The purple room in my dreams,
where does the door lead?
I wake before reaching beyond,
I shake when thinking of it
This purple room, open and free,
with the purple people,
who are all just like me
The Purple Room (a poem)
absurd
Masks (flash fiction)
Everyone wore masks this particular day, some sparkled, and some were dull and gray. But there was one man who went maskless – this man I saw on the street corner. His face was normal as could be: a thin nose, bushy eyebrows, full lips, and ruddy, plump cheeks.
He stood there, beckoning me to come forward amid the masked people walking to and fro. “Did you know,” he started, “that I wear a mask, as well?”
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Albert Camus (graphic art)
Here’s something I made on Canva recently – just playing around with various filters and effects. The man pictured, of course, is the French philosopher and absurdist Albert Camus.
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Mr. Franz Kafka (graphic art)
More graphic art! I took this Wikimedia Commons image of Franz Kafka and played around with it. I like the spirals in the background, and the red hue was my favorite of the colors.
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Embracing the Absurd
Every so often, when things get really crazy, I like to think about Albert Camus. I turned to Camus’ writings a few years ago when my personal life fell off the rails. Yesterday, when Pro-Trump loyalists stormed the U.S. Capitol, I began to think of Camus again.
American politics right now are definitely absurd. People have been throwing around a lot of words to describe what’s going on: unprecedented, dark, nihilistic. Absurd is a good adjective, too.
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Perfectionism (a poem)
The saints wanted perfection
so do some of us
but chasing this goal is like
walking over burning coals
what about progress?
self-acceptance?
what about turning away from Never Enough?
resting in the realization that
this life is absurd
that all this effort can
crash & burn
in the blink of an eye
(Photo by Aron Van de Pol on Unsplash)
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Book Review: Amerika by Franz Kafka
After reading Franz Kafka’s complete short stories last year, I was determined to read the three novels that were published posthumously. I find Kafka to be a tremendously interesting writer and literary figure, and after reading most of his work, the recurrent themes became evident.
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My book review of ‘The Plague’ is published!
About a month ago, I posted a review of The Plague by Albert Camus. It’s now been published in Bewildering Stories, along with an accompanying review by Don Webb, the website’s managing editor.
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Today’s quote – a reminder on non-conformity from Albert Camus
“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.” – attributed to Albert Camus. Camus is one of my favorite writers and philosophers, and I agree with this quote wholeheartedly. I don’t try to be weird or different on purpose – I simply try to follow my heart.
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‘There is No Death’ – a short story (Conclusion)
Father Curran has committed to this new philosophy of the afterlife. He’s not sure whether he will, in fact, die soon. But his old faith is in tatters – that much is certain. Here’s the conclusion of “There is No Death”:
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