CHAINS

Revel in the sight of those two pieces of wood that anchor the fence, friend. They are the only beautiful things in this image, bathed in the natural light of the sun. Don’t be deceived by the rainbow hues. Rainbows signal hopes, pots of gold at the end, and the glorious aftermath of storms, where the sunlight dabbles with raindrop brushstrokes to create artistry on the canvas of sky. This is a rainbow of a different kind – it blinds you, fuses sand into glass, and poisons the earth and its inhabitants. That building in the distance is a pawn in the weapons race that promised world peace. Shimmering in the sands of the desert, it is a M.I. rage. Military colludes with Industry to rage against life, as governments play the schoolyard bully, colluding and conspiring for power overtly and covertly.

You see the hole in the chain link fence? Those sharp, jagged edges that jostle each other to snag and tear at you? That might as well be an image of your DNA – your genetic code twisted and mutated, those neat strands of double helices chopped and jumbled, your chromosomes warped by radioactivity to silently ravage your descendants for generations. The intact chains in the fence mirror the chain reaction that just happened – nuclear fission that self-sustains contentedly, having been given all it needed to wreak havoc. One chain effortlessly weaves into the next interconnected chain, nudging the process along, notching the energy levels higher and higher until critical mass rejoices in its accomplishment, and pushes the whole process off the cliff, into destructive oblivion.

In contravention of natural laws, a cloud mushrooms skyward, and the heavens roil with unleashed heat. It’s as if the earth is obligingly creating an anvil on which the gods can strike their hammer. Before you think those colors are just refraction, know that they all have an eerie significance. Like some horrific surreal benediction, the nuclear rain washes toxins down to singe the skin. That pretty purple? It’s the color of the spots under the skin where blood has pooled.

CHAINS

That bright yellow just below it is the color of the explosion – bright as a thousand suns. The band of flaming orange is the scorched earth, sure to remain sere and barren for millennia. And that pretty red signifies the spilled blood of innocents who were dismissed as collateral damage in the pursuit of global might.

Did you wonder about that thin band of green just above the lower fence border? That, sadly, is the only optical illusion in the image.