Cockroach Blood

Prologue

‘Competition’ and ‘compassion’—each word begins with the same first four letters and ends with the same last three.  The words look and sound much alike, their chief architectural difference being a very hard repetitive consonant in one and a very soft double consonant in the other.  The consonants are exclusive to each word, there being no ‘s’ in ‘competition’ and no ‘t’ in ‘compassion’.

There is a monumental difference in the meaning of the words, though.  The words describe the fundamental opposites of the universe; the universe of time and space and also of what lies beyond.  The words represent the twin opposites that comprise the entire cosmos of all existence; the two threads that constitute the entirety of all.

As with most opposites, competition and compassion are complementary as well as contradictory.  They cannot exist apart; not in life.  They are two threads that form the cloth of life.  Only one of the threads can exist outside of life; outside of time and space, even.  The other thread cannot.

One thread depends on the other for its meaning; it depends on the other for its very existence, in fact.  Which thread is dependent and which thread is not?  Can you guess?

Each thread has its own peculiar color, but the color of the one is constant and the color of the other changes all the time.  The fabric made from the threads has limitless colors that are dependent on both threads; the thread with the color that never changes is the thread that changes the color of the other.  One thread has a spirit all its own and one thread derives its spirit from the other.

Threads of competition run vertically—the warp of the loom of life—and threads of compassion run horizontally, as the woof.  As the threads weave, the fabric may take on a bright, smooth shimmer or a dull nap.  The fabric might glow in iridescent, highly contrasting patterns or become subtly contrasting, one element fading into another.

Patterns of individual lives come into resolution through the magic of this celestial weaving work.  That is where the patterns are most interesting; in the individual lives.  That is what is most vivid to our imaginations, of course.

Are there some individuals that can run their fingers across the fabric, as the celestial spiders weave their work, and affect the patterns of other individual lives?  Are there some that can cause the colors of the fabric to change in order to benefit a life; to give it some grace?

If so, how would they work their strange craft?  Are they helped by entities such as angels or even archangels?  Through what means might these entities operate?

Could the power of angels move and flow through flowers, birds and insects, as well as through humans?  Is it possible that the power flows everywhere, even through lowly cockroaches?  It is all one web of fabric, after all, so the cockroaches must be included.   It might be that those that come into close league with archangels, or maybe even cockroaches, are the one’s responsible for the peculiar grace that life sometimes acquires.

Long ago, in the second Great War, a parish priest might have been one of these that could influence the weave.  He might have been unusually adept at touching the web’s interlacing threads and also very adept at communion with spirits.

One thing is sure; he did not work alone.  He worked within the web of the fabric of action.  Each spiritual entity, or person of flesh and blood, had to perform his or her part in very different ways in order for eternity to be satisfied; in order for the pattern to produce all the potential possibilities.