Aphorisms

by Griffin R.K.

1. The desire for reality is perhaps one of man’s most bizarre.

2. Then again, life doesn’t have to beckon and cajole like death does.

3. It is often believed our suffering is redeemed by beauty. Really, just the turning of heads?

4. Our lives are somehow not interrupted even once.

5. Sprouting wings tends to be a pain, but you’re just a person without them.

6. Perhaps each suicide should be performed before a panel of judges.

7. How long did it take Lazarus’ eyes to readjust? Or to break-in life like new boots?

8. The young are surer than the old that God is through with them.

9. You were dead not too long ago, and now you’re bored.

10. That we take the phrase “all right” to mean middling is a testament to our insane ambitions.

11. Geriatrics tend to regard the youth like the hands of a clock.

12. “Would you do it all over again?”—Only if it were exactly the same.

13. Man has done the impossible and is somehow self-enslaved.

14. Nobody is more worthy of our disinterest than people who know that they’re beautiful.

15. Only amongst torturers and executioners is it apt to fear the skills of their apprentices more.

16. Never thank people you’re paying.

17. The soul is whatever you are bereft of words.

18. Every wild animal would kill themselves if only they knew they could die.

19. Conjugal love is much like a taxidermy of regular love.

20. What does it say about God that our sex wounds him so deeply?

21. All men die young; a fortiori, never has a man been old.

22. Thank the gods that the seasons don’t go out looking for Nirvana.

23. Oneirologists know that a man can scarcely go twelve hours without yearning for death.

24. An especially pertinent insult is flattering, if nothing else.

25. Oneirologists know that coffee and sugar seem to be the only two things that can assuage our nightly yearnings for death.

26. The Christian worldview: “It is better we have justice than no need for it!”

27. I’ve heard it purported that the ghosts of stillborns often exhale sighs of relief as they fly up to Heaven.

28. I hope for the sake of the religious that they’re wrong.

29. Many contagions we politely refer to as “popular.”

30. The mentally ill are those amongst us who don’t take comfort in their misery.

31. We rub salt in the wounds of children by reminiscing on our childhoods.

32. It seems no one’s secrets are more difficult to keep than your own.

33. Sometimes what we despise most is that no real tragedy in our lives can account for our misery.

34. “Life’s biggest questions” tend to be decided by their entertainment value.

35. That the universe was made in only six days seems quite believable.

36. Most of what we come across in life only serves to christen what we’ve known since birth.

37. Descartes has been proven incorrect: we now know that love and meaning are conquered each night by something so simple as sleep.

38. Assume reincarnation is true: this is perhaps the only time in a hundred thousand years I’ve been clever enough to write this aphorism.

39. Doctors have convinced narcoleptics that their enlightenment is a sickness.

40. For contrition, many are willing to pay dearly—even to a brazen head.

41. By normal people, petrification is easily and often mistaken for laziness.

42. A tragic irony: surpass your heroes, and even then you’d never think so.

43. Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy will be done, on Earth as it is in heaven. I’m going to need a lot of guns—thank you.

44. Polite people are only willing to call what’s attractive ugly.

45. I must give credit where it’s due, even to myself.

46. The decrees of a king can only be as ignominious as accidentally urinating on a spider.

47. At the very least, the lobotomists of yesteryear would refer to themselves as such.

48. What do you call a polite friend? An enemy.

49. People-watching from a ten-storey high window, you tend to forget they can see you too.

50. Some artist are paternal and others maternal, and only the former find success.

51. You’ll meet the perfect person by chance, and that’s when you’ll finally realize all your bad luck has actually been good luck.

52. I regret that I haven’t spent my whole life silent.

53. You’re most in the mood to make promises the same afternoon you hatch your escape plans.

54. It seems like only the Japanese are willing to acknowledge the obvious: suicide is often a most perfect apology.

55. Failure is often mistaken for wisdom. The true wise man has a fire in his heart.

56. Willingly, many kill to prove that truth is one thing when truth is everything.