[Bleedingwhiteash] New post at Nott Road Blues

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Posted by Michael Jas. Murray:
Awake

   "Exorcizo te" the priestess shouts/And drives the angel's devils out./
   But her cry is lost in the Engine's din/And the demon enters in again
   One of the things I struggle with on a periodic basis is the
   phenomenon known as sleep-paralysis. Itâs an interesting experience.
   One awakes to feel the limbs suffused with a tingling energy, a flow
   of force that immobilizes the body. I have often tried to scream out
   in this state, only to find my jaw securely shut by whatever it is
   that is pinning me to the bed.
   Of all of the unpleasant aspects of the experience, the tendency to
   have visions in this state is the worst. Perhaps the most frightening
   of these occurred at Clover Patch Camp, an overnight vacation spot for
   the mentally and physically disabled. I used to work at the camp
   during my summers off from college. During my final year, I awoke one
   night completely paralyzed, feeling the sensation of a hand gripping
   my wrist. Although I couldnât see anyone in the darkness, I heard a
   voice whisper in my ear. âI know youâre awake, Michael.â I wrested
   myself free and descended back into sleep.
   Iâll always thing of the experience as one of my first brushes with
   the types of psychic states I refer to as devils. I donât believe such
   experiences are literally demons, although there is nothing to rule
   out the possibility a priori. The world is an intricate place, and who
   is to say that there arenât types of intelligence which operate
   differently from our own? However, such metaphysical issues have never
   struck me as being as fascinating as the devils that our own bodies
   conjure up when our flesh becomes sick and our mind diseased. These
   devils are a part of us and, yet, are somehow alien at the same time.
   It was at the camp that I first encountered the types of demons that
   possess and motivate sick individuals to acts such as lust murder.
   However, it was not in myself but in a consumer that I confronted
   these states. One of our campers was a paranoid schizophrenic who
   heard voices urging him to kill and lash out against women he found
   attractive. He had such an episode when I was in attendance, falling
   into one of his trances and lunging at one of the female counselors. I
   restrained and took him down, shouting at him as I held him, trying to
   wrest control of his mind away from the voices that obsessed him. I
   eventually calmed him and, together, we banished his devils, if only
   for a short time. It was the first time that I saw the manifestation
   of urges and impulses that would, eventually, make a home in my own
   psyche. I often give that episode much thought.
   In my more whimsical moments, I consider myself a type of Father
   Surin. Surin was the head-exorcist of the Loudon exorcisms in which a
   convent of nuns had purportedly become possessed by an entire army of
   demons. Surin concentrated his attentions on Sister Jeanne, the head
   of the convent who was possessed by such demons as the blasphemous
   Behemoth and the wrathful Leviathan. Desperate to free the afflicted
   woman from her demons, Surin begged God to send her devils into
   himself instead. Surin spent the rest of his life struggling with
   these devils, tortured by their power to inspire wrath, hatred and
   lust in the once gentle, mystical priest.
   The thing about Surin I find so compelling was that his devils were
   never actually driven out. After a lifetime of struggling with them,
   he eventually came to terms with his demons and found his soul
   purified and uplifted by his long, agonizing ordeal. The heat of his
   devils had burned his spirit clean.
   A part of me fervently hopes that my situation will eventually mirror
   Surinâs in that respect. I can only hope that whatever it is I am
   feeling now with have a purifying effect, that eventually the devils
   of concupiscence and wrath will exhaust themselves. I have misgivings,
   however. There has been nothing beautiful, or uplifting or
   inspirational about any of it. Itâs just filth and dirt, and I
   sometimes feel I am nothing more than the gutter into which Natureâs
   sickness flows.
   Perhaps there are rare cases in which our devils can lead to our
   salvation. However, all too often this doesnât seem to be the case.
   The devils merely lead us down into those places where angels and
   devils become indistinct. The hope that one who descends far enough
   will reach the other side and emerge into light seems to be a
   groundless one. The Abyss is by its nature bottomless. The light of
   God and Nature doesnât reach so far below. There is no purgatory for
   those who fall so far below. Thereâs only damnation.
   And when we finally wake up from a life of fitful nightmares, we find
   ourselves awake in Hell.