Cities and suburbs, real and imaginary.

Thursday, August 30, 2007

iphigenia at aulis

you know the story, don't you? a great king offends a goddess, and murders a sacred deer. he speaks arrogantly of this goddess.

finally, a time came when a seer had to be called to the king, because for some reason, no storms had come to wash the ships to war in a place famous for storms and winds.

the seer said that the great king had to sacrifice his daughter.

but, there are as many versions of a myth as there are grandmothers in greece. in what most people know, the daughter was fooled into believing she was going to a wedding. then, she was thrown upon the altar and killed by her own father before she even really understood what was happening - even if she had been told.

but there are other versions of this myth, some of them with more historical and cultural credibility.

for instance, was there really not enough wind at aulis, or was this merely a construction of other kings that were angered at the power of agamemnon? thus, they declared that their ships could not sail without an unthinkable sacrifice. directors of stage and screen often enjoy this version, wherein all this talk of not enough wind is framed with lots and lots of wind, or else the wind arrives before the sacrifice and still the great king must sacrifice the daughter to maintain his power.

another version of this myth is that the great king filled the air with a heavy fog, to mask what he was about to do. he dressed a deer in wedding white. he dragged the deer to the altar, and sacrificed it. the daughter was smuggled away to a temple of that very goddess lest the goddess be angered for long at such trickery.

another version, the goddess, herself, chose to be merciful. she descended in a mysterious fog, and claimed the girl for her temple.

here is the version i like, that i shall call my own.

the kings of aulis schemed to hold back the power of agamemnon, because the world had never seen this kind of power before and the kings had grown so accustomed to their own power. they declared that the wind was not strong enough to set sail. agamemnon, a shrewd man, knew that these great kings were lying. but, to call them out on their lie would only destroy his power on the throne. he called the seer, calcas, and confessed to the sin of slaughtering a holy deer and speaking disrespectfully of a goddess. agamemnon was lying, of course.

the great king was confident the blind man - who did not know the intricacies of sailing - would announce that this was the cause of all the bad winds. the seer would speak of what could be done to change the winds.

no king could speak against a goddess' will, after all.

calcas, a true believer, hated what the entrails told him. he announced it with a whisper. the kings that heard him shouted it to the top of the sails. iphigenia must be killed. agamemnon must sacrifice his beloved daughter, his beautiful jewel, on the altar. her flesh would be burned, and spread to the kings like a slaughtered deer's venison.

the great king was not through with his machinations. he called his daughter to a wedding feast that would become her own death. he used the name of the arrogant warrior that was the great king's greatest opponent among the gathered kings - achilles, the proud. when iphigenia arrived, agamemnon led her to the pyre.

achilles, angered that his name had been used for such trickery, tried to rally the kings against agamemnon. he was too young, too brash, to realize that this would not work and that this failure would be his true shame that day. the humiliation of achilles' failure quieted them that believed achilles should have been the great king, as their greatest warrior.

agamemnon led his weeping daughter to the pyre. he threw her on top, to be burned.

a heavy smoke poured forth from the pyre, like something holy. but it was only a trick. inside the smoke, the blind seer, calcas, horrified at what he had had to declare, and without the aid of his empty eyes, undressed the girl on the pyre. he did not need to see to undress her. he did not need to see to pull the drugged fawn from his back. he threw the faun onto the funeral pyre. he wrapped it in the girl's clothes.

he smuggled the girl away, down the back of the pyre, into the forests and hills.

the army, seeing the magical transformation, glorified agamemnon as their king.

iphigenia was transformed in the woods to a fawn of a different sort. calcas, the true believer, did not take the girl to her mother. he took her over hill and dale, over mountains, to a temple of the goddess. (this goddess' temple was known for its prostitution...)

by the time calcas returned to the king to tell him the news, the army was gone to glorious troy. the fire of war stoked by the sacrifice had to be struck at once. the king had not remained long enough to discover if his daughter had made it all the way home.

calcas instead went to clytemnestra in her palace, and told her the news.

the queen, horrified to learn her daughter had been murdered by her own father, was crushed when she found out her daughter's true fate, on her back among the rabble of an island far from home. she hushed calcas, and urged the man never to speak of these things again. let the girl be dead. better she be dead a martyr than alive as a holy whore.

calcas traveled on to troy, to witness the glory of greece with his empty eyes.

all of these things were told to men that came to the temple by a girl prettier than the others, and mostly cleaner. she told men this story if they stayed long enough.

the men told the story to other men, to sons and daughters.

once, someone came to the girl just to ask her this: would you rather have been killed on that pyre instead of working here for the goddess?

she said to the man - the princess naked on a dirty pallet, with an opium pipe in her palm - "i'd rather have died on that pyre."

pity washed over the man. he strangled her. he set fire to her body. he bowed to the flame, and decided that she must have been a goddess.

