Pain

It brings clarity to the moment: isolating it against a static background of somber tones of listless monotony.  Pain sharpens the senses, increases the memory and open a pathway of reality unknown to those who hide behind their fortifications against life.  The edge of a knife, it slices through deception and camouflage to reveal the truth beneath the masquerade.  We seek it in all endeavours, encounter it at the climax of every accomplishment.  It is the harmony of success, and the partner of fulfilment.  A search for death in life: the desire for beauty is manifested in a desire for death. To see clearly we leave behind the residue of impurity, like a trail of muck that marks the path of a slug.  Those who journey to greatness may be found by walking amongst the refuge of filth and unkempt dreams of darker or lesser glories.  All our voyages will end the same: in death.  All life born with the seeds of destruction built into them.  Nothing will last, we speed towards endings of splendour, or of cowardice as we attempt to dodge inevitability.  No man that seeks to avoid fate will find his lot cast amongst the heroes of the past.

Pain will bring light into dark places, and bring the power to conquer what lays before us.  It will bring up that well-spring of emotion instantly to its aid.  What must we feel now?  Is it anger, is it sadness?  What brought us to this point of intensity in a world of torpor?  All the must be will come when called by the dark gods of humanity.  They must be wakened, they must be satiated: it is pain that will rouse the sleeping giants within us.  Pain will call the legions and light the signal fires; we shall never overcome adversity, but rather shall be raised above all by adversity.  Pain is our father, and we seek none greater.  This is the prelude to life.