I want to tell you about my world. What happened. Why we, are where we are. Perhaps as a warning, perhaps as a lesson, or maybe just to get all those strange things clearer in my own head. Whatever the reason, it might be worth you taking a few minutes, because I can guarantee that while you are reading this, they will be watching.
In my place, where I live or, more properly,
where I lived, we looked in all the wrong places. So maybe we were paranoid,
but you must understand we had every right to be. We had been at war for a thousand
years with every permutation of neighbour. We fought the rich, the poor, the
religious, the black, the white, the red, and the yellow. In fact, we fought
wars for every, and any, reason. It was the way we were built, it was in the
core of us, in our blood.
We fought each other because all we saw were
the differences.
And yet, looking back, we weren’t so different after all. We all inhabited the same planet, had the same biology, but just kept different Gods and idols - different ways to nail us to this little rock of ours. When you live next to someone, you see their faults, their little ways, their selfishness. Yet if you stand at the end of a street, you can see more than that, you can see our similarities. The further you are from something, or someone, or a problem, the clearer you can see it.
So perhaps that is why they chose to live up there.
While we watching our borders, scanning the horizons for refugees, for immigrants - the others were watching us. We were looking in all the wrong places.
All the wrong places.
Take a moment to stop reading this and look up. If it’s only the roof then look out of the window, and see the highest of the buildings out there. It was the one place they knew we wouldn’t look – none of us ever look up.
While we were fighting each other, brother against brother, sister against mother, they moved in to the tops of things.
Look up while striding a city street and you will notice that on the pinnacle of any building are empty rooms – or at least they appear empty. If you are in a town, or a village or a hamlet, look around you – there will be empty rooms hidden at the top of things.
That was where they lived. Up there was where they bred, where they planned, where they gained strength, and where they could look out on us and see our weaknesses, see our faults, but most of all see their victory coming.
Now you’re asking about where they came from. Who knows? My belief is they weren’t from this place, or any place we knew of. Perhaps they had always been here. Perhaps they came in the night. Perhaps they had been underground for millennia.
Yet, they watched and waited, waited and watched. Until the time when we were so busy fighting each other, that we never noticed them take over everything. They brought us to our knees – we were destroyed.
So take this as a warning. As you walk down a street, be it busy, be it ever so quiet, they will be watching you. They will – I know. Watching from all the rooms at top of things, from all the empty attics, from all the little garrets, and turrets, and lonely corridors. Don’t think they aren’t there, because they are.
Have you never been alone in a room and heard a scrapping, or a scratching up there? You thought it was a mouse, or a rat, or trapped bird. No – it is indeed them, waiting for you all to be looking the other way.
Then they will come.
Take it from me, I know.
bobby stevenson 2016
And yet, looking back, we weren’t so different after all. We all inhabited the same planet, had the same biology, but just kept different Gods and idols - different ways to nail us to this little rock of ours. When you live next to someone, you see their faults, their little ways, their selfishness. Yet if you stand at the end of a street, you can see more than that, you can see our similarities. The further you are from something, or someone, or a problem, the clearer you can see it.
So perhaps that is why they chose to live up there.
While we watching our borders, scanning the horizons for refugees, for immigrants - the others were watching us. We were looking in all the wrong places.
All the wrong places.
Take a moment to stop reading this and look up. If it’s only the roof then look out of the window, and see the highest of the buildings out there. It was the one place they knew we wouldn’t look – none of us ever look up.
While we were fighting each other, brother against brother, sister against mother, they moved in to the tops of things.
Look up while striding a city street and you will notice that on the pinnacle of any building are empty rooms – or at least they appear empty. If you are in a town, or a village or a hamlet, look around you – there will be empty rooms hidden at the top of things.
That was where they lived. Up there was where they bred, where they planned, where they gained strength, and where they could look out on us and see our weaknesses, see our faults, but most of all see their victory coming.
Now you’re asking about where they came from. Who knows? My belief is they weren’t from this place, or any place we knew of. Perhaps they had always been here. Perhaps they came in the night. Perhaps they had been underground for millennia.
Yet, they watched and waited, waited and watched. Until the time when we were so busy fighting each other, that we never noticed them take over everything. They brought us to our knees – we were destroyed.
So take this as a warning. As you walk down a street, be it busy, be it ever so quiet, they will be watching you. They will – I know. Watching from all the rooms at top of things, from all the empty attics, from all the little garrets, and turrets, and lonely corridors. Don’t think they aren’t there, because they are.
Have you never been alone in a room and heard a scrapping, or a scratching up there? You thought it was a mouse, or a rat, or trapped bird. No – it is indeed them, waiting for you all to be looking the other way.
Then they will come.
Take it from me, I know.
bobby stevenson 2016
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