If I could remember what happened last time, that would help. Couldn’t hurt anyway. Like giving chicken soup to a corpse – it can’t hoit.

Are those crumbs in the bed? Or ants. Would it be so bad if they were ants? I liked that story about the star. Wait, was it a story?

I don’t even think this is a bed, come to think of it. I think it’s a grave. A tomb. That’d be silly though. After all I just got here.

What happened last time? Dammit! Was there a last time at all? There better have been. Or there’s no chance of things getting any better..

That story about the star scared me.

Okay, just a couple more minutes and I’m getting up, I really am. I really am.

This ridiculous. This is laughable. I am.

Just got to step out into it.

Brace myself.

I can smell something dreadful.

But the journey of 100 miles begins with the first step.

The journey of 1000 screams begins…the first muffled groan.

Into it now. Out into it. And the eyes open. And the mouth open. Oh…

Just tell it like it is, bro. Just tell it. Sing it.

*gasp* LOL…

So very many machines, fueled by millions of tons of dead flesh and bone and fruitless trees.

So many people wearing so many beautiful things, with sheets of tears down their faces.

And there, Tantalus and Sisyphus screwing in a cave, both condemned to keep it up forever.

The Hells – this one anyway – so very bright. Never dark, in fact. So many surprises here in the Hells. Delightful. Fascinating.

I hadn’t expected the Hells to be so colorful.

I hadn’t expected the Hells to be so…charming.

Maybe that’s how it works – get you fascinated, intrigued…charmed – then into the boiling oil!

There was a star, wasn’t there? Keep forgetting that. But what happened to the star after the story was over?

One hears stories. Rumors. Tall tales.

“I’m from vampire school,” I heard one effete voice declare.

“Set it in motion,” urged a kindly lady.

“I have High Expectations of you only because I have such very High Expectations of my self,” said someone with conviction.

“So then what about the Star?”

The Star

Ha! The Star was a bullshit myth. Silly, right? Impossible. I guess. Or not. Fuck. No one will ever know what really happened. Never.

I’ve a feeling I’m going to see everything in the Hells – everything – but the truth. It’s ok. I’ve always preferred quantity over quality.

So here’s what I see. And who are you going to believe? Me, or your lyin’ eyes? Ha! Whatever…I do see the Star. Still, I see the Star.

“This is my quest – to follow that star, no matter how hopeless, no matter how fucked the whole thing is.”

You don’t even know my name.

Nearly revealing the name…

Nearly.

Roman kids had fucked up names.

Decimus…meant you were the 10th kid.

Quintus…you were the fifth kid.

Here, honorable number one son.

Here, honorable number two sun.

Star. Here I come.

Giving a Hell a name makes it less…hellish. “Hell Of A Thousand Knives”, say. Not nearly as bad as “Hell Of A Million Knives”, right?

Some people can name All Fifty States Of The Union.

A man I once envied could name All The Roman Emperors – from Augustus to Romulus Augustus.

My father could name the 55 counties of West Virginia. He learned when he was a little boy.

Mnemonic devices are helpful. “Give me a mnemonic device big enough and I can memorize the World.”

Only a very ill person would try to name all the Hells. It cannot be done. You name one Hell and two more spring up in its place.

The first Hell we would name is The Hell Of Naming.

So then…

Acheron.

Styx.

Phlegethon.

Cocytus.

Lethe.

These to Hades, as to me are…

…Aorta. Venae Cavae. Pulmonary Artery and Vein.

The Hell Of The Broken Heart. We shall see this one. Cannibals and child murderers disguised as grief sticken widows lurk here.

Over the murky beds of Hell’s waterways roam colossal carp the size of subs who live solely on the endless supply of dumped limbs and heads.

Tartarus.

Hades.

The Plutonian Shore.

This Ultimate, Dim Thule.

Gehenna.

Sheol.

The Land Of The Dead.

They say you’re most alive when you’re in greatest distress. So no one in The Hells could truly be called dead, could they?

Those simpering twits flitting around Paradise – I would call those the Dead and Dying.

Inferno. Naturally.

I have a secret…

Hell is not banishment from the world.

Hell is asylum.

The Artist Prays

That Artist started me thinking.

I think the Artist is in The Hell Of Naming. Blessed in seeing so many strange, delicious things. Damned to have say something about it.

The Hells always extract a toll, a fee. If…then…

If…then…

If…then – we march through Hell. Every act depends on the one before. Nothing can stand on its own. Nothing is itself.

The moment you pour your change into the Ferryman’s basket, you’ve bought into the system.

