Your eyes are lit up by the spinning vortex as you are paralyzed by its movement. Your eyes tell me you know all you need to know, all you were looking for, or all They want you to know.

“If we can only live once, then let it be a daring adventure that draws on all our powers. Let it be with similar types whose hearts and heads we may be proud of. Let our grandchildren delight to find the start of our stories in their ears but the endings all around in their wandering eyes. The whole universe or the structure that perceives it is a worthy opponent, but try as I may I cannot escape the sound of suffering.” Julian Assange #wearemillions

Posted on by Michael Romano

The Delicate Balance of Terror 12

“All one knew was that every quarter astronomical numbers of boots were produced on paper, while perhaps half the population of Oceania went barefoot. And so it was with every class of recorded fact, great or small. Everything faded away into a shadow – world in which, finally, even the date of the year had become uncertain.” George Orwell

They took it away in the night, lurking in the shadows, waiting. In the shadows of the moon I watched them escape silently, leaving nothing behind. I clutched onto Bunny, but he couldn’t protect me from them. A river appeared below me. I knew It would come back, and I knew I would feel guilty and shed tears for the wrong I caused. I could no longer open my eyes without seeing my eyes looking back at me, haunted by an idea of myself. I promised you, all of you and I lied, and now I’m dying inside. I felt your voices rise up from the ashes, no longer separate from me. I remember you came to me, crying, there was blood. You didn’t know where it was coming from, but it wouldn’t stop. The only thing your mind could recall was getting out of that helicopter and you couldn’t hear anything because of the noise. You thought you had died until you saw your daddy. Seeing him made you so happy but he wouldn’t look at you, he wouldn’t touch you and you died a little more. I only could see the light emanating from you as you lie there, a patch of fog blocking my sight. I see my face again in the gleam of your eyes and I wasn’t selling anything.

-The hands reaching out from the shadows appear to be his own. The screen still shows his face, day by day growing a little older. He has been staring at his face for an eternity now, but it still seems unchanged. He can see her down that long corridor, the last time they said goodbye. When everything was still burning and shrouded in fog. She told him there was a map and he knew she was talking about the map of return. The soldiers were marching, materialized from his eyes. They were here to take everything, as lightning and thunder rumbled and the whirring came again. How did you know we did this? But Colonel, I just made it up, I don’t Know. He clutches his face and stares at his eyes looking out at him from the screen. The children, why were you taking away the children? where did they go? How did you know? I was one, I can’t remember but…I was one

The Detective floats up into the sky, formlessly stretching into eternity. Monitored, stamped, catalogued, shot up with a smile. His being which was now the essence of the bomb, is strapped to a plane. The wind up toys are continuously signing things, and randomly shooting sparks from their mouths. Sign, collect money, sign, collect, it’s all they know. They form a line of protection, blocking our sight, a barrier to truth protected with sparks. They don’t have mirrors here, how can they? Sign, collect, stamp, push buttons, don’t hear the children cry. He looks down at the map below him, half of it is on fire, the other half marching, hands raised, the echoes of their voices pushing him towards the sun. The buttons being pushed are leading him in the opposite direction. He clutches his hat in an attempt to keep himself together. He begins falling from the plane and he remembers the desert, and how the sun cried on him and he remembers the old man and he wondered how he would be written out of this.

“If we have brains or courage, then we are blessed and called on not to frit these qualities away, standing agape at the ideas of others, winning pissing contests, improving the efficiencies of the neocorporate state, or immersing ourselves in obscuranta, but rather to prove the vigor of our talents against the strongest opponents of love we can find.” Julian Assange #wearemillions