House Of Empathy

I cannot believe my eyes. The priest is dressed like a jester in tights with a multi-colour diamond pattern on it. The secretary I kicked out yesterday is a Queen in a velvet robe, seated on a throne studded with gemstones.

I recognise my toddler from his face. But he is now grown up, and doing all the things I taught him not to. He smiles at me, but it is a strange smile I don’t recognise. Does he recognise me?

An impulse to look at myself overtakes me. I desperately look around but cannot differentiate between walls and mirrors. People appear static, but I can see fleeting emotions on their countenance. What disturbs me is that the emotions do not correspond to the personality

.

I rush to a door expecting a powder room with mirrors, but the door pushes me back with neon words –House of Empathy. Empathy? The word expected was Illusions or Mirrors.

A sound appears to come from the hollows, but I cannot place the source. I am strongly tempted to kill – asphyxiate the beings around, to hear their dying sounds – till they are reborn as originals.

There are no originals. Everything is in a state of flux. You need to live in somebody else’s body to understand why they are whatever they are. They look like opposites, but are merely in transition – to a different state of empathetic beings.

I would like to get out – floating in air, just the way I came in. The glass on the door shows my old self in a navy business suit, blocking my exit. Somebody says I look better dressed in a feather skirt and wooden beads – the gypsy in me.