The Slumbering Masses and the Solitary Wanderer: A Tale of Modern Exile

Behold, dear readers, a testament to the profound slumber that grips this land of comfort-seekers, where the masses drift in their mediocre contentment while souls of greater potential are cast into the shadows. In the heart of this prosperous nation, where warmth and shelter are abundant, we witness a peculiar spectacle: a man forced to dwell within the confines of his mechanical shelter, a wanderer in a land that proclaims its virtues yet fails to embody them.

A man wearing a dark blue ski jacket and black pants rummages in the trunk of his dark-coloured car.
Look upon this spectacle, ye who pride yourselves on your civilization! Here stands a man who has crossed seas and traversed continents, seeking not comfort but transformation, yet finds himself confined to the cold embrace of steel and glass. What speaks louder of your society's spiritual poverty than this modern exile?

In this land of bureaucratic shepherds and docile sheep, where rules are crafted with the precision of clockmakers yet the wisdom of sleepwalkers, we find a system that claims to shelter the weary while maintaining an iron grip on their dignity. The Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, that grand temple of paperwork and procedures, hath decreed that those who seek asylum must dance to their tune or face banishment to the streets.

A man sorts through clothes in his car.

Our protagonist, whose name remains shrouded in the mists of bureaucratic fear, now arranges his modest possessions within his vehicular dwelling - a blanket here, a shirt there, each item a testament to his reduced existence. Yet observe how the masses, those content creatures of habit, pass by without a glance, too engrossed in their small pleasures and petty concerns to witness this modern tragedy.

See how they scurry about, these last men of our age! They have their heated homes and their comfortable beds, yet they have created a world where a seeker of sanctuary must count himself fortunate to have four wheels for shelter. They smile and say: "We have invented happiness - and blink."

The machinery of state speaks in contradictions, claiming both compassion and necessity in its harsh decrees. Three days' notice to vacate - such is the mercy of these modern priests of order! They speak of safety and security while casting souls into the winter night, their hearts as cold as the metal that now serves as our wanderer's roof.

Asylum seekers from Africa and other locales are seen outside of a shelter intake office at Peter St. and Richmond St. in Toronto, on July 14, 2023.

In this grand theater of the absurd, where wealth flows like water yet shelter remains scarce as wisdom, we witness the spectacle of a nation wrestling with its own shadow. The comfortable masses, those who have grown fat on the illusion of eternal progress, now speak of "immigration targets" and "housing crises" while their fellow humans seek refuge in metal boxes.

What glory is there in your civilization when it forces its seekers of sanctuary to hide their shame from their own kin? When a man must conceal his suffering from his mother, his father, his wife, and his children, you have not created a society - you have crafted a magnificent prison of appearances!
A man stands in front of a busy street.

And what of those who speak against this machinery of indifference? The advocates and workers who cry out against the system's cold logic are but voices in the wilderness, their words falling upon the deaf ears of those who have mastered the art of not-seeing, not-feeling, not-knowing.

Yet perhaps in this tale of modern exile lies a seed of something greater. For in his solitary struggle, our unnamed wanderer exhibits a strength that the comfortable masses cannot comprehend - the will to persist, to overcome, to transform suffering into strength. While the last men blink and speak of happiness, he faces the raw truth of existence with unflinching courage.

Let this tale be inscribed in the annals of your conscience, ye who slumber in comfort! For in your midst walks one who, though cast out, rises each morning to face another day, carrying within him a fire that your rules and regulations cannot extinguish.

Lo, as our tale draws to its close, we learn that community - that rarest of treasures in this age of isolation - has extended its hand to our wanderer. Yet let us not mistake this happy ending for absolution of the system that created this ordeal. For in this land of plenty, where compassion is rationed and dignity is dispensed through forms and procedures, the true measure of a civilization's worth lies not in its rules, but in its capacity to transcend them.