Adam Roberts - The This

You dont get me, Im part of the union
You dont get me, Im part of the union
You dont get me, Im part of the union
Till the day I die
Till the day I die.

Richard Hudson and John Ford

The analysis of an idea, as it is properly carried out, is, in fact, nothing else than ridding it of the form in which it has become familiar.

G.W.F. Hegel

Allow me to remark:
The Ghost has just as good a right
In every way to fear the light,
As men to fear the dark.

Charles Dodgson

In the Bardo subject and object are the same. You say, Im not sure I understand what that means.

Theres somebody else with you in the Bardo and this other person is going through the same process you are. Or, to put it another way: there are many persons in the Bardo and theyre all going through the same process as you. The place is crammed with people. So many! Do any of them understand this business better than you do? You say it again: Im not sure I understand what that means.

Means, says the other. I mean, since we cant suppose time has any purchase in this place, the present tense in your statement comes into question, rather, dont you think? Meant, means, will mean. I mean, whos to say?

You say: Huh?

A flash of light marks your passage out of the Bardo, and youre alive again. That flash was the sunlight. All of it. That flash of light is all the sunlight you will see in the course of your life, and all the darkness, too. Which is to say, you see, in an instant, the balance of the two but of course youll see less darkness and more light over the run of your whole existence, because the day is lit and, though the night is not, theres always light inside your dreams.

Embodiment, and its queasy wondrousness. Milk assuages your wailing. You run, and its a pure joy, and the high grass snickers at your hips. You take your share of the meat. You are a parent and sit under an overhang and watch the rain come down so hard its as if the whole sky has collapsed its liquid blue down upon you in one go. It smells of cleanness and clover, of sky and freshness. As you sit there, cradling one of your kids, a thought rushes your memory with intense and vivid suddenness: that time when Hari cut the throat of a wild cow with a lucky cut, and all the cows blood came out in one go, with a great sloshing and gushing it was the noise of this rain, the noise of life sluicing endlessly through the sky and the earth, through you and all the animals, and you feel a sharp fragment of understanding. There was good eating for days from that cow. You sleep and dream of a great mountain. The next day the ground is muddy. A pain in your jaw grows until you can do nothing but lie on the ground and cry. It fills your head with its pain, and when you think the pain is so great it cannot possibly be greater, it swells further fire and grinding and pressure combined into an agony. It breaks the bone to burst from your head through the side of your face, and the release of this pressure is so sweet you sleep for a day. It still hurts, and the others make fun of your ruined face, and then you are feverish and then you are more feverish and then you are dead.

In the Bardo subject and object are the same. You can remember the whole of that lived life, as fine-veined and perfect as a single glossy leaf from a tree with a trillion leaves. You hold the whole memory in your mind. The light comes again.

You are reborn, and live long enough to develop a sense of yourself, of your mother and your siblings, of heat and shade, of the difference between bitter food and sweet, and then you die a day and a night of diarrhoea and youre gone.

In the Bardo subject and object are the same.

I can remember all of them, you say. I suppose you do, too? Is it the same for you?

The other person there smiles. Are you sure, this other person asks, youre not collating numerous similar life-memories into a smaller number of manageable memories?

You say: Thats a good question.

The light, again. There is more brightness than darkness in this life, too. Its like that for almost every life. You grow up by a pool, and there are fish to eat as well as what the tribe hunts in the forest. You and your brothers and sisters and cousins are a tribe within the tribe, and you like mischief. One day, when one of the communitys Big Men is washing himself in the pool, you and your siblings all piss into the pool for a joke. The Big Man is very angry, and his anger does not settle as anger usually does. He surprises the group of you all later that day youd already forgotten the prank, and are picking and eating berries. But the Big Man has not forgotten, and though most of your sisters and brothers run off screaming, he catches you and punches you on the side of the head. His is the Big Fist, so its blow breaks the bone and you lie on the ground sobbing and passing in and out of consciousness. Over the course of evening and sunset the shadow of the bush slides over you like a blanket. Your mother finds you and tries to lift you up, but the movement dislodges something inside you and you start fitting furiously. Vomit comes up one way and goes down another and youre dead.

In the Bardo subject and object are the same.

Does it just go on and on? you ask. I mean, I suppose what Im wondering is are we on our way anywhere?

The other person smiles. You mean, enlightenment? Zen and spiritual evanishment and all that? I dont know anything about any of that.

You tell them your name.

They tell you theirs: Abby something.

Abby Normal? you laugh, and Abby laughs, too, so thats a joke you share, it seems. A cultural reference you have in common. At the time this doesnt strike you as strange, but later, when the sheer scope of well everything comes home to you, it sounds a more discordant note. I mean, what are the odds? That you both recognised the reference, that you had cultural knowledge sufficiently in common to both laugh? An old black and white comedy movie. Pastiche monster-mash.

Where did you start this process? Which was your first life? You wonder about yourself. You ask Abby.

By way of reply Abby smiles a Serenissima smile.

This time there is no flash, and this life is more darkness than light: you live underground, and when you come up the light hurts your eyes and you dont like it. But you bring up the ore and you eat your meals, and you play, and when you get older you fuck, and you dont know any different. Then youre dead and you do know any different and you think: That wasnt much of a life.

Bright light. You live by the river and your life is a habitual matter: prayers, scooping the water into your irrigation channels, growing your food, passing your due to the rulers, making small trades with your neighbours. You marry four times and have six children, two of whom live to adulthood and are present at your deathbed.

In the Bardo subject and object are the same thing.

Theres a degree of monotony, you note.

Abby shrugs.

Darkness this time: you are blind, all your long life. You never see the sunlight, although you can feel it on your face.

In the Bardo subject and object are the same thing.

Brightness swells again.

You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are a farmer. You are pressed into the army and die of dysentery far from home. You are a farmer, pressed into the army and spiked with a spear from behind on a battlefield whose name you do not know. You are a farmer and you die by the sword. You are a farmer and you die of disease.