EDIE AND CYRUS

(a dialogue)

by Richard A. Spiegel

Edie

What do you mean by desire?

Cyrus

It’s complex, eh?

Edie

Yeah.  It is complex.

Cyrus

Let me try to define it.

Edie

Oh, come on.  It’s really simple.

Cyrus

No.  You asked for complexity.

Edie

I’m kidding you.

Cyrus

But desire poses a real philosophic problem.

Edie

How so?  Tell me.

Cyrus

Is it an illusion?  You think you know what you desire, but are you fooling yourself?

Edie

I know what I want.

Cyrus

What happens when you get it?

Edie

Then I want something else.

Cyrus

So, you constantly desire.

Edie

Yes.  

Cyrus

Then you’re eternally wanting.  

Edie

I don’t think so.  

Cyrus

Desire attaches itself to an object.  That object of desire might be what makes a message jump from neuron to neuron.  The nerve message enters our body through the senses.  Then it finds its way to the brain, jumping from neuron to neuron.  Now, desire is what informs the message where to jump.

Edie

I think you’ve lost me.

Cyrus.

Follow this.  Why won’t a message from the eye just stop?  What propels it on?  What force?  Desire!

Edie

Desire is a force?

Cyrus

Like gravity.  The gravity we know on Earth is this planet’s desire to hold us, to possess our presence.  If it let go, it would no longer desire us.

Edie

Mmmmm.  I’m not sure of that.  When we lose something, or let it go – that doesn’t mean we no longer desire it.

Cyrus

Ah, here comes the illusion of desire.

Edie

That’s not clear.  Let’s go back to the neurons and the message that jumps.

Cyrus

It jumps from the ends of the neurons; dendrites and axons or whatever they’re called.

Edie

Okay.  So they jump to the connector they desire.  They might wind up at the wrong connection, but their desire is constant. 

Cyrus

So they keep jumping until they arrive somewhere in the brain and the mind becomes conscious of that message which becomes a mental image.

Edie

Which could be a dream.  

Cyrus

We dream on.