A Friend of Jacob’s Wesley however loved young Jacob, he taught him as
The Machinist was an inventor in Turkey. His much as the young boy could retain and gave him the
name was Wesley Farthing. He was from England and best education he could afford. Jacob was deeply
moved to Turkey in the later part of the late 19th affected by his mother’s scorn and rejection, despite
century. He was a kind, inventive man with a good the love he received from his father. Jacob excelled in
disposition towards everyone and everything. When he languages, and joined up as a translator with the British
was on his way to Turkey on the Ottoman Express he Lightfoot when he was eighteen years old. A year later
met a woman, also from England her name was Myla, war broke out. So many men and officers were dying
she was a biologist. Myla was strong, independent, and that by the second year of the war Jacob went from
a free thinker. Myla was thought of as strange by most being sergeant to lieutenant.
and would hardly be considered sweet by anyone other In his years prior to the war Jacob was constantly
than Wesley. In 1890 they returned to England unwanted and ostracized not only by his mother but
because the Ottoman Empire became much too also by his peers. He was always receiving thrashings as
dangerous a place to be, with the tensions that were a young child from his mother and other schoolboys.
arising throughout Europe. Then five years after their He had no friends besides his books and father, his
return Myla was burdened with child, they would come self-esteem; never came to exist. Jacob was sitting with
to name him Jacob, Jacob Farthing. Myla resented the his back up against the wooden beams supporting the
young burden as an end to her endeavors in science. trench in which he was residing that night. At the time,
he was marveling at paradox of his past relations with Back with his body, daylight broke. Revealing
people and the rejection he received, and now people that good fortune had shown its light on Jacob for the
had to listen to him and do what he said. Then the German’s lines had broke, like a fickle argument being
whistle blew and the false bravery that was instilled in splintered into thousands of pieces by a master of
him took hold. He raised his arm gesturing forward as rhetoric. The greatness of this fortune was that Jacob’s
a sudden blastoff noise roared, men yelling as they body was recovered and sent to his parents. When his
sprinted toward their end. The flashes from what was body arrived at home his grief stricken father vowed to
once a far distance were now up close and in the face himself that he would take Mary Shelly’s dream and
of Jacob and his men. Abruptly in his stride he noticed realize it to make his beloved son walk the Earth once
something was askew with his senses. All sound faded more. Myla agreed to help her love; she saw it as Jacob
light came pouring into his sight until he could not see correcting himself from the burden he once was to her.
his hands in front of his face. Strange he thought. How For now she could practice science again and not only
can I be here now, I was just at a place surrounded in that she could prove herself amongst all other scientists
the aurora of death, a place of night and darkness. as a worthy peer.
Redness dawned across his vision like a bloodied sun Through the use of mechanics, Jacob was able to
rising behind great white clouds. Then a thud and live once more except now he was more of a machine
darkness soon ensued once again. than man, or at least this is how he felt. No electricity
was used to re-instill his life, but he had parts in is heart
that were clock like. A bullet pierced Jacob’s heart on successfully given death life. The bird and Jacob
the night of his death. His parents decided to keep his became close at once, as if they both suffered the same
new life a secret from the rest of the world, because past; they now were feeling the same harsh and cruel
everyone knew he was dead and if they saw him… well feeling. They felt that they should be dead, but together
his parents couldn’t imagine what would happen but they found a will to continue. Until one day when
they assumed it would not be good. After several Jacob awoke to find that his friend’s legs had failed and
suicide attempts Jacob’s parents thought all he needed he had fallen from his perch and once again died.
was a friend. Then one day when Wesley was on his Jacob then thought about how his friend was now free
way home from the city he saw a crow dead just outside from his mechanical entrapment of a body and now
their house. He brought it in and told Myla his plan to was at rest. Jacob then opened a trunk and pulled out
do to the bird what they had done to their son. Myla his dog tags and service pistol. Then he placed the dog
agreed to do it she now had nothing but love for her tags to his forehead and pressed the barrel of his pistol
son and Jacob forgave her, because what else could he to the metallic circles… once again light poured into his
do his mother’s affection was something he always sight this time it never turned red. Instead when the
wanted. The crow’s legs were completely destroyed brightness had fled he was sitting by the banks of a
and were replaced with the legs from a doll that is used stream with his friend perched on his shoulder; his
by artist to draw humanoid figures. Myla and Wesley, friend’s legs were real and would never again fail him.
