Michael of Princeton, NJ

Trying to compact one's life into a long story is easy but growing up a poet, it will have to be a short story as I am taught to never waste a word on pointless details.  Maybe I should have considering where I am now but it's too late for conversation so I'll start with the best of times and the worst of times and we'll go from there.

My parents divorced when I was young and perhaps this separation sparked my own separation from reality, maybe not.  Since I was little, I've felt out of place. I spent my life chasing women and thinking on a larger scale that seemed to see a life as pointless to the eternity of mankind.

Often times, throughout my life, I have felt different. I've been able to see into people's souls and read their actions accordingly. Some call it future sight or clairvoyance but I simply call it placing the demeanor of a man up against the norm for him and reading critically.

There's nothing there but sometimes when I get to thinking really hard, I can feel phantom wings on my back that plague my physiology with thoughts of flying in my dreams.  When this happens, I feel an emptiness inside of me that becomes prevalent when I truly think about forever.

In eternity, nothing matters besides love but when one lives for this kind of purity, they often find themselves meandering the extremes which is why I find myself where I am now.

Growing up, I bounced through relationships. I chased women around the world. From all around the country to the shores of Japan and Africa. The hunt for immortal romance was always on my mind and I'd always find one thing that fit, only to find out later that there was a million things that didn't. Even now, at 30 years of age, I find myself facing death because life never mattered at all.

You see for all my romance, there was an equal amount of sex, and one of those times, I happened to bring a child into this world. The girl loves me and I loved her but it felt out of place and I knew it. I did right, however, and married her and now my child is two years old and I work a shit job for shit pay to support both my wife and the baby.

for the longest time, what kept me from doing evil was the hope for the future but as hope diminished at this dead end job, my reservations grew less and less and here I find myself with an empty can of gasoline in my hands and retribution in my heart.

She sits inside her empty room on her computer filled with more work for her underpaid workers.  Her mean spirit has crushed their souls more than once and although she is only a middle man, a scandal can ruin the integrity of any company.  With her door shut and her curtains on her only window to the inside of the building down and closed, she hardly noticed as I began to douse her door in gasoline.  Lighting the match, I trust in my lord and savoir that I might shed light on this operation and change the nature of the people who live in ignorance of the injustice.

Throwing the match on the floor, I watch as the office goes up in flames.  Her curtains peal back lapped up by the flames tongue like aging wallpaper over time and I see her face through the tiny window next to the door as she can go nowhere due to my dousing the door in gasoline and burning it as a barrier.

In solemn resolve, I see her clawing at the window and screaming in agony. All I can offer her are the words, "vivres in infernum perpetuam, nefandus"

I prayed to god in this moment and offered as retribution, my life and my soul for taking hers.  I accepted that my lord and savoir was the only way to heaven as the flames grew higher and the light around me flashed and sparkled.  I watched her burn to death in front of me and stood amidst the flames.

The light dimmed and I found myself in the swirling Vortex between the worlds.  My wings stretched the gap and I was no longer Michael of Princeton New Jersey.