Hypnogogic (Hyp) Prose #6

Intricate interior action — profound passion plain.

Hyp Prose Tenet #6 — Detailed description reserved for movements of the spirit. Intricate interior action (cf the dense interiority of the Psalms) making profound passion plain.

Excursus

Hyp prose is fundamentally concerned with emotional action and interior narrative: the movements of the spirit rather than physical movements.

It utilises the most magical power of words, their ability to admit us into the dense inner world of an individual human being, a power which underpins every human interaction especially our ability to love.

The Psalms are a fine example of such words, with their intensely detailed descriptions of the interior state of the supplicant. To take Psalm 6 as a random example:

Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am faint

Heal me, Lord, for my bones are in agony

My soul is in deep anguish, I am worn out from my groaning

Night-long I flood my bed with weeping

And I drench my couch with my tears.

Modern authors are coy about such descriptions. Attempt them and your work will be called maudlin, or overwritten, and you may even be accused of the greatest heresy in modern literature: the crime of actually having something to say.

The sample text [The Majesty of Judas: 143–146] depicts the horror and the pity of the execution of Judas Iscariot, who went out to die because of his great love and his great loyalty: in order to redeem the life of his brother Jesus and also to save the world.

The piece is told from the point of view of his beloved Lily, who takes his suffering on to herself to the extent that she is able. Para 146 is a variation upon that most famous line of Scripture: Eli, Eli, Lama Sabacthani.

Excerpt (The Majesty of Judas: 143–146)

143. One thing you have not been told is that I was there. I saw Him emerge into the cold light of day, I was there when they laid the timbers upon Him and He buckled under their weight. I walked beside Him like His shadow and witnessed them goad Him like a beast, to get up under His burden again and again and drag it towards Golgotha. Through all of it I was with Him, regardless of how much He would have wanted me to leave. I stayed with Him even though I could not look in His direction, because I knew that even in His extremity He would try to smile at me, and that one thing would have broken my heart and ended my life at the very moment He most needed me to stay with Him.

144. For the first time in my life I was not merely a witness. I stepped forward to find I was able to take His suffering upon myself, at times almost completely, and I moved forward gladly to embrace this new skill. Out of some route He had opened within me to take up the worst of His pain. I felt Him soften and exhale every time I took His pain on, He was reprieved every time I exchanged His old strength for His current agony. And He knew what I was doing, I feel sure of it. He tried to set limits on the pain I could uplift from Him because He did not want me to suffer, and this halting exchange between us continued all the way to the end. Every time His strength failed I was there to be His strength, and every time He used that strength to pull pain back out of me and upon himself again.

145. His ordeal was long and bitter and I gave Him such comfort as I could. Spending all of the strength He had relinquished when He had me cut His hair. The sun flared very hot as noon passed overhead, and in His beaten state it began to wear Him down badly. I sent Him every bit of strength I had left but He slowly sank beneath my reach, and as the sun blazed overhead I found limits within myself that could not be surpassed while my soul remained in the world. He sank more and more helplessly against the timbers, He had lost so much blood and His eyes were blinded by blood and salt and dust and the glare of the sun. He gradually became mad with heat and thirst and as death stole towards Him I could not hold Him steady. He no longer knew where He was or what had happened to Him and He could not feel me with Him no matter how desperately I reached out.

146. This part of your Book of Heartbreak is true. As death called Him onwards He strove to remain in the world but He could no longer see me or feel me there kneeling at the foot of His cross. Amidst all of His suffering this was the most terrible thing, to think that I would rise and turn my back and walk away from Him. With His last few breaths I heard Him cry: Lily, Lily, why would you abandon me? Not out of anger but in puzzlement and heartbreak and I will testify that this is the worst part of this story. He wept for me forsaking Him even as I knelt there in tears, reaching out towards His soul to tell Him I was there. But your brutality had put Him beyond reach, He neither saw me nor heard me and I want you to know that this is the way this boy died: despised, rejected, brutalised, and abandoned by His only love.

This is about as heartbreaking and as beautiful as I can possibly make a text. I may have better in me somewhere but I sincerely doubt I'll ever find it.

If you have written something more heartbreaking or more intensely emotional please do get in touch. I promise I will work as your literary slave for the rest of your life if you can surpass the brutality and the tenderness of these lines.

P. Julian

All of my work is available to read free either at the Books page of my website or at my page on the Internet Archive.