The Living Dead

An estimated 230,000 people died in the Asian Tsunami of 2004. The 2005 earthquake in Kashmir claimed between 70,000 and 90,000 lives, depending on the estimates one chooses to rely on. The earthquake in Haiti claimed as many as 230,000 lives. These disasters were all tragic, and resulted in a global outpouring of charity, to the tune of a combined $17 billion. The death tolls were headline grabbing, heart wrenching, and sympathy inspiring. The resulting emotions at the sheer devastation, punctuated by high death tolls, convinced people to reach deep into their pockets and donate generously. It was enough to force governments to pledge massive sums, ex-Presidents to mobilise and promise to use their considerable charm and swagger to not only secure pledges, but also to act as trustworthy custodians in their distribution.

In comparison, the recent floods in Pakistan appear tame. A mere 1,600 people estimated dead. A paltry number when compared to the previous major disasters. Even the earthquakes in Iran and China had more casualties. The fear is that lower death tolls would translate into less sympathy, which in itself may translate to less aid and charitable contributions. When thinking about the floods I was reminded of a discussion I had with a colleague post the July 7th bombings in London. The colleague refused to take the tube to work, deciding instead to add an hour to his journey by walking every day. We had a lively debate about the futility of trying to avoid an untimely death, and the nature of destiny. During that debate he said something which has stuck with me ever since, "It's not dying I'm afraid of, but there are things that are worse than death."

The more I thought about what he said, the more I was struck by his words. Which brings me back to the statistics I've quoted above. Above the numbers of corpses of those that tragically lost their lives in each of the disasters is a more telling number; the number of people "affected". The dead are just that – dead. Whilst we should mourn the dead, and feel a tragic sense of loss, we can do nothing for them. They are gone, resigned to our memories and kept alive within the people that they knew. Our charity is reserved strictly for the living – they are the ones that we can help, they are the ones that we can make a difference for –and ultimately, given the circumstance, it is them who we can save to ensure that the final death tolls aren't higher. When we give aid, the money goes toward sustaining and protecting the vulnerable living. And given the conditions, many of them are on very limited timescale within which we have to act in order to ensure they remain members of that exclusive state of being. Without our support they are resigned to become part of the depressing statistic of those "lost" – but in these instances we had an opportunity to ensure they wouldn't be.

Many of these people are alive in conditions that hang somewhere between life and death. That may be worse than death. Which once again brings me back to the statistics. Approx 11 million people were "affected" by the three previous described disasters – 5min the Tsunami, and approx 3m each in the Kashmir and Haiti earthquakes. The numbers affected in the current crisis are estimated to be above 13 million, more than all three combined. When weighing up the decision of whether to donate, and if so, how much, we should be guided by those that we can still help, and if we are to do so, it would suggest that Pakistan currently needs generous support.

When we react to disasters we should ensure that our focus is not on the number dead, but on the number that hover in a state of purgatory; the number who we can actually assist, and who the money, food, shelter, medicine, and other forms of aid can still help. In business education we are constantly told about our "sphere of influence" and trying to expand it. The dead are beyond that sphere and always will remain so, it's the living dead that we must ensure aren't.

The Misogynist

Somewhere within me, there is a genuine hatred of women. It surfaces in moments of beauty and nostalgia. A disgust, repulsion even. In the same moments there is a reverence for my mother as the only divinity I am willing to acknowledge. And then there's the lust. Love for the flesh of another, a burning for entwinement. A longing. An infatuation for passion, the igniting of a flame by the wax of her body and the wick of my loins. A spark is all we need. Fire doused with disgust. It’s only when I dissimulate from emotions and immerse myself in her that I feel at peace. When I stand in reverence of beauty, basking in the sunlight of existence, I cannot bear the sight of loving a woman. Seeking comfort in whores, and for the briefest of moments confuse immortality for love. It’s in their arms I fancy myself a poet, and a knight - and now is the time for Thomas, now is the time for Blake.

Murder of One

Should I murder God,

In the midst of night,

Would anyone take notice

Of the bloodied sky?

If in a beggar’s prostration,

Cup in hand, awaiting charitable mercy

And alcoholic warmth, I am injured enough

To commit murder, may I deem it just?

