-
Prologue: God Games — Idols and Ideals — The White Oz
- Red Hen Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
xiii PROLOGUE God Games — Idols and Ideals — The White Oz SAY TO YOURSELF, I AM GOD. That’s right. Imagine it. Now, do some tricks, try out Your powers. Hide in a far Nothing at the edge of light. Drift near Far Tortuga in a leaky turtle boat. Melt an icecap, craft a crop circle, have sex with a virus—etc. Now, go to the city of Washington and read a few minds. Pick up a copy of the Post. Hang out in a senatorial hideaway with an oil or weapons lobbyist. Try to reconcile the biases, irrationalities, and politics You encounter there into something that makes sense for the good of all. In other words, try to un-Babel this city . . . You cannot. It is impossible, even for You. Being all-powerful,You have “created” a place even You will never sort out. Short of flaming snakes from the sky (at least twice a week), two worlds will always prevail in Washington and trump all Godlike efforts: the World of Idols and the World of Ideals. If contrast is necessary to resolve doubt, or if you are unable to decide which World is more important to Washington, nix the God imitation. Buy a ticket,and come autumn,fly to the city.Stay there for days,weeks, whatever it takes. Stroll around and compare the Worlds. Glide like the ghost ofThomas Paine or Clara Barton beneath the power-aired vaults of the Supreme Court. Cup your hands in the starry black Reflecting Pool. Stroke the faces of marble head in the Capitol and touch the shimmering surface of the White House. See your own soul in the architecture of hope.Then at dawn, call room service. Order Eggs Norwegian, kiwi fruit on the side, black coffee, and a Bloody Mary with lime. Eat and xiv drink slowly as you gaze from your balcony across the Potomac over the acres of dome, obelisk, and temple winnowed out dark by the morning sun. At such time you will feel dazed, and it will appear to you that this Grand Republic Babylon of Idols (and partisans), this White Oz of Ideals (and fools), is none other than the fabled Atlantis itself, a rumored utopia restored from the ocean strata and made to assume its rightful station as an omphalos of the cosmos awaiting extinction once more. If you try to inhale it, or realize its synergy, you will find it impossible . The human mind cannot grasp Infinity, and neither can it contain Washington. Only by creating a God, or a president, do things begin to anchor. Each generation demands an idol, and sometimes more than one, worship always preferable to despair. ...