Finished!

After a grueling editing process, I’ve finally got a reading copy of my new manuscript ready! That’s right! I finished another book. It’s an exciting supernatural thriller set in New Mexico. I’d like to have a few people read it before I start shopping it around. If you’re interested, drop me a line and lemme know!

Daily Wisdomisms: The Holy Bible

Today’s bit of wise-ness comes from the Gospel of John. Of all the NT Gospels, this is my favorite. I don’t know if it’s because of my love for good story telling or my spirituality, but both are fed when I read this Gospel. This passage speaks volumes to me. Enjoy!

“If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, the world hates you.” John 15:19

Ever heard the phrase “You can’t serve God and Mammon”? The above verse is the heart of that phrase. Mammon represents materialism, which is rooted in the physical world. To deny Mammon is to deny material gain and ambition. Doing this has inescapable consequences. Take some time for self reflection and ask yourself who you serve. How important are things to you? Could you give it all up and walk away if it meant an adventure of discovery and self-realization? Be warned though. Mammon knows those who’ve turned their backs on him. And if you try to exist in his world while seeking Enlightenment he’ll make you suffer for it.

Adaptation

Spirited away
beyond the boundaries
of secret folklore.

Do you know of what I speak?

Whispers of soft velvet dreams
blanketing you with naked grace.

Three hundred and eleven eternities
inside the black liquid glass
that paves the road
into the heart of nightmares and waking visions.

Now
Awake, you sleeping giants.

Jason DeGray 2012

Daily Wisdomisms: The Way of Hermes (Irreverence)

The writings of Hermes predate most religious texts. As a result, almost every modern religion has taken from the wisdom of his words. In this passage, he speaks of what sins God and his divine servants will forgive. Enjoy!

“Irreverence is mankind’s greatest offence against the gods; for the gods’ work is to do good, men’s to show reverence, and for the spiritual powers to serve. Whatever else men have the audacity to undertake through error, recklessness, compulsion (which they call destiny), or ignorance, the gods will hold them guiltless. Only irreverence comes under judgement.”—The Way of Hermes p. 76

Hmmm…looks like there isn’t much sin that God won’t forgive us. As a matter of fact, the only sin He can’t forgive is turning our backs on him. I like that he compares compulsion with destiny and hints that as humans, we often confuse the two. But even this is forgivable. Awesome. Just…awesome.

New and Improved!

I’ve always wondered about that statement. How can it be new AND improved? If it’s new, then there’s nothing to improve on yet. If it’s been improved, that means it’s been around for a while and is no longer new. Anyway, I noticed the links on my pages were broken. Using quick links was a bad idea. So I’ve fixed the broken links AND added a new page. (Bonus!) Plays and Misc. found under the Short Stories tab. Check it out, surf around and lemme know what you think!

Jason

Daily Wisdomisms: Rumi

A short piece, but a powerful one. Enjoy!

An Egypt that Doesn’t Exist

I want to say words that flame
as I say them, but I keep quiet and don’t try
to make both worlds fit in one mouthful.

I keep secret in myself an Egypt
that doesn’t exist.
Is that good or bad? I don’t know.

For years I gave away sexual love
with my eyes. Now I don’t.
I’m not in any one place. I don’t have a name
for what I gave away. Whatever Shams
gave, that you can have from me.

—-From The Essential Rumi translated by Coleman Barks and John Moyne.

Abstract

I enjoy looking through my old writing notebooks. They’re like journals, only the stories are told in poems, scenes and stories. Enjoy this trip down my memory lane!

Love me, loathe me,
but please don’t
leave me

Behind
a torn curtain
my fantasy dances alone
inside a box
crying for mother’s milk
that dried up

Long ago
dinosaurs dwelt in bars
drinking gin with God
until He

Left
of the diner is an old house
with many stories
to tell if one will

Listen
to

The Sound of Silence
within our hearts
has all the noisome answers
one can fathom.

Copyright 2003 Jason DeGray

A Universal Shift: Short Fragment

An old fragment, like a glimpse into another world I never got to explore. Enjoy!!

Whispered mumbling…almost ominous.

Followed by the clank of metal on metal.

The dreamscape pulls out to reveal two shadowed figures in cloaks. They are dimly lit by an eerie orange glow from behind. The impression of cobblestone under my feet becomes a reality. I don’t know how I manage to take all this down, my hands are shaking so bad. I’m not sure who they are—these cloaked figures. I’m not sure what they are doing, but the dread, the terror begins to sink its claws into my skull. And look, now I’m staring at black on white again. Words just tumbling onto this nonexistent paper like so many delicate drops of blood falling from an oblique hand—drip…drip…drip–with a methodical pitter-patter onto bone white parchment. Equally as nonexistent, but a lot more real than these invisible binary codes that follow my every sentence.
“There is a dark side to this. This violent dance of self important monkeys, this perpetual staccato razor blade rhythm, this coveted but mistrusted gift. I am not the evil that has come to destroy you, but the darkness that has come to liberate you.”

This is the manifesto that is pounded like a desperate symphony onto the screaming keys of an ancient typewriter. In the background is a large room fashioned from roughly cut stones, like something in a castle. A roaring fire lights the room as it warms. Medieval almost. And then the fingers once again begin their bleak concerto.

