Last Rose of Summer

I don't know how to start this and the title is just the song that's playing now on YouTube as I write this. I'm reading Maus by Art Spiegelman and marveling at what people are capable of. I'm just at the bit where Auschwitz is about to be introduced, Truth be told,  I am scared of proceeding further. I mean, sometimes the visuals are so striking that it just makes me want to puke. 

There's a war going on in the world now, as I'm writing this and I wonder who invented war and why. It is inhuman. I come from a country that kicked the British out and that in itself was a war of sorts. We've seen 'Nam. We've seen the second one, the war to end all wars and yet it marches on, like an insatiable machine guzzling oil and belching out misery and murder. That's all war is actually, glorified murder.

And I'm reminded, as the last notes of the song fade away that a certain man called Nietzsche stated that 

"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music"

I am also reminded of the fact that the world spends trillions on defenses and if that money were redirected somehow, perhaps we wouldn't need to defend ourselves.

I made a YouTube video about this which you can check out here  on my ScrollStack and see for yourself what my feelings about war are. I'll shout this from the rooftops if I have to, but if war is the answer, ou're asking the wrong question.

 

And so, although Maus is uncomfortable, tear jerking and horrifying...I will finish it. I will finish it because I want to know that the human race is capable of doing this to itself. I will also finish it and remind myself that I am a member of that race and I will remember the novel, and hope that one day I do not turn in to such a monstrosity.

And isn't it fitting that Half the World Away by Oasis is playing, which has this line, whose poster version is uploaded below? By the way, the poster is one I designed myself...(shameless self promotion, on a corner of the Internet that is mine and also yours and will remain so)

The Bilge Master