Chapter 13 corroding a poem about mr. whittier

"We made the same mistakes that the cavemen did," Mr. Whittier said, "and we still make them." So maybe we should have fought each other, hated each other, tortured each other...   Mr. Whittier pushed his wheelchair to the edge of the stage. He had age spots on his hands and was bald.His slack face seemed to hang from his oversized eyes, blurred, water-gray. The loop that goes through one of his nostrils, the cord of his CD player's headphone that winds around the wrinkles and flabs of his beef-jerky neck. On the stage, there is no spotlight, only a black and white film.The picture of the marching army was pasted like wallpaper on Mr. Whittier's head.His mouth and eyes disappeared into the shadow of army boots and bayonets creeping across his cheeks.

He said, "Maybe suffering and suffering is the point of life." Because the earth is a processing plant, a factory. Picture a big tumbler polishing rocks: a tumbler filled with water and sand.Imagine your soul as an ugly rock to throw into it.It is some kind of raw material or natural resource, crude oil, ore.And all that conflict and pain is just our grind.Polish our souls and refine us.Life after life teaches us, completes us. Think again that you were chosen to jump in, and again, and again.Know that this suffering is the only reason you are here. Mr. Whittier, too many teeth crammed into the narrow jaw.His eyebrows were like dry grass, and Mr. Whittier's bat-winged ears were puffed out.Shadow Troops marched in stride."The only other option is, we're forever stupid," he said.

We fight, we fight for peace.We fight hunger, we love war.We fight, fight, fight, with guns or our mouths, or money.And this earth is no better than it was before us. Leaning forward, his hands gripped the armrests of his wheelchair like claws.Newsreel troops marched across his face like moving tattoos.With machine guns, tanks and artillery.Mr. Whittier said, "Maybe that's the way we should live." Maybe our factory planet is working on our souls... to be more refined.