“I am staring off to my left. There is nothing. Just…nothing. I feel that at any moment my whole world could just topple over into this infinite space. Sometimes I feel the tremors of chaos rumbling beneath my flimsy plane of reality. They warn me, they are the harbingers of truth that reassure me that when it is all over, the world will be a much better place. A much purer one. But that small reassurance still won’t stop the nightmares.
I am the child of a lost generation. A generation discarded and scorned because we are the final prophets of a dying race. The last hope and the last great failure. We don’t need anyone’s prayers. We are the product of answered prayers. This is God’s plea to us all. His final proclamation before the universe corrects itself. We are fighters, we are healers we are the purest scapegoats a tainted world has to offer for sacrifice. This makes us cry. This makes us bleed. This makes us willing to ensure our martyrdom is for a reason…a higher purpose. We will not heed the ignorant demands of those who would discard us silently, stealthy and with dark and selfish intention. You want details. You want a story, I can tell. You want something you can wrap your brain around. Something to relate to. Well, shining inside the depths of every single word is a story. How can I tell them all? They really tell themselves.”

Honestly, I think the gentlemen is simply rambling at this point. I think he is masking something. The truth behind the veil.

Sunlight

Sunlight

like the Wind’s laughter
or waves lapping against
a gentle shore.

Bask in simple radiance,

faces upturned
to absorb that perfect Light.

This Just In! It’s All In Your Head.

A new report issued by Scientists Under Control of Kooks and Assholes found that it really is all in your head.  And by “it”, I mean the big It.  The world. The Universe. Reality.

“It’s true. Nothing but a figment of the collective imagination,” affirmed Dr. Norman Peabody, lead SUCKA scientist for their Department of Quantumly Physical Thingies and Whatnots and chief egghead on the project.

When asked about the specifics of the experiment, Dr. Peabody took on a very defensive and aloof air.  “Those processes are far above the comprehension of the normal masses.  Suffice to say, the evidence was there.”

But journalistic integrity demanded that I press further.  Finally, Dr. Peabody relented a few of their top secret methods.

“What we did was we took a lot of blind people and put them in a big room.  Then, we told them to point to a poster we had on the wall.  Only, we didn’t put a poster on the wall in the room.  But that didn’t stop everyone from pointing.  Some people even claimed to see it! Can you imagine? Describing a poster that doesn’t exist?  That’s when my team and I realized that if people want to see something bad enough they will conjure it up out of thin air. Literally.”

“How does that prove reality is all in your head?” I had to ask.

“Because they couldn’t see and they saw a poster anyway! Don’t you get it?”

I admitted that I didn’t.

“Small-minded flagellate spoor,” mumbled the good doctor.  “Here’s another example.  We put a bunch of deaf people in a room and told them to listen to a recording and repeat it back to us.  They couldn’t do it.”

“Not too surprising. They’re hearing impaired.”

“Exactly! They couldn’t hear it, but the sound was there! That’s when my team and I realized that just because you can’t hear a tune doesn’t mean there isn’t one on the juke box.  But to them, see, sound doesn’t exist. So in their world, there really is NO sound!  Are you getting how deep this is?”

“I’m starting to. Give me the deepest thing you’ve got. Let’s get to the heart of the matter.”

“Alright. But this one is off the record.”

“Of course.” I put down my notepad, but left the recorder in my pocket running.

Peabody looked around and leaned in close before revealing, “We interviewed several comatose patients,” in a hoarse whisper.

“You what?” I shouted. “What good could that possibly serve?”

“Shhhh! Calm down! It served plenty of good! We asked them basic questions about their surroundings. Asked them to describe the rooms they were in, what the interviewers and doctors looked like. What sounds and smells they noticed.  Not one of them could answer a single question.”

“No shit, Sherlock! They are comatose!!” At this point my journalistic patience was being tested to its limits. I took a deep breath and said, “Really? This is scientific integrity?”

“It certainly is,” said Peabody adding a curt tone to his elitist smugness. “The reason they couldn’t answer is because this world isn’t real to them. They are getting absolutely no sensory input from their environments. Sensory input, as we know, is taken in via our sensory organs and processed in our brains. Without sensory input to construct a physical world, the physical world doesn’t exist. Do you see the profound implications this has on psychology and spirituality?”

“For sure. You’ve profoundly implicated that blind people can’t see, deaf people can’t hear and comatose people are perpetually asleep.”

“No. We’ve proved that nothing exists outside our own perceptions of it. This includes God, Santa Clause, social equality and soccer in America.”

I wasn’t convinced. “There’s soccer in America?”

But Dr. Peabody didn’t hear me. “If you think this is great, wait till our next experiment. The final nail in the coffin of all idiots who believe in things paranormal or supernatural.”

“Do tell. Just a tiny hint for our readers.”

Dr. Peabody was obviously conflicted, but he was so proud of himself that he couldn’t help but blurt out, “We’re hanging pictures facing the ceiling in operating rooms.”

“What the hell for?”

“That way, when patients claim to have out of body experiences, we can ask them to describe the pictures to us. If they can’t then the OBE was obviously false.”

I had no words. I know that as a journalist this shouldn’t happen, but my jaw was slack with disbelief for so long that I started drooling. Finally I croaked something about “Absurd and irrational rationality” and fled to the nearest bar where my great friend Captain Morgan assured me that the “real world” spun and lurched uncontrollably, walking in straight lines is for pussies not pirates, and that waking up without heaving your guts out really isn’t waking up at all.