The barns, 1926 - by Ture Sellman

Beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror, which we still are just able to endure, and we are so awed because it serenely disdains to annihilate us. Every angel is terrifying.

- Rainer Maria Rilke.

If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever.

Liberia, 2001

City bus in the outskirts of Murmansk, Kola Peninsula, Arctic Russia 1970s

All my life, I have lived with the feeling that I have been kept from my true place. If the expression "metaphysical exile" had no meaning, my existence alone would afford it one.

— Emil Cioran

How many lives do we live? How many times do we die? They say we all lose 21 grams... at the exact moment of our death. Everyone. And how much fits into 21 grams? How much is lost? When do we lose 21 grams? How much goes with them? How much is gained? How much is gained? Twenty-one grams. The weight of a stack of five nickels. The weight of a hummingbird. A chocolate bar. How much did 21 grams weigh?

Nothing ever ends poetically. It ends and we turn it into poetry. All that blood was never once beautiful. It was always just red.