INCENSED, LOST

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Courtesy Get Covers dot com 

Cool as it was, nasty as it was, here in the out falls, amidst intoxicated, lyrical dreams, far from heaven, far from hell, within the reaches of consciousnes, but barely thus. There's no justice in the land, his aging mother parrotted, but it was more than this. An ancient past, a paralysing future, all in the slipstream, the comfortable and the craven, the hallmarks of industry and shoddy product, and then a voice, reaching up out of the swirling clouds beneath his feet, lost, lost, join the lost. He could see their battered faces as they spoke. He could feel the instant memory, what should have been fun, and he could feel the aging terrors. And they were gone.

Love died in an instant, when he saw the nasty, manipulative, vicious little bastards for what they were. But it didn't stop his head going around in circles; appalled at his own gullibility and stupidity, obsessed with a sense of loss, saddened by the craven manner, the flailing whirlwind, the dangerous forces of thieves and pedophiles stalking him through myriads of corridors, so that he could not move. There on the dark side. In the dangerous shores of defeat. In places he had never dreamed existed. In ways he could never have imagined.

And then it was over and gone. And he paddled into quieter shores. Sun picked out new landscapes. Horrors eventuated. Nastiness enveloped. He came to believe. His destiny, a tragic destiny, flurried into other places. Behind the screens. Beyond the fabric of reality, the material world. Into places they could barely imagine, spaces between atoms, beings who could not be defined. Here he dwelt, in liquid, lyrical dreams, and reached up to grab someone's throat, found echoes of people he had pretended to be, forced his way through a flailing of ghosts, back to a sunlit beach.

It wasn't an easy path.

There was no way now that he could see what he had done. He knew that some of the participants were dead already, or soon would be. He knew that the crowing chorus was something the population would soon forget, engrossed in the questions of their own survival. He knew that their treachery did not haunt them the way it haunted him; that in an instant it was gone, these cloaks of convenience, the friendly smiles, the stroking fingers, the smiles, almost radiant in their force, the deep darkness of a soul that had gone to the other side, and all of it, all of it, falling away. 

There was no way back; there was only a way through, to another place.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2013/08/24/gas-attack-syria.html

Syrian state media accused rebels of using chemical arms against government troops in clashes Saturday near Damascus, while an international aid group said it has tallied 355 deaths from a purported chemical weapons attack earlier this week.

Doctors Without Borders said three hospitals it supports in the eastern Damascus region reported receiving roughly 3,600 patients with "neurotoxic symptoms" over less than three hours on Wednesday morning, when the attack in the eastern Ghouta area took place.

Of those, 355 died, said the Paris-based group.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Saturday that its estimated death toll from the alleged chemical attack had reached 322, including 54 children, 82 women and dozens of fighters. It said the dead included 16 who have not been identified.

The group said it raised its death toll from an earlier figure of 136, which had been calculated before its activists in the stricken areas met doctors, residents and saw medical reports. It said the dead "fell in the massacre committed by the Syrian regime."

'All the information we have is converging to indicate there was a chemical massacre in Syria, near Damascus, and that Bashar Assad's regime was behind it.'—Laurent Fabius, French foreign minister

Death tolls have varied wildly over the alleged attack, with Syrian anti-government activists reporting between 322 and 1,300 killed.

George Sabra, leader of the Syrian National Council, told CBC News that "logically," the only faction capable of launching such an attack would be government forces.

"Everybody knows that was not the first time which the regime used the chemical weapons," he said from Montreal, adding that the U.S., British and French governments have collected evidence to support his claims.

Sabra urged the UN to send an investigation committee to "discover the truth" in Damascus with regard to neurotoxic casualties suffered by opposition fighters.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2013/kevin-rudd-questions-tony-abbotts-temperament-on-global-affairs-20130827-2sod9.html#ixzz2dCulG6Rk

Kevin Rudd has launched an extraordinary attack on Tony Abbott, accusing him of lacking the "temperament" and experience to handle complex international situations such as the worsening crisis engulfing Syria.

Facing internal doubts over his confidence as his election campaign is perceived as bogging down, Mr Rudd sought to contrast his reputation as a foreign affairs expert with Mr Abbott's notoriety as a political hard man.

Kevin Rudd says Tony Abbott doesn't have the temperament or experience to handle complex foreign policy issues. Photo: Getty Images

Adapting a tactic from the play-book of John Howard, who once claimed then opposition leader Kim Beazley lacked the ticker to be a prime minister, the unusually direct language appeared to be a calculated move to erode confidence in his opponent's ability to stride the world stage and represent Australia in the councils of the world.

Mr Rudd spoke of his telephone discussion with US President Barack Obama on Tuesday morning, regarding the security emergency in the Middle East, more or less asking voters if they could imagine putting Mr Abbott in the same role.

Describing Mr Obama as "a good man", Mr Rudd reflected on the dangers of military action and claimed Mr Abbott was unsuited because he is inclined to be impulsive and to "rush ahead" when caution was needed.

Asked about the growing likelihood of armed conflict, Mr Rudd depicted the Liberal leader as a "pugilist" who was suppressing his combative nature and could therefore not be trusted to handle diplomacy where "words are bullets".

"You've got to sit back, think and calmly reflect, and then work through what the best decision is, and temperament and judgment and experience are quite important," he told the Seven network's Mark Riley.

"He doesn't have a background in this field and sometimes I find in him a bit of an impulsive nature, that is rushing ahead to judgment.

"You know what his background is ... he's been in Parliament for 20 years, 19 of which he was the great pugilist, you know and the last 12 months he's suddenly become the statesman, so the Tony Abbott that I know, having served 15 years in the Parliament with him, is of a different nature."