Tit for tat it’s going to be. Nothing for joy’s sake. Nothing for free.

The flipside of the coin is you get to see Torquemada screech and squirm and beg. And that is very gratifying.

Pandemonium.

Amenti.

Where All The Dead People Go.

I always like to think Hell starts only after death. Like a purchase on credit where you don’t have to pay a penny for the first 70 years!

To most of our grandfathers there was no distinguishing Hell and Death. Or at least, there was no Heaven on offer. Life was good.

The Christians said you couldn’t take it with you. The Greeks said you could – but you had to give it all to Hades God Of The Underworld.

Hades/Pluto God Of The Underworld dripping riches – the first and greatest Bank. The UnderWorld Bank.

Substantial penalty for early withdrawal.

It’s an engaging pastime to spot what Artists have made it to The Hells and what ones are conspicuously absent.

Virgil is here, of course, because he needs the work.

Melville is here – “as a student” he says, but I think he secretly finds it all thrilling.

Jackson Pollock is here, because he suspected that life was life. And there were many angry gods and jealous angels who hated him for this.

Laurence Olivier is here. He spends most days looking at Sisyphus’s hams and shaking his head solemnly.

PROMETHEUS, that greatest artist of all, was most terribly punished, but punished out in the world – made an exhibit of. Spared the Hells.

The Hells have no records of Henry David Thoreau, Jimi Hendrix, or Vincent van Gogh. And this is not surprising.

I’ve yet to see a single female artist in The Hells. But maybe that’s just me. I hear this constant wailing though – chilling, inconsolable.

Ixion

You hear about pearly gates in Heaven, but that’s about it for technology. The Hells though are filled with contraptions, cunning devices.

So many parts, so many aspects. The place itself is an ingenius machine.

Perdition.

The Pit.

The Infernal Regions.

All technologies are implements of violence. I hate to say it. Hate to. To turn the will into action against the physical world – violence.

Even our hearts, stuffing our lungs full of blood – like a glutton pushing more food down his face – vicious, violent.

Like angry fists, our hearts. We’re taught the fist is the primal weapon, the first tool. The heart smelled blood before the fist ever did.

The Way Of Suffering I

I heard someone declare: “It is insanity to say that we came INTO the world. Better to say, we came OUT OF the world. Better.”

So did I come into The Hells? Or did I emerge from them? An entrance? Or an unveiling?

The Hell Of A Thousand Knives.

The Hell Of Hot Ice And Freezing Fire.

The Hell Of The Infinitely Deep Burial Alive.

But is there a Hell Of The Adorable Kittens? A Hell Of The Cute Little Baby Feet? A Hell Of My Lover’s Laughter?

Hell.

Hell?

Hell…

Gates of Heaven, of Hell. Why gates and not doors? So one side can see out, the other side see in.

Hell!

Daedalus With One Wing

The Hells are all about the fall. The Heavens, flight. Why is passage through the air so vital to the meaning of this mess? Air. Breath?

Spirit. Spiritus. Breathing. Breath. In. Out. Down. Down. Down into the hara. Insubstantial. Incorporeal.

Through air. Through err. Breathing spirit. Drinking spirit. We draw breath into the belly. We swallow the world into the belly. Fly!

Emptiness. Fullness.

Form is emptiness, etc.

I fancy it has something to do with density.

Even the still air is buzzing, you know. Buzzing all the time. Silently buzzing.

In The Hells it roars. In The Hells it screams. In The Hells the air is honest. It doesn’t talk behind your back.

Airy fairy…

Airy fairy harps and sings in dulcet tones…

Aerie faerie swoops and tears apart your bones.

Ha, ha, haaaaaahhhhhhhh.

Lovely planet Venus Goddess Of Love. Lovely morning star. Hellish under your cool cloud tops.

Fly on over to Venus. We swear you’ll be crushed, lungs burned, flesh baked from body. Air as dense as abyssal seas. But hot. But bright.

The only difference between air and sea is the math. Something to the somethingth power somewhere. Not alchemy. No. Just math.

We walk at the bottom of a sea of air. Soup of N, O, CO2. We’re bottom dwellers. Sound travels badly through air, even at this great depth.

Witches can fly, fly on broomsticks, fly across the moon, fly. Of course they would float in water. Obviously they would float in water.

Awful things come out of the air. Nothing good or wholesome comes out of thin air.

The air bends light, distorts the light.

Giggles and belches and discourse and farts. Air is human.

Pffffffffffffffffft!

I bet clouds weigh tons and tons.

