Once again, nothing satisfies. Highlights of refined intellectual insight, tight passages of poetry, breathy rigors of the negative dialectic– all this bores me. More boring are my own words– my own insight, poetry, negativity– including my denunciation of everything that would give the self a false sense of assurance against its death.

That ultimate question– “Why go on?”– no longer has any meaning for me. There was never any going on, or anything to go on. Nothing was ever going on, or going to. There is no language in these words, and everything I’ve done is stamped with the most ruthless absurdity. All I’m doing is hanging on, waiting on death– and “enjoying” the nameless life I lead by waiting methodically, patiently, openly. I feel as if I’ve learned all there is to know; what comes next is only the useless work of communicating it, writing books. But there’s no one at all to do this work; I don’t ever contradict what I’ve learned. My ax strikes at the same start every time, and nothing ever gets broken. And so there’s no reason to ask, “What good is it?” since it isn’t anything– since everything is already perfect.

And so the only thing left to do is to become fearless; and to do so, or to appear to do so, with utmost ease. My goal is to strike down any thought that would be self-defeating, and to pursue every thought that gives me strength. I know I’m isolated in this– there is no other way. But what makes me strong bursts the bubbles of isolation instantly. Therefore: I will not be surprised if in a very short time I am the universe– or dead, if there’s a difference.

Clearly, I wasn’t sent here. I’m not a messenger and there isn’t a message. I’ve seen through the horror of discourse; what’s left for me is to endure the pain of being distanced further. It is this pain that strengthens me. I have horrible dreams because of it– which makes my unshakeability even more amazing (a dream with my mother in 1979, before I was born but in my first bedroom, bedridden, her eyes bulging and swollen, her face ghastly thin, leaning up like a cripple from under the covers, her head surrounded by a carrion aura, as I crack the door and she screams, “Your father doesn’t love us anymore!”).

I feel the winds of Hades. I know what it is to not mean anything. I know what it is to be. I know what it is to go away. I know what it is to be fearless.

But this doesn’t excite me. I’m impatient and don’t give a damn about Jesus. I don’t care to assist humanity in anything. The only thing that matters is going your own way— doing what makes you strong, doing what makes you fearless.

And so at bottom, I’m a rat, slimy as a street peddler. I’ll say anything so long as it aggravates you out of your torpor. What I couldn’t stand were failed souls– men who never pursued anything or fell into a common mode– men who pranced around and faked their tears– men with morbid guts and bathroom senses of humor– men who accepted being boring and colorless– men who bought pillows– men who had no idea about being a warrior. I kept going, not to wake them up, but to make sure my life wasn’t as regrettable. Don’t get me wrong– I can befriend them and, to a degree, respect them, if only because of the current dearth of creative models; but mostly, I can’t stomach them and quickly flee. What I cannot abide, above all, is timidity– that clever quality of turtleing, of sidestepping, of evading, that turns men into mice or worse, and which I had to learn to force myself to fight with all the marrow in my bones. Because it’s not that we lack insights, though those are wanting too; what we really lack are actions, strong types who strive in great challenges, artists who crave nothing but grave difficulty. A society that makes “easy” its top priority is a society without a backbone; but if I go on, it’s not to save it but to have a backbone myself– to “stand for something,” to speak misleadingly. My goals aren’t lofty and in the end I’m realistic. What I’m doing seems to me to be the prerogative, if not the duty, of every man: to promise oneself a future, to be responsible for ones potentials, to risk ones life in what one does and what one says. Somehow, doing this makes one a rarity– which too often leads those who do it to despair. But I say to them that they have not given their strength enough credit– or rather, enough impetus. They have not yet demanded of themselves enough. Despair must never be left to linger. Agitation and action must force away these fogs with urgency, such that we keep in sight, however dim, the light of our own courage, and choose the paths that will lead us to the most uncompromising outcomes. For if we wallow, we are already dead; whereas if we urge ourselves to rise, to not submit to our cowardliness, we will soon taste glory– the glory of being no-one, of being strong, of being perfect.

So don’t listen to me– go away– be perfect.