Herodotus reported that in his day, Taurians still offered human sacrifices to a virgin goddess who they said was agamemnon's daughter. most scholars of Herodotus' age believed that iphigenia was actually Artemis, herself.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

crappy romance villanelle

i wrote it, but i will never publish this piece of bullhonky.

mayhap you'll like it:

villanelle:

the end of things, it always comes too late
when lions yawn and fires smolder down
we could have used a faster great escape

when cars give out and engines creak and groan
when telephones fall quiet just like stones
the end of things, it always comes too late

when lipstick blurs and whispers lose their moans
we lingered in an autumn after birds flew on
we could have used a faster great escape

when all the roses drop into the loam
and then thorns drop, too, with stems and bones
the end of things, it always comes too late

when we were together, we were still alone
the ants have conquered pantries, while we were home
we could have used a faster great escape

the candles died, we sat in darkness long
too long, waiting for the other to come
the end of things, it always comes too late
we could have used a faster great escape

edit: after much research, i have deduced that this is, in fact, the worst "poem" i have ever written. bask in its treacly glory. BASK IN THE TREACLY GLORY!

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

i feel like david hasselhof

if you notice, on this german amazon website, i have a sales rank.

http://www.amazon.de/Last-Dragon-J-M-McDermott/dp/0786948574

this means that people in germany who likely use german amazon more than english amazon are actually pre-ordering my book.

also, my sales rank in german amazon is vastly superior to my sales rank in america.

thus, i can say, like david hasselhof, "they love me in germany!"

over and out.

robot prostitute speaks

I am a Robot Prostitute with a smile
Made entirely of the lost, brown teeth
Of other prostitutes. My breasts feel like
Real prostitute breasts. They’re silicone
And covered in ruined pleather from
the worn-down jackets of other prostitutes.

My engine runs entirely on nicorette gum
burned to a crisp that leaks from my redwax lips
to keep the authentic taste of streetwalker.

I am made to wiggle seductively
With the help of my recycled condoms
over recycled champagne
that I use for my human-like skin
that tastes exactly the way
prostitute skin should taste
after i smother it in smooth vaseline.
between my legs, i have a flashlight
at the end of a tunnel
that was made out of lost shoes
and smells like all the places
where lost shoes have been.

I keep my seventeen cats behind the garage
Where I go to make sandwiches
out of cigarettes and methadone and two fat
slices of pot brownies, sliced thin.

my head is made of one giant lightbulb
I have a blacklight in my pelvis.
they make interesting colors when I move around
they keep the right places nice and warm,
and they attract the right number of flies
men don't come to me unless
i can attract lots of flies.

somebody told me to say I loved him.
this exceeds the parameters of my design
I was only supposed to fuel his vanity
and his self-disgust

In truth, I suspect love is like when my seventeen cats,
upon eating their sandwiches,
stagger away and away and away
and then, they fall down.

Monday, August 27, 2007

life never stops for anyone

Life Never Stops for Anyone

can't see the trees
for the paper
can't see the paper for the black ink
can't see the black ink

“and i know my clients
i've got this client i know
the da's agreed to this
get his stuff in before the kid goes on a ski trip
and i know the da's agreed to this
but bullshit
the driver says he couldn't see
hey, i think i better go in and give blood
maybe about eight in the morning”

“do you want it on a plate?"
"no kidding,
that sugar goes straight through
it's not like the processed sugar”

“she had this bed sore
they had to operate on it
she can't swallow, so they make her
eat through her stomach
they were overfeeding her
she got so full she just threw it up
white-chocolate mocha, do you want some?
it was shocking
he was good looking”

this sound -- this sound -- this sound sound sound

“him and his girlfriend
he was more of a cousin than a brother
do you like it?
life never stops for anyone
my friend's mom also died
no one really understands”

dances slumped in chairs

can't see the cloud
in all this rain
can't see the rain
in all this light
can't see the light
in all this skin
can't see the skin
in all this eye
can't see the eye

Sunday, August 26, 2007

love story of beatrix fortuna

Her left arm was lost in the Moon War.
Along with her eyes, and her mouth,
And her guts don’t quite work right
Sometimes, she spits up screws
And wires and things from inside
Where her body is rejecting her new bits

On dates, at meetings, at social gatherings
People reach out and shake that new hand
Her eyes light up in pain
They flash and roll back into her head
And, if the hand-shaker is lucky,
The girl’s secret stash of money
- hidden in her strange, new chest cavity
- pops out.
Usually, only chewed up screws
Lost teeth, bits of yesterday’s dinner

They call her randomized response girl
They call her Lady Luck, in Vegