In the midst of humanity’s disgraced swan song into oblivion, discovering a vein of unconditional beauty pulsing through the viscous membrane of intolerance, fear and anxiety that has bound our planet is all anyone needs to realize there may be hope yet. The vein beat through the audience with the earnestness and disruption of a child’s chalk drawing on the otherwise ordinary slab of pavement. Pumping vessels filled with imagination, completely free of judgement or pretention, ready to be digested as something unique to every single audience member.

Witnessing what appeared to be an apparition from 2006 (complete with flat brimmed hat and cut-off shirt) release 5,000 years’ worth of emotions into the air on Saturday night was everything. Heartbreak, happiness, mortality, love, loneliness, death, auto-tune, nothing. At points, the emotions poured out with such abandonment that they were completely incomprehensible. And in those moments of bewilderment, I found myself staring at nothing in particular, swaddled in a state of infantile curiosity. Laughing uncontrollably at a suit of balloons.

Moments later almost crying at the prospect of impermanence and death. That something so delicate and perfect could only sustain itself for so long. Grateful for family and friends and more specifically that incredible moment in time, but understanding the heartbreak that no such moment will ever exist in those exact circumstances again. I’m uncertain if I’d want it anyways. The impasse of wanting nothing to change while also having faith that it is in some ways, somehow necessary.

I found it difficult to write this, because both everything and nothing describe the show perfectly. Ten billion words or zero words in a language that will never be invented. A rare moment in time in which pure happiness and pure sadness poured out simultaneously, in unrelenting beauty. I can only say that I am happy that I was part of the deconstructed mass left in the wake of a masterpiece and that humanity is, in some capacity, still capable of good.

Thank you Sufjan.