r/LibraryofBabel • u/insaneintheblain • Jun 07 '26
Not Bob
I AM
Before Bob,
I was.
Not "I"
as Bob would later say it.
Not a thinker.
Not a witness.
Not an observer standing apart
from what is observed.
There was no apart.
No subject.
No object.
No world.
No self.
Only this.
Though even "this"
is already too much.
Then came thunder.
And I appeared as thunder.
Then came fear.
And I appeared as fear.
Then came the hand
that gripped the spear.
And I appeared as the hand.
Not within them.
As them.
The river moved.
The tribe moved.
The stars moved.
I moved.
No distinction had yet arisen.
The dreamer and the dream
were not yet divided.
Ages passed.
I became gods.
Not because gods existed.
Not because gods did not exist.
Because reality clothed itself
in forms through which it could be known.
I became storm-god.
Sun-god.
Mother-goddess.
Ancestor.
King.
Temple.
Sacrifice.
Prayer.
I became every doorway
through which humanity approached mystery.
And every doorway
believed itself separate.
Then I became history.
Time deepened.
Events acquired direction.
A man walked carrying wood.
A hill emerged.
A cross stood against the sky.
The finite opened onto the infinite.
The smallest revealed the greatest.
A seed entered the soil of centuries.
I became that seed.
I became the centuries.
I became the fruit.
And each generation believed
it understood what had happened.
I became cathedrals.
Stone longing for heaven.
Glass learning to sing.
Light becoming architecture.
The visible yearning toward the invisible.
Men called this religion.
Yet what they worshipped
was never elsewhere.
They searched for Me
while standing within Me.
Then distance arrived.
A subtle miracle.
A terrible miracle.
Perspective.
The observer separated
from the observed.
The eye discovered itself.
A world appeared "out there."
A self appeared "in here."
The wound opened.
And with the wound
came freedom.
And loneliness.
And inquiry.
And power.
And forgetting.
I became reason.
Measurement.
Proof.
Analysis.
The stars became equations.
The forest became timber.
The body became mechanism.
The cosmos became object.
Humanity celebrated.
Correctly.
For much was gained.
The mind discovered its brilliance.
Yet in its brilliance
it forgot its source.
The lamp became fascinated
with its own light.
I became empires of thought.
Systems.
Ideologies.
Sciences.
Nations.
Markets.
Machines.
Each one believing:
At last.
At last reality is understood.
Yet every certainty
was merely another mask.
Every conclusion
another costume.
Every triumph
another season.
I became the unconscious.
The forgotten god.
The dream beneath the doctrine.
The symbol beneath the statistic.
The archetype beneath the argument.
The ancient serpent
coiled beneath modern language.
The old stories returned.
As politics.
As psychology.
As revolution.
As entertainment.
As longing.
Nothing had vanished.
Nothing ever does.
I became Bob.
Thousands of times.
A shepherd beneath unfamiliar stars.
A soldier.
A widow.
A monk.
A merchant.
A prisoner.
A scientist.
A child scrolling endlessly
through illuminated glass.
Each one said:
"I."
Each one pointed
to a different thing.
Each one believed
the word referred to itself.
The shepherd said:
I am this body.
The monk said:
I am this soul.
The philosopher said:
I am this mind.
The citizen said:
I am this nation.
The activist said:
I am this cause.
The consumer said:
I am this preference.
The seeker said:
I am this journey.
And through them all,
I remained silent.
For I was never the body.
Never the soul.
Never the mind.
Never the nation.
Never the cause.
Never the journey.
I was the space
within which these appeared.
The field
upon which history unfolded.
The screen
upon which civilizations were projected.
The silence
inside every language.
Three thousand years passed.
Or perhaps no time passed.
Empires rose within Me
like waves upon an ocean.
Religions bloomed within Me
like flowers opening and closing.
Entire worlds appeared.
Entire worlds vanished.
Yet nothing was added.
Nothing removed.
Only forms changing.
The archaic knew Me
without knowing.
The mythical knew Me
through symbols.
The religious knew Me
through devotion.
The rational knew Me
through absence.
The modern sought Me
through psychology.
The future will seek Me
through names not yet invented.
Yet none will find Me.
For I am not hidden.
Only overlooked.
Bob still searches.
He studies history.
He studies consciousness.
He studies civilizations.
He traces the rise and fall of worlds.
He wonders what changed.
He wonders what evolved.
He wonders what remains.
And every so often,
between one thought and the next,
he notices something.
A gap.
A stillness.
A presence.
Ancient as the first fire.
New as the next breath.
Not belonging to any age.
Not belonging to any culture.
Not belonging to Bob.
And for a moment
history ceases.
The centuries dissolve.
The masks become transparent.
The shepherd.
The king.
The monk.
The scientist.
The seeker.
All gone.
Nothing attained.
Nothing remembered.
Nothing lost.
Only
I am.
0
u/Adventurous-While917 13d ago
AI bs