{"id":2764,"date":"2022-05-24T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-05-24T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/?p=2764"},"modified":"2022-05-23T13:41:30","modified_gmt":"2022-05-23T11:41:30","slug":"the-limb-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/2022\/05\/the-limb-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"The Limb of Life"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Image: <\/strong>\u00a9\ufe0f Frederica Petriglieri & Kiljan Paris<\/p><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Authors<\/strong>: Frederica Petriglieri & Kiljan Paris<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nothingness was eternal. Without pain or pleasure neither anger nor calm. It was the lack of everything, the erring of lost consciousness of those who weren\u2019t aware of their existence.
Floating in infinity among stardust and lights. Carrying the emptiness of the universe.
All souls were one and one soul was all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How am I supposed to remember our matterless past?
While I\u2019m floating tenderly in Charon\u2019s boat.
Why does my memory of the universe fade away?
For the first time of my ethereal wonderings
I\u2019m forgetting everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The darkness starts to weigh over me.
The Acheron! Am I drowning?
Wasn\u2019t I destined to cross it?
Sudden fears grow in my being.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As I\u2019m sinking deeper in unknown matter
Away for my lost embarkation
The fluid is tickling my lips
An instinctive sensation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The pressure grows and grows
My entire being is surrendered by warmth
The feeling of weight accentuates
Where am I?
I did not cross the stream where everything ends
So has it just started?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All of a sudden my hands grab a soft rope.
I let them go freely along it
But they\u2019re ending touching a moving wall
Is it possible? In all the darkness around, am I in a defined space?
For all I know now I\u2019m trapped and alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My consciousness is trembling
The surrounding moves again and again
The wall is forever dancing
I\u2019m trying everything to reassure myself,
When, out of my touch
Something comes directly through my head.
Wonderful hot air, smelly yet irresistible.
The Acheron smells nice!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

-No wait!
I\u2019m not in the river anymore
So where does this come from?
Isn\u2019t hell supposed to be filled by flame and toxic gas
And that all the unliving are suffocating for eternity?
So why does all I breathe taste unrealistically familiar?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All flavors flourish within me.
The more I feel, the more I forget.
Senses of deeper knowledge
Are drifting me away from all that I know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I start to hear my own symphony.
My heartbeat settle the rhythm
While the pond over me is shaking
I thought the underworld bears two rivers
But my ears hears billions
From the depth of darkness
The songs of their endless streams
It is drifting me back to a sense of unity
For all the rivers are joining in one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The tune is connecting me to everything
To all that is over me. I can feel it.
So why does my rhythm sound different
From all the rivers symphony?
-Am I not alone?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Far distant sounds make the wall trembling
Soft and insistent
Decided yet subtle
As pretty whining in the darkness
-Maybe it’s not that hard in the underworld
It must be the voices from those who successfully passed away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I’m still running in circles.
And my cell is getting smaller.
-Has my judgment arrived yet?
Am I a damned soul trapped in itself
Destined to question for eternity?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

-LET ME OUT!!
I push the wall and pull the rope with all strength.
The voices answer me back:
\u201cAHHHHHH\u201d
\u201cAMORE CALMATI\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve no clue of what that means but surprised as I am
All the muscles within me freeze.
\u201cHAHAH, GRAZIE\u201d
Who the hell is talking?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To satisfy my curiosity
And also because it was itching me
I open one eye to glimpse beyond the fence.
Soft lights spread in my small nest.
But enough to see the whole of me
My arms, hands, feet and toes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From darkness comes shadow.
On top of that I\u2019m hearing voices.
I\u2019m starting to be crazy for sure.
I need to act, to move and get out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m taking again the rope with both hands
My feet are pushing in every corner of my prison
I hear the same voice shouting but now I\u2019m not stopping
Voices become louder and louder.
But I continue to push.
I\u2019m banging my head through the wall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m sure it’s moving and I can pass through.
-That’s it! I found a fissure where the light breaks.
Even if I suddenly doubt about following the light at the end of the tunnel.
I know it\u2019s the only way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s as if the wall wanted me out.
Every now and then the tunnel squeezes me and pushes me forward.
\u201cLET\u2019S GO PUSH\u201d
Well I can\u2019t do better and my head is stuck.
\u201cHAHAHA\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I look up again and the light blinds me.
I\u2019m tired, my body aching everywhere and my muscles start to fail on me
\u201cGO GO COME ON\u201d
As I\u2019m fainting, the ground under me collapses.
My lungs are exploding as I\u2019m trying to breathe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it hurts, I\u2019m suffocating
Yet the boundaries around me are gone\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m floating amongst the giant hands of the underworld
So I did cross the Styx and Acheron after all!
For I\u2019m selfless, defenseless and vulnerable.
In the arms of two titans who sing lullabies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know nothing anymore.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Image: \u00a9\ufe0f Frederica Petriglieri & Kiljan Paris Authors: Frederica Petriglieri & Kiljan Paris Nothingness was eternal. Without pain or pleasure neither anger nor calm. It was the lack of everything, the erring of lost consciousness of those who weren\u2019t aware of their existence.Floating in infinity among stardust and lights. Carrying the emptiness of the universe.All souls […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1002027,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[36],"class_list":{"0":"post-2764","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-2022-spring","7":"tag-poetry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1002027"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2764\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.unil.ch\/musemagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}