One of the demons once said, and I quote: “Enlightenment is exactly like everyday life, just floating one foot off the ground.”

Tar Pits

Very big things are scary. Smaller things are far less scary. Invisible things are the scariest of all.

“‘Those I hoped would rescue me were allied with my abusers.”

So many traps. Deadfalls. Snares. Pitfalls. No wonder we fear dancing.

All the riches of the world come from far below. From deep down.

Living things are put beneath the ground to do their part too. To incubate, their remains accruing interest over eons.

How many pounds of human flesh would it take to squeeze out a ton of coal?

Coal and oil. Diamonds. Uranium and gold. Pluto owned all these all along.

What a con! What a con, to make us pay the Ferryman out of our own pockets!

He owns us. He has always owned us.

Zeus is the Sky Father. But Pluto-Hades, he The Boss in the Big House.

All of us tar babies, tar babies all.

Sticky. Sticky stuck, us.

The crowd was going to tar & feather Daedalus. That’s what it was. Ingrates.

Paper smothers rock.

Scissors cut paper.

Rock smashes scissors.

Rock reduces. Reduces. Leads us back again. Again. Damn. Again.

Paper smothers rock though. Paper gathers. Paper enfolds. It implicates.

Paper hides.

Scissors divide and conquer. Twins joined at the waist, snip and snicker.

Rock brought down on the cunning craft of scissors. Smash you, bitches. Rock smash!

Paper covers rock.

Scissors cuts paper.

Rock…

There goes Sisyphus again. Stupid fucking idiot.

Power Sander

One of the nice things about the Hells – you don’t have to practice anything. There’s no improving things. You’re all done.

Perdition?

Tar Nation!

Guess I’d better get back to naming all these Hells or it’ll never get done.

The Hell Of Stuffed Full Of White Hot Stones.

The Hell Of Stripped To The Bone And Set Across Coals Like Satay.

The Hell Of Mistaking Searing Hot Vegetable Oil For Apple Juice – Over & Over

The Hell Of Stepping In Gum.

The Hell Of Becoming Toothless.

The Hell Of Neverending Teething.

The Hell Of Poached Spleens.

The Hell Of The Undercooked Poultry.

And, top-of-the-charts: The Hell Of Quiet Desperation.

Everyone is perfectly fine in The Hells. You ask them. “Fine,” they say. “Fine.”

Most people arrive in The Hells re-emphasizing that they’re feeling fine, filling out the necessary paperwork with an agreeable smile.

Van Helsing Makes Amends

To be deprived of death, to have your death stolen from you – that’s what makes the vampire so, so terrifying, yes?

All the most terrifying tales have as a central theme the theft of a proper death.

Did Bram Stoker know he was creating a franchise that would live forever?

Vampires bite you at night when you’re sleeping. Vampires bite you at night when you’re sleeping.

So don’t go to sleep without having done the most important thing. Praying. Fucking. Something.

Why would dread Dracula metamorphose into a bat? A bat. Stealthy little critter. Velvet-winged mouse.

Dracula would hate the The Hells. All this senseless suffering, benefiting no man.

Why do the most terrible vampires always present so devout a face, so pious a lilt in the voice, so dreadful a smile?

In The Hells they feed you well, and they clothe you and bathe. They expect nothing in return. They tell you they expect nothing in return.

When you’re slacking here in The Hells – especially here in The Hells – they let you know it. No tolerance for slackers in The Hells.

I smell the aroma of smoke and sweet flesh – a thousand scapegoats roasting down on the plain. Smoke like fog. A feast, so satisfying.

I love you.

I need to get to work. This is crazy. Need to focus. Sometimes you can have too much time to finish a task.

In The Hells they always say “Relax, take your time.” But it’s a trick to keep you off-task. The whip is your friend. Heed the whip.

The markets in The Hells are vast, stretching from horizon to horizon. So much beauty to buy and sell. Glorious.

This guy’s trying to sell me blood by the jar. Who’s he think he’s talking to? Always buy in barrels. My dad said, always buy in barrels.

I’m lost. Better buy something and get out. It’s all buying and selling stuff here. Things. Services not allowed.

Could steal something. Very tempting. But it’s just not done here in The Hells. Not done. “Too honorable”, they say. Snobs.

Bags of cats. Sure. Why not? It’s an impulse buy, but why not? Bags of cats.

Been wandering around all night with three bags of cats. I don’t want three bags of cats.

Here in The Hells it’s a mark of great strength and skill to sell people things they don’t want or need.

In The Hells it’s a sign of great virtue and kindness to buy things you don’t want or need.