the machinist and the biologist had once again
Moribund murdered, murdered by the scum of the slums. I
In the slums of Liverpool on the first floor of a received no inheritance from them due to some
corner building is where I dwell. It is a dark building. I dictated fluctuating bureaucratic legal matters; they had
have no friends, not one. When I walk the streets there never filled out any sort of will, so to the government
is no one to meet me or even gesture a hello. My face and Lords their money went. You’d think wouldn’t you
hides beneath a top hat and behind muttonchops, in- that people of their status would have done something
between that a smile shines farce at strangers that wish like that when they came into money. Their funeral
not to know me. But they do, They know me as Mad was in the country, where my mother had came from.
Young Mr. Hays in the local area. Not just Mr. Hays! It was my first time leaving Liverpool I was only
But alas the name it is deserving for I am mad in both seventeen when they died. After coming back to next
manners of the word’s meaning. You see it is the to nothing I moved to the slums. This was where I
people around me, the wondering mindless started to dement.
unintelligible disgusting beings that God saw fit to give Last night was the same as many before it, I
life, that have drove me mad and have caused my couldn’t sleep terrible visions, thoughts; horrid ghastly
anger. I do not wish to be here amongst them. things would creep into my head as they have been
I once was a son to a mother and a father, but doing at night for over a year now. Then when I calm
no longer am I any person’s son. Just over a year ago down and let the weight of the world take down my
they died. No, no, no-- they just didn’t die they were eyelids; it happens….
The first time I thought it was a terrible dream A knock came then suddenly at the door, a
from opium or gin. No, it was in hindsight most voice rang out “Mr. Hays, we’ve come for you under
certainly reality as bizarre as it seemed. As I looked at the suspicions that you have committed several acts of
my arms the flesh pealed away revealing bone. Bones murder and savage cannibalistic acts!” I looked over
soaked in blood; then my eyes shrivel and burn. As I my shoulder and saw the bloodied cleaver resting on
begin to scream it fades into a ghoulish hiss. Then I the counter near it were blood soaked rags. The door
instinctively get up and adorn my clothing, hat, and a came down and the constable and another officer burst
cleaver at my side. Then underneath my top hat and in grabbing me up out of my chair. As they took me
behind muttonchops, cracks a boney smile. I walk out out of my home, they put my wrists into iron binds. As
of my home to the corner and first slash a harlot or two they dragged me I thought, thoughts ones most terrible
that loiter outside of the taverns and alehouses. I pick and grim. Then my boney wrists slipped though the
flesh from bone and I had never thought to do so but it binds that once bound flesh; to the constable and the
was just a craving an unstoppable urge to dine on officer I killed. I ripped out the windpipe and jugular
human flesh. After a few had been consumed I felt my of the constable and crooked the neck of the officer as
skin and blood return to my form. I ran for shadow a shot riled off near by.
I write this journal to reread and see if I believe I I dropped to my knees as steaming red blood
have a sane mind, whether or not I believe that these poured out from the hole ripped open by the lead of
events are actually occurring. the law. Falling to my shoulder and lying on the damp
cobblestone I didn’t know what to believe for now I hum the second movement of George Frederic
was encased in flesh and moribund, bleeding a rivers Handel’s Concerto Grosso in B flat major to myself.
worth of blood. But with last breath I uttered, “I This gray makes me forget of all other colors and
believe I am…” become focused more than I have ever been in my
entire existence. It is November, a month that I’ve
always associated with the hue. The bark on the trees
has gone pale this month and the sky lost its vigor.
There is an eerie way about the air and I feel very
optimistic for my future. From this moment seasons
will pass and that feeling I had will flee, never to return.
