ChocoVine and Life

ChocoVine, for those not in the know, is a wine that- as the name suggests, is made of chocolate. And wine.

The misshaped metaphor vaguely hinted at by the title of this post stems from the fact that spoiler alert when you drink ChocoVine, the first thing you taste is "the great taste of Dutch chocolate" which is sweet, generally. (Unless you like real- not that impostor, type dark chocolate; in which case, it'll be more bitter but still sweet.)

Traditionally speaking, when one is a child one is generally carefree if not happy. Candies, affection, attention, carefreeness. Unless you're little orphan Annie. In which case, you're out of luck. Until some rich guy bails you out... assuming you can melt his cold black heart first. In either case, childhood tends to be free of the disease of responsibility. When the world still seems fresh and as if nothing could go wrong and everything is possible. Wanna be a cop arresting the bad guys? You got it! Wanna be a doctor who takes care of sick people? Right on! It's sweet and endearing, like chocolate.

Then you taste "fine Cabernet wine". Wine (and alcohol) require(s) no further explanation. It fucks you up. Only adults drink it, or so it is believed- if one rules out underage shenanigans. Adults have to face the harder things in life. Gone are the dreams of being that cop who arrests the bad guys. As Mathis so perfectly sums it up in Quantum of Solace: "When one is young, it seems very easy to distinguish right and wrong. But as one gets older, it becomes much more difficult. The villains and the heroes get all mixed up." Bring on the questions of morality and responsibility as you not only wrestle with your dreams slipping away but the arrests one has to make, and the patients one has to see. To arrest someone who didn't commit a crime but simply fits a profile? To give medical attention to someone who is sick but has no money? It fucks you up, like alcohol.

The metaphor isn't that elusive. First you take something chocolaty and sweet, then it takes you by surprise as red wine makes its way past your uvula and into the deep dark chasm that is life.

It seems very simple but it's one thing to lay out a metaphor and another to understand it. I can only do the former at this point.

Jolly ol' Skip

Cavernous echoes inside
ringing
and blinding
and searing shut the outside world.

Beyond the confines of the mind exist only
that which I have not created
and that which they've defiled.

Thank you, doublethink
Thank you, grand hypnotist.

To imprison myself in my own mind
for the rest of the universe's life
would be destructive bliss
beyond what is called sublime.

To imprison others
in my mind is
cruelty galore.

Savagery
on a scale never seen before!

Not violence or death or something forlorn.
No sadness or misery
or pain or fear.

Just cruelty of a different breed.
It begs the question
"anything understand Does me?"
To imprison others in my mind is cruelty
and torture.
For that which they do not grasp
they will snarl at and attack.

Commencing the butchery of bliss before dawn.

The king dethroned.
The czar exiled.
The troubadour trapped in a jar.

To imprison, not welcome, others in my mind
is cruelty.
Akin to that of forcing the universe into a bottle.
And burying it 'neath the Earth for none to see.

Lock your doors
demand a password.
And you should be
skipping cruelty
to skip and to just be jolly.