Noctourniquet
The Mars Volta entertain with a mature, complex record that will leave the listener in a dazed wonderment.
Even under closed eye visuals I could see it all.
Even under closed eye visuals I could see it all.
I awoke to damp sheets and a sick rain knocking at my window. I unclenched my fists from the bed sheets and took a second to catch my breath. I put my glasses on and ignited the lamp. Strangely enough a gray thick light oozed from the fire. Distressed by this I opened the window to release my doubts. I was greeted by a gust of freezing rain that licked at my clammy skin. And hiding behind a school of clouds, directly above the rigid stone town I had known for many years was a black sun.
I staggered back unable to discern what I had just seen. I raced out the room, down the steps and into my basement. I let out a sigh of relief to see my laboratory as I had left it. All of my vials were in the right position, selected experimental solutes were being processed and my books were scattered as before.
However, I noticed the same anomaly from the lamp occur with my bubbling mixtures and distilled compounds. They were illuminating shades of gray and black. I tried pushing this surreal reality out of my head with the aid of my beloved books. But the more I leafed through them the less of a grip on reality I held. Somehow all my work had been transcribed into gibberish. Welt up in confusion and rage I flipped through my entire collection only to meet the same result.
None of this could be true, I must be dreaming. I slapped and pinched myself a couple of times but nothing happened. I could feel my stomach churning and my fingers tensing up, I was undoubtedly awake.
And so I burst out of my house into a nocturnal world. I observed my surroundings in search of something peculiar like the black sun. But everything seemed normal, my neighbors lawn was unkempt as usual, the sidewalk leading to my house was still corroded and the column of elm trees that stood at the foot of the street were still leafless.
And suddenly, as if it appeared out of thin air, I saw it.
Past the scenery in the negative spaces of everything, a subtle displacement of the earth.
In such confusion I couldn't even put together a concrete question towards what I was witnessing. It was as if god himself had beset blasphemy upon my me. Bound by arduous amounts of stress I wandered into the stone town.
As I arrived to the main street I noticed it was as lifeless as the morbid moon hanging above me. I walked on the cobblestone street, the constant click clacking, echoing my presence. I looked in the small stores along each side of the road but no soul was insight. Instead colonies of cobwebs and dust had conquered the vacant space. Past the main street a cathedral centuries old stood erect in the blank illumination of the void above. This magnificent monolith carved of limestone and mortar was a testament towards my undying yearning for the truth behind these anomalies.
It had been years since I had entered a cathedral. In fact, I had almost forgotten how majestic such buildings were. From the perfectly smooth arches, hand-crafted gargoyles, to the ornate stained window glass and bountiful flying buttresses. This cathedral held an ethereal aura to it that felt different from any other place in this nocturnal world or for that matter the real world.
I sat at one of the pews and after an exhausting couple hours, let the halcyon setting consume me. At that moment when I had let go of worriment and stress I felt something exhale from the room. I opened my eyes quickly as if to catch the escaping gas before it was too late. But instead I found that the cathedral began to decrease in size. Slowly the large wooden doors began shrinking and the wide Gothic vault fell closer and closer towards the ground. Jesus was on the cross and seemed to be the only thing aside from myself to retain its original size.
At this point I didn't run from what seemed certain death. There was nothing for me in this blackened world, nothing but unanswered questions and unsettling discoveries. Soon after, everything began crashing into itself. What took decades to create soon began to crumble away in seconds. Such beautiful architecture and design untouched by time deteriorated in front of me. Large blocks of limestone came crashing down; smashing pews and altars next to me. The stained glass windows cracked away and large pillars came tumbling down. Finally I saw it falling down, another block of stone that would finish me.
And in that small amount of time I had left in my life, everything slowed down...
Like a perfectly patterned puzzle of missing people and places, I could peer into the past and approach what seemed a pleasant peril.
I could see it all.
However, I noticed the same anomaly from the lamp occur with my bubbling mixtures and distilled compounds. They were illuminating shades of gray and black. I tried pushing this surreal reality out of my head with the aid of my beloved books. But the more I leafed through them the less of a grip on reality I held. Somehow all my work had been transcribed into gibberish. Welt up in confusion and rage I flipped through my entire collection only to meet the same result.
None of this could be true, I must be dreaming. I slapped and pinched myself a couple of times but nothing happened. I could feel my stomach churning and my fingers tensing up, I was undoubtedly awake.
And so I burst out of my house into a nocturnal world. I observed my surroundings in search of something peculiar like the black sun. But everything seemed normal, my neighbors lawn was unkempt as usual, the sidewalk leading to my house was still corroded and the column of elm trees that stood at the foot of the street were still leafless.
And suddenly, as if it appeared out of thin air, I saw it.
Past the scenery in the negative spaces of everything, a subtle displacement of the earth.
In such confusion I couldn't even put together a concrete question towards what I was witnessing. It was as if god himself had beset blasphemy upon my me. Bound by arduous amounts of stress I wandered into the stone town.
As I arrived to the main street I noticed it was as lifeless as the morbid moon hanging above me. I walked on the cobblestone street, the constant click clacking, echoing my presence. I looked in the small stores along each side of the road but no soul was insight. Instead colonies of cobwebs and dust had conquered the vacant space. Past the main street a cathedral centuries old stood erect in the blank illumination of the void above. This magnificent monolith carved of limestone and mortar was a testament towards my undying yearning for the truth behind these anomalies.
It had been years since I had entered a cathedral. In fact, I had almost forgotten how majestic such buildings were. From the perfectly smooth arches, hand-crafted gargoyles, to the ornate stained window glass and bountiful flying buttresses. This cathedral held an ethereal aura to it that felt different from any other place in this nocturnal world or for that matter the real world.
I sat at one of the pews and after an exhausting couple hours, let the halcyon setting consume me. At that moment when I had let go of worriment and stress I felt something exhale from the room. I opened my eyes quickly as if to catch the escaping gas before it was too late. But instead I found that the cathedral began to decrease in size. Slowly the large wooden doors began shrinking and the wide Gothic vault fell closer and closer towards the ground. Jesus was on the cross and seemed to be the only thing aside from myself to retain its original size.
At this point I didn't run from what seemed certain death. There was nothing for me in this blackened world, nothing but unanswered questions and unsettling discoveries. Soon after, everything began crashing into itself. What took decades to create soon began to crumble away in seconds. Such beautiful architecture and design untouched by time deteriorated in front of me. Large blocks of limestone came crashing down; smashing pews and altars next to me. The stained glass windows cracked away and large pillars came tumbling down. Finally I saw it falling down, another block of stone that would finish me.
And in that small amount of time I had left in my life, everything slowed down...
Like a perfectly patterned puzzle of missing people and places, I could peer into the past and approach what seemed a pleasant peril.
I could see it all.
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