Now I better find some sucker to buy these bags of cats.

Pass it forward, motherfuckers.

Treasures I

This fellow’s selling “human pelts”. Almost certainly fakes.

Mansions, palaces even, can be acquired in the Hells for no money down. Real estate is plentiful, labor is cheap.

I don’t have as much tolerance for the marketplace as I used to, don’t have the endurance. The Hucksters aren’t as amusing.

The marketplace is wide as the sea and loud. Real loud.

It’s etiquette and tradition – it’s honour – that keeps the marketplace thriving. No one’s permitted to say what they really want.

In The Hells speaking what you need and want, what you really enjoy, will bring an avalanche of shame on you and your family.

That Bastard’s never going to let us out of here, is He? Never, ever.

Why create something for the sole purpose of torturing it? As if we were characters in a fiction.

One of the great jokes about The Hells – those blessed with the ability to live here happily, never have to live here.

Takes time in the Hells to learn the lingo. When someone says “I hope” what they mean is “I fear”.

When they say “I love you”, they mean “Certain fears of mine have reached an intolerable level.”

And when they say “You’re forgiven” they mean “I fear the wrath to come.”

The language of the Hells has a beautiful simple poetry.

When Hell boil down – 4ltr word. LMAO!

Werewolves Saturday Night

In The Hells the full moon always shines down from high, high above – because the sun is always on the far side of the world

So bright sharp moon. Could cut you open with that moon.

Could do all necessary surgeries with that sharp moon.

It is never night time in the Hells. Never time for rest.

And it’s never daytime in The Hells. Or it is, I suppose, a kind of day. But it’s a day that never saw a beginning, and will never see one.

In The Hells there is no dawn. The morning birds tweet all day long, gaunt and dry-throated. Like galley slaves to joy.

The Hells are infinitely wide, yet crowded to overflowing, yet terribly lonely. Wondrous. Miraculous.

The Hells are not a battlefield.

Or let’s say, The Hells are not a theater – of war or of any other type.

The field, the theater, the arena – these are sacred spaces. The firing line is always a sacred space.

The sidelines, the grandstands, the policy makers’ map rooms – there are The Hells.

There are so many people to hate in The Hells. You could be here 10,000 years and never get done hating all the people who need it.

There’s no lack of self-help books in The Hells. Libraries full of them. Multistorey bookstores.

Self-improvement is one of the great devotions here in The Hells, practiced with near-religious zeal. We seek betterment. Betterment.

The Way Of Suffering II

Every one of here in The Hells craves a triumph. We each imagine proceeding down the way, cheered by even our enemies.

Every one of us wants a colossal statue of himself – of pure jade – erected, facing the sunrise, attended by 30 manacled singing virgins.

So many bloody cracks in The Hells. Fissures filled with screaming men & women.

It’s so easy to twist an ankle.

Pop a hip out of joint.

Stub a toe.

The agony of the Hells is not that they are so hot, so cold, so painful, so terrifying. The agony is that they are unchanging.

One of the first documents you’re handed when you arrive in The Hells is a list of all the people you could have known, might have met.

In The Hells, there’s much mercy. You are always saved from The Emergency, always rescued. You are never allowed to progress, to transcend.

When a life is pressured, crushed, it becomes coal to burn. Black and shiny. Beautiful scarecrow eyes.

Coal is for burning.

But when a life is pressured more, more, crushed and damned for an eon more – then you get a diamond. Impenetrable and penetrating.

Diamonds to adorn our fishing nets.

It’s a comfort to see here in The Hells, a horizon rolling with mountains of coal – tons and gigatons and supertons of coal.

Coal for burning.

In The Hells we are encouraged to make lists – wish lists, to do lists, top 10 lists. We print neatly on fine stationery.

Then we pin our lists to the red-hot walls. They vaporize even before our fingers can burn.

I see that lives are not lived, but combusted.

Here in The Hells I have come to believe that lives must be combusted, that there is no choice. Oh, the cunning Hells.

In The Hells, nothing is extinguished.

In The Hells many groups and commitees are organized to find out what the problems are.

These groups make many plans and recommend how things might be improved.

Note Found On A Malformed Man

It’s certain that love is a thing you say. Love is spoken. Must be spoken. Tell me if I’m right.

“Christopher Marmalate, The Foot Farmer”, selection from Michael Galindo’s book “True Murders”

I have a thing that isn’t mine. It’s mine now.

The Lists Of Cousin Archie

I’m here. I am. And as long as I am so are The Hells. Laughable, isn’t it?