Night Cemetery

Painting by Christopher Marc Ford

He has always been drawn to cemeteries, from a young age, when he didn’t know fear yet, or the intricacy of life and death. Later in life, he learned the complicated truth about emptiness of the living dead and the totality of a life’s end.

He doesn’t believe in life after death, nor the grand closure death may bring to the human souls. He gets comfortable with death, like birth, breathing, hunger, thirst, sleep, arousal. These sensations are striped down to the natural form of things, without the need for questioning or overthinking.

Tonight, he was motivated to take a walk in the cemetery to get some fresh air, to get unstuck in his creativity, to deconstruct the somewhat overwhelming feelings and all the while numb sensation.

Maybe it’s the blue moonlight reflecting the quietness of the dead, maybe it’s darkness presenting herself as a lover, he broke free from his jeans and linen shirt, exposing his chest to breath freely. He lay on his bare back, let the moisten soft grass caress his over sensitive skin, he felt the softness and teasing. The flexing of muscles drove the lawn bugs to hiding.

He experienced a surge of energy from the earthing, sparks of electricity coursing through his body, building up in his torso. Without any conscious awareness, he started to stroke himself with firm pressure while staring into the void of the inky sky. His palm pulsating in sync with the blood-filled veins, without knowing how close he got, the flash of shooting stars brought about his eruption.

Slowly he began to notice his own breathing; the steady rhythm of his heartbeats returned; the feeling of an uncomplicated emptiness stayed with him in the deep of the night, in the cemetery filled with the serenity of the dead.