BREAD

They are lining up for mind-improving bread around the country. Buy the grain, strengthen the brain. They believe it because they can’t see it, because they have been told that it works. A nation needs hope to function. There is no religion but that which we buy from convenience stores. The sacred objects come in plastic boxes with garnishes and recyclable bottles. The corporations are feeding the national obsession: do what is right for you, just like everyone else.

A new reality is being constructed out there, just as I have made my own four-walled haven. They are both islands, but only one is cut off from the truth. Both have routine. There must be order. We cannot have anarchy, or chaos, or freedom. They have failed to win me for their world; my task is to show them mine. But there is much work to be done first. Logic has no growth spurts, it grows like a hedge. It must be tended and honed, nurtured and sculptured, until it has a shape. This form must be admired, free from weeds, perfectly balanced. I am the nation’s gardener, a friend of nature. I will bring back the natural way of things. I will show them where they went wrong.