Just, in that I am no mercy

Or worthy of such prayers,

So why does the Almighty,

Not heed them thus?

Why must it be left,

To those themselves tortured

By life in entirety, to answer the cries

Intended for a Creator?

Why must selfish life,

Tend to life, and dying flesh,

And deny itself

In favour of another's burden?

I look on with pity, at shivering bodies

At warm conscious corpses

In the icy winter wind, which bites me so

And see respite in death alone.

Coming to revile all spirituality,

Reverence for divinity, and adherence to scriptures;

All selfish and hollow, like my complaints,

Like their begging, like hunger in us all.

If I were to Murder,

So that they should look to none but themselves,

Would I not be righteous, in removing false hope,

And preaching of life as it is, rather than were?

In my heart lies an empty grave, engraved thus;

"Here lays the Lord, slain in battle",

For I knew the day would come,

When I could no longer bear the ceaseless cries of suffering.

If I were to Murder, the Maker of all pains and sorrows,

Of the Heavens and the Earth,

Of the fires of Hell, of famine and death, of life so ugly,

And despairing. Of pain itself, of being, being in a place of constant sorrows,

Measured by their temporary cessation, as a break in the clouds,

Which we cling to like a moment of sunshine, smiling, forgetting always

That sadness is the rule. Would it all be in vain,

I fear, would anyone notice?

I fancy they would continue in their ways,

Clinging to time honoured traditions,

Archaic methods contrary to reason,

Unjust in the zeitgeist which post-dates their relevance.

I fear it would pointless, and though I long for no credit in the deed,

It would be unheeded all the same; as they would remain unchanged,

For they require no God, no Truth, no Fire in the sky,

So long as they have rules, and false hopes.

Imagination and machinations that would continue regardless, in spite of facts,

Thus rendering the service meaningless, and prayers harder to bear.

Irrelevant is the truth, and less relevant miracles,

They ask nothing of anything,

And like sheep follow for their own selfish fears,

Reproducing them in children, such that idiocy should live on.

In spite of the Virgin, and her Son on the Cross,

In spite of their neighbours, in spite of humanity,

In spite of anything,

In spite, they live on.

By Haemophiliac

Finished 22/12/09

A Prayer for the Dark

Insoluble in life, dissolved in darkness

Without ghosts or apparitions,

Solitary, even in embrace,

Save for smiles, and the sharing of common pains.

In a wilderness, I echo amongst the trees

Life in abundance, occupying space alone.

Voids fill voids, formless gravity connects one to another

No strings to pull on, empty in ourselves.

We create creators to escape isolation,

But I know better than this

Afraid of the dark,

With no angels to comfort me.

To cease to be, once we have existed

In a child’s cries, lies proof of life.

No Gods to beseech, no Devils to forebode

Afraid of the dark,

In a starless room

I am alone.

A prayer for the night, on my flesh I compose,

When I am engulfed, let life live on.

My kidneys to the needy,

Let them be purified by me alone.

My liver to an alcoholic, for he has lived,

And found demons where I saw none.

Blood to all those longing,

Or drain in the gutters if my thoughts are polluted thus.

Let my marrow be used to fight cancers

Which plagued all efforts to love.

And if science should permit,

Gift my eyes too,

Perhaps there is more to see than suffering,

And it was I that knew not how.

My tongue then, to whomever

That I may comfort someone, with a kiss

Or simple words. Taste life anew,

This time maybe not so bitter.

Let me not forget

Life in totality,

So to the animals my flesh,

And my skin to adorn.

Lastly my heart, let it beat in another

That love should live on,

Regardless of object or form.

Only in this is being, the beauty of moments

Resonating in our breasts, a metronome for existence,

Use the measures for music,

Sing only of love.

My prayer for the dark, for a soulless soul

In life we live on, after we are gone.

With the matter of existing then, create impressions all round

That after the implosion, though the candle exhausted

The waves ripple on.

To face cessation, I have only fear

Of painlessness, when for pain I long.

So let my words carry in the organs, I bequeath to the earth,

The neurons die, all impulses gone

We return to nothing, but in life we live on.

By Haemophiliac.

Finished 17/12/09.