there is a land, i'm told,
where transgressions
are meaningless
salutations that
dapple conversation
in pirouetted grace
grandfather, more,
pleez, tell us more
it is a land where muvee
screens hold all the truth
and beauty in the world--
like tripwire for the mentally
retarded
oh, grandfather, it sounds
glorious, tell us more
it is a land abolished
like slavery
and picked through
like scraps for the
scoundrels and savages
of democracy
grandfather, you're scaring us--
you had it once,
children,
what happened?
Sunday, October 11, 2009
episode
"What I need," he said,"is statistics. Mathematical truth. Numbers." He removed a book from the middle row, a random selection. He blew the dust off the front jacket and sat down at a nearby table.
"Ah! Here we are: '1 and 1 is 2,'" he said, adjusting his thick-rimmed glasses. "This is good. I rather like that."
A woman sitting close by looked up from the magazine she was reading, keeping her face half-hidden behind the thin filmy-pages of some soon-to-be dated volume on fashion or fashionable advice on pleasing one's sex partner. She noticed the camera and the ominous red light which meant that the camera was recording, the man's face casually being documented.
"When the camera is on," he said, glancing over at the onlooker, "that means I am recording. And when I am recording, nothing else matters."
The woman quickly looked away, immediately immersing herself in her magazine.
"Now, this is absolutely vital if we are to understand anything. There is truth. There is truth. Again, I say, there is truth in numbers. Figures. Glorious symbols with universal, timeless meaning. Do you understand what I'm saying?" He looked back over at the woman, now completely absorbed in pretending not to have acknowledged the man in the first place.
"Bah!" he snarled. "You truly are a ghost. Woman, you are mad!"
He continued reading, silently, to himself, as the camera kept recording, everything as it's supposed to be.
"Ah! Here we are: '1 and 1 is 2,'" he said, adjusting his thick-rimmed glasses. "This is good. I rather like that."
A woman sitting close by looked up from the magazine she was reading, keeping her face half-hidden behind the thin filmy-pages of some soon-to-be dated volume on fashion or fashionable advice on pleasing one's sex partner. She noticed the camera and the ominous red light which meant that the camera was recording, the man's face casually being documented.
"When the camera is on," he said, glancing over at the onlooker, "that means I am recording. And when I am recording, nothing else matters."
The woman quickly looked away, immediately immersing herself in her magazine.
"Now, this is absolutely vital if we are to understand anything. There is truth. There is truth. Again, I say, there is truth in numbers. Figures. Glorious symbols with universal, timeless meaning. Do you understand what I'm saying?" He looked back over at the woman, now completely absorbed in pretending not to have acknowledged the man in the first place.
"Bah!" he snarled. "You truly are a ghost. Woman, you are mad!"
He continued reading, silently, to himself, as the camera kept recording, everything as it's supposed to be.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
perverse
somewhere, there is a place, that is kept well-lit and immaculate, where they can just know exactly what i'm thinking and i don't have to explain anything--extract the impossible: i don't have to bother with trying to figure it out myself. i simply walk up, knock on the door, and they know. already, they know. and they are able to help. like a clinic for the soul. a clinic for the mind--but, unlike the psychiatric offices i've been to before, they know. they really know. and they are ready to help.
the problem, i think, is that i've become too self-aware. of myself, obviously, but, also, my own thinking. i start to question everything. and when this happens, i lose it. i try to turn it off, but to no avail. i am stuck in my own stinking thoughts, in my own stinking brain--that one part of me--of my body--which seems to have failed completely. in some realm, i'm sure, my brain is unsightly and, certainly, crippling. i am held back by own thinking--the essential self. it's not always obvious. my brain is my one, it seems, irreparable physical flaw.
i know i'm crazy. but does knowing still mean i'm crazy?
these are thoughts i can't restrict. the only consolation is to think in terms of gross generalizations and universals: the human mind and how it relates to me.
it's remarkable, really, how we are able to make sense, so automatically, so naturally (it would seem) of symbols--how easy it is to get caught up in that perpetual game of alphabet manipulation.
words: they mean nothing. they mean everything.
i need someone to reinstall, reconfigure my faulty wiring and update me with a more consumer-friendly program; new software, same features.
if i had it my way, i'd do nothing. all the time. i would do nothing at all. but lay in bed and sleep. if only i could sleep forever--to become intellectually comatose. then, i think, i might be o.k.. no bad thinking is better than any bad thinking. and all i do is bad thinking. all the time.
i would kill myself. honestly, i would. but i'm too afraid. not of dying, really. my religious conviction is too strong. i believe in god. i believe there is a devil. and i know that ending one's life prematurely can only result in eternal damnation. i don't want to spend forever engulfed in flames of hellfire. but, sometimes, it doesn't sound so bad, considering the alternative: a life filled with prescription sanity and perpetual loneliness.
something should change around here.
the problem, i think, is that i've become too self-aware. of myself, obviously, but, also, my own thinking. i start to question everything. and when this happens, i lose it. i try to turn it off, but to no avail. i am stuck in my own stinking thoughts, in my own stinking brain--that one part of me--of my body--which seems to have failed completely. in some realm, i'm sure, my brain is unsightly and, certainly, crippling. i am held back by own thinking--the essential self. it's not always obvious. my brain is my one, it seems, irreparable physical flaw.
i know i'm crazy. but does knowing still mean i'm crazy?
these are thoughts i can't restrict. the only consolation is to think in terms of gross generalizations and universals: the human mind and how it relates to me.
it's remarkable, really, how we are able to make sense, so automatically, so naturally (it would seem) of symbols--how easy it is to get caught up in that perpetual game of alphabet manipulation.
words: they mean nothing. they mean everything.
i need someone to reinstall, reconfigure my faulty wiring and update me with a more consumer-friendly program; new software, same features.
if i had it my way, i'd do nothing. all the time. i would do nothing at all. but lay in bed and sleep. if only i could sleep forever--to become intellectually comatose. then, i think, i might be o.k.. no bad thinking is better than any bad thinking. and all i do is bad thinking. all the time.
i would kill myself. honestly, i would. but i'm too afraid. not of dying, really. my religious conviction is too strong. i believe in god. i believe there is a devil. and i know that ending one's life prematurely can only result in eternal damnation. i don't want to spend forever engulfed in flames of hellfire. but, sometimes, it doesn't sound so bad, considering the alternative: a life filled with prescription sanity and perpetual loneliness.
something should change around here.
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