I have moved to where the gray only has the
industrialist quality of imprisonment. I can’t help but
notice how there is no definition to the color now. I
enjoyed the emptiness it brought to nature. What a
Life and Lethargy splendor, to see all of the life and brilliance of summer
As I sit with my hands wrapped around my knee and early autumn succumb to the bleak emptiness of
caps at the edge of the tree line I watch wisps of gray impending winter. The life always came back. Here the
mist dance slowly in a ghostlike waltz across the fields I lifelessness is perpetual; beyond that there is nothing to
find in the grayness of the city, which one can argue is mine. She is whom I used to be... full of hope and a
the same as the gray nothingness of the woods, but I positive light that exploded in such brilliance that all
say that they are worlds apart. In the city I just sense could see. We both long to know why the world stands
barren emotionless dribble of the gray brain cells, on its clouded gray head for some and would crush
which reside in the minds of people here. The others under its boots. She sees this and shames at it;
meaning of gray, the color that I choose to represent then seeks answers to help the crushed and broken.
myself takes on a frivolous and tortured meaning here, Me, I’ll scoff and just want to know how to preserve
which chokes my every expression. It shows my myself so I will never end up a mashed soul under the
indifference with the world and yet my never-ending heel of the world. It is the gray unkindly city that has
curiosity for how it works and what it will become. I made me this way, I’ll return to the countryside with
care not of its people but the surroundings of the my love someday and then the gray will find its
people, how the environment of a person reflects upon meaning with me once again. It will offer hope to me,
them. No person could distract me from this notion and then I’ll see all colors and praise my happiness and
save one. give thanks for it instead of cursing and thinking I’m
She is the partner with whom I’ll grow gray with undeserving of it. Then my love and I will ecstatically
in my elder years. She will be the one who is most see eye to eye. However, I am not there yet. I still exist
intrigued by my cynicism, for she herself could not only in the in-between for now. I am pushed, never
attain such a thought pattern as gray and uncaring as seeing forward or back, light or dark just gray. I see the
difference between my home and here. There I had Quivering lips part for this the girl’s only art
dared to care here exists an apathy, one that I could Tears streak down pale and soft cold bitten cheeks
never foresee being so overpowering. I wish to care As she lay frozen in place she stared up at a face
again, if only I could find a way to see what lies ahead For in the blinding white that was all encompassing
and give me something to work for, and then I could She saw a dark cloaked man; he took her by the hand
have purpose. Instead I feel as if I were a lump of With arms he clasped her to his chest and whispered
forgotten dried-up clay. Gray, cracked and hardened, I You are home now; she rose to the highest bough
sit waiting for someone to come along to provide me With swollen soul she looked on Earth in its whole
with moisture and give me beautiful shape, then paint Her father leers, she smiles cracking frozen tears
me a splendid color and fire my soul warmth in the A long time it has been; I’m glad you are here again
kiln.
Pallor Mortis
The crisp fresh powdery snow lay neath the flesh Trafalgar
Woman’s figure outlined bare beneath somber pine He took his men through rough and cold
Golden hair flow’d free in the shivering breezy air The ice took to their very bones
A breath was taken, a last beating of her cold breast Silence was heard and yet still
A lancet made of ice pulled across both arms twice The quiet tested the strongest will
Whitest earth now flooded in a deep, deep red
Of men thought to never break Blood falls from my open chest
But winters wrath soon wakes Again I fall laying breath to rest
Selecting lives that it shall take
Sullen hearts readied soon to ache To the clouded sky I shake and cry
Why is it I lord, that here doth lie
As news reaches loved ones ears This single question I must pry
Eyes grow red immersed with tears Why should I be the one to die?
Men carry on their world on their back
At the command, all able would attack
Begetting Bygones
Hark the muzzle blast as it sounds
There has been so many loves
My lifeless body lies to cold ground That were lost or never were
A new light fades as drums pound Yet I hold the love close and dear
All the loves that happened too fast
Atop a heaven my soul is found Longing not to last
There has been to many people
The lord returns breath to corpse That were lost or never were
I pick up myself push on in force Yet we hold the people close and dear
All the people that happened too fast Providing the fodder giving life to hateful eyes
Hating not to last
To keep looking through, at me and at you
There has been to many days A heart in his body pumps blood that runs blue
That hold and did occur
He seems tame but his flame burns at all times
Still I hold those days so far, far away
All the days that happened
Memories of our past
He sinks in the corners of his entrapping home
Those days will last forever Quietly staring, for silence is all he has ever known
But I wished they never happened
He has slain all creatures even a Seraphim
There sound has made me fractions
Of what I could have been Taking an eye and one and a half wings from him
Murderous His song as murderous as the siren’s
Through a bent glass at the other end of the room
He does not feel for the ones he has killed
Lay a murderer, a creature born not of human womb
Nor does he remember them
He kills not with bullet or knife,
But strikes with bites to end a victim’s life
This of course time will not mend
I know it is I, who keeps him alive