Dearest Franny

Study for Blue Note #2, 2016 by Robert Owen

Dearest Franny,

You are so full of light. So very full of light, come what may, you hold on to that tiny spark of hope inside you that burns all darkness penetrating. Look at you, shining proud, attracting swarms of bugs like moths and flies afraid of the night. How I sometimes envy you and wish I didn't exhaust all light left inside of me. Now I am but total darkness. But don't feel so bad for me. I've grown fond of the dark. I thrive in it like the cats and bats photosensitive of the artificiality of day. Psh, the day! Wouldn't you agree it's so overrated, Fran? All the gloriousness of day and the limited spectrum of colors one can perceive from its light. Have you ever tried staring at the darkness, the abyss, for a change, Fran? It's quite a treat. The darkness, the void doesn't require a mirror (for what good is a mirror without light?) to reflect all dirt, zits, warts, and farts of humans. It simply grabs you by the jugular, shakes you up, and drags you to corners you refuse to look at like the overflowing gutters teeming with scurrying rats, the dimly lit corners where maggots thrive, or the precipitous cliffs where despairing worms jump off to die. I take it, these lowlifes can't see daylight like you do, like the many intoxicated boujee does. I mean, how can they? They couldn't afford it, Fran. They couldn't afford a hit of dopamine from good food, good coffee, good sleep, good mattress, good prayer, good laugh. They could barely afford a day in the sun. A day in the sun is rare to them—like milk to their flat-tasting 3-in-1 or butter to their stale bread. There's nothing for them to clamor for save for the crumbs of the rich—their meager manna from heaven. That's the way it is. If you give them excess of your crumbs, they'll mistake you for a god. And you'll blush if they do and for once you'll think of yourself a fine human when in fact you're not. You're probably just as crummy as they are when stripped off of all your gold. You see this now, right Franny? The fakeness, the superficiality of the value of gold and how it loses its luster when exposed to gross oils oozing out of the human flesh? Yet we choose to believe in all of gold's glory because if we don't then we lose our luster too and we fade among the ashes, the trashes, the asses. Humans. How trivial we all are. We assert our importance by fabricating truths and placing trust only in half-baked ideas we concoct. But for what purpose? To stave off our inevitable demise? You see, Franny, this is precisely why I choose to believe in the strength of darkness. It wipes away light's smug little smile.

Wow, I better stop myself from going further. I am not sure what has gotten into me. Perhaps by tomorrow, I will have moved past this mindset. I sincerely hope I haven't dampened your spirits.

Yours,

S