No, I'm the Greatest Doomed Romantic
I have recently come to the modest yet entirely reasonable conclusion that I am The Greatest Doomed Romantic I know. This is a simple fact. A plain truth. I have no competition in this arena that even comes close. Begone, pretenders.
You see, I have gazed into the future, and at no point does undying love or happiness seem to leap or even drift into my path. Fine. I can live with that. I have come to accept that I have no choice in this matter.
However, I do have a word of advice to pass on to my fellowed Doomed Romantics out there, even though they are neither as Doomed nor as Romantic as I. Listen carefully, for I shall share this profound secret only once.
It is time, high time, that you all stopped talking about having a heart full of love for someone, about two hearts becoming one, about having a broken heart, a wounded heart, an empty heart or, indeed, anything to do with your heart. Your heart has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with love. It is no more than a vessel, a piece of meat - and not even a particularly attractive piece of meat once a hand has pushed itself inside your or your sweetheart's chest to rip it out and hold it up as a prize in the battle of life. Art, literature and poetry have pursued the idea of the heart being related to love for far too long, to the point where it is now worthless and outdated. It's time to see sense, to pause and rewrite the language of love.
A broken heart can be mended, after all. You simply call in a skilled surgeon and have a transplant or open heart surgery. Even a stopped heart can be restarted, thanks to the assistance of a couple of large paddles surging with electricity and a medic bravely shouting "Clear!". So as Doomed Romantics, who know all too well that nothing can be fixed or repaired when it comes to love, why do we keep associating this throbbing, pulsating, putrid mess of flesh with the greatest of all emotions and experiences?
No more. Every true Doomed Romantic should now throw out all references to the heart and replace them with words that poetically refer to broken minds and, at best, distorted souls. At worst, our souls are even more rotten and diseased and crying out for release; make sure you work that into your verse if it's more your style.
Yet neither the mind nor the soul be fixed, unlike the heart, because they do not exist as solid matter. They are not tangible. The heart can be squeezed through your fingers and left in a bloody heap on the antiseptic floor tiles of the post-mortem lab or the operating theatre; the mind and the soul cannot. Like love, they exist only as a concept - a powerfully moving, emotionally complex and at times deadly concept, but a concept nonetheless.
Throw your hearts in the incinerator. It's for the best, believe me. Being The Greatest Doomed Romantic, I know about these things. Indeed, I have (almost) lived to tell the tale.
You see, I have gazed into the future, and at no point does undying love or happiness seem to leap or even drift into my path. Fine. I can live with that. I have come to accept that I have no choice in this matter.
However, I do have a word of advice to pass on to my fellowed Doomed Romantics out there, even though they are neither as Doomed nor as Romantic as I. Listen carefully, for I shall share this profound secret only once.
It is time, high time, that you all stopped talking about having a heart full of love for someone, about two hearts becoming one, about having a broken heart, a wounded heart, an empty heart or, indeed, anything to do with your heart. Your heart has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with love. It is no more than a vessel, a piece of meat - and not even a particularly attractive piece of meat once a hand has pushed itself inside your or your sweetheart's chest to rip it out and hold it up as a prize in the battle of life. Art, literature and poetry have pursued the idea of the heart being related to love for far too long, to the point where it is now worthless and outdated. It's time to see sense, to pause and rewrite the language of love.
A broken heart can be mended, after all. You simply call in a skilled surgeon and have a transplant or open heart surgery. Even a stopped heart can be restarted, thanks to the assistance of a couple of large paddles surging with electricity and a medic bravely shouting "Clear!". So as Doomed Romantics, who know all too well that nothing can be fixed or repaired when it comes to love, why do we keep associating this throbbing, pulsating, putrid mess of flesh with the greatest of all emotions and experiences?
No more. Every true Doomed Romantic should now throw out all references to the heart and replace them with words that poetically refer to broken minds and, at best, distorted souls. At worst, our souls are even more rotten and diseased and crying out for release; make sure you work that into your verse if it's more your style.
Yet neither the mind nor the soul be fixed, unlike the heart, because they do not exist as solid matter. They are not tangible. The heart can be squeezed through your fingers and left in a bloody heap on the antiseptic floor tiles of the post-mortem lab or the operating theatre; the mind and the soul cannot. Like love, they exist only as a concept - a powerfully moving, emotionally complex and at times deadly concept, but a concept nonetheless.
Throw your hearts in the incinerator. It's for the best, believe me. Being The Greatest Doomed Romantic, I know about these things. Indeed, I have (almost) lived to tell the tale.
posted by Orpheus | 9:20 pm
Okay, I now believe you are the Greatest Doomed Romantic I know, too.
I'll have to get you a medal or a trophy or something. How about Cupid's corpse, smothered in every Valentine's Card ever sent? :P