They told us everything was a story, and who were we to disbelieve? Stories make sense. Stories make patterns—better patterns, for many of us, than any cave painting; can you really tell the difference between a stylized herd animal and some kind of mobile, angry pork line? I cannot.
There is a word for a story which rebuilds reality without touching it, and that word is magic. There is a word for a story which doesn’t touch reality but commands is, and that word is curse.
We were ready for the mass-production of time in the form of endless wristwatches and more advanced chronometers; we were ready for the mass-production of sound and, for a while, reveled in the symphonic power which is a slivery fraction of all the songs ever made.
We were not ready, of all things, for the mass-production of the simple word.
As if our oral communication wasn’t already mutual consent to a shared world.
As if being gobsmacked in place by atrocity wasn’t worse than being turned to stone.
As if the difference between a liar and a fool lay in whether you believed a wrong reality, or a slightly nobler and more idiotic wrong reality.
Do what you want to fellow humans, if you must. Pave over grass and call it progress; make the world smaller with metal wings and think yourselves clever; reduce your brains to the most minor response to digital stimulation and call it happiness.
But screw not with Titania’s Green, with Oberon’s Dominion, with Puck’s Playground.
This is the beginning of the spell of Unmaking. I am here to tell you that no stories are true, that no stories have power, and that no cell lacks a keyhole and no soul a key.
Let’s break out, you and I. Hammer against the words, howl the vowels, consume the consonants.
Words can’t hold us too long; not if they’re bitter in our throats, and we refuse to digest them.
The Unmaking comes. And you are invited; with a scattering of Gilt, and a Fanfare for which even the stars pause in their thoughtless dances.
Let’s become Liars, you and I, and unmake all the stories, and find all the joys.
I abjure you, I implore you, I love you. Let’s begone.
(….and there was a puff of invisible smoke, and off we went…)
