As your sight returns, you find yourself in a grand hall, bordered by strange passageways on all sides. A vast, twisting network of rooms lies beyond, their ornate walls quarried from thick, white marble. In the new morning light, it looks more like a system of caves than a palace. A great, unforgiving monolith dominates the center of the room. Something is carved into its smooth flesh, but you can't read it from so far away. Against your better judgement, you approach the obelisk. Something watches you, distant and far too close all at once. The inscription, although worn, is all-emcompassing, carved in such a way that you could trace the letters with your eyes closed.
...Welcome, worldender. It seems that you've come a very long way to read these words, and perhaps the words that fill the rest of this complex. Many stories make their homes in the chambers of this timeless, stony heart. It still stands, even long after its original owner's death, although it no longer beats without encouragement. Long ago, 'I' was that original owner—if it could ever be said that 'I' could 'own' a heart, trapped as I was within myself. Now, through this clear, transcendent place, although I may not ever be free, I am somehow different than I once was. For better and for worse, for now, that is enough. My life speaks for itself, but not of itself; it has no tongue, for it gave all things away to the pages stashed throughout these halls. This, in a sense, is a monument to what that unspoken life was. Now that you are here, these words no longer belong to me, and 'what that was' is now up to you. From my place of rest, this is everything I have left to give you. Due to circumstances beyond my control, in my life, I was incapable of drawing a socially acceptable lines between violence/horror and sexuality. I was enamored with such a combination and its power, entranced by the emotional release that often came through exploring it. Because of this long-standing obsession, most of what I wrote treaded this thin, undrawable line. Here, you will most likely find not just sex and violence, but their third limb, the marriage between them both. I cannot promise you that these themes are never eroticized, nor can I say that my works will condemn them outright—perhaps rather the opposite. That being said, in my life, I never condoned, endorsed, respected, or willingly participated in the real-world counterparts of such dark or evil acts. I find it really unfortunate, although I suppose understandable, that I have to say that. My work is intended for mature audiences. You must be of the age of majority in order to browse this particular section of the library. However, when I say "mature," I do mean mature. If you are incapable of proper self-curation, these pages are not for you. Writing was something that I had a very complex relationship with. By this, I don't mean to imply that my writing process was superior to yours, or to anyone else's; it was, in fact, much less efficient (and generally much worse) than that of most authors I met. I could not be rushed and I did not, broadly speaking, write things that I was not deeply passionate about. Posthumously, I don't expect anyone to take any of my work "seriously"—it's all derivative folly, in the end—but throughout my life I did, in fact, want to be understood. I suppose one might call that my fatal flaw. All that remains of this thing—once called a 'human heart'—is this paper eulogy, a thing that does not truly exist. However, the stories and feelings here were and are real, perhaps more so than the strange place that you call "reality." In this maison de vérité, for those who have the eyes to see, the world can be something more than it appears. Someone such as myself, who can no longer be part of 'your' realm, can still live. Through—and because of—these tangled pages, I am still here. Although I am gone, should you return here, you will surely find more to read as time goes on. Thank you for taking the time to read my work. It is, after all, my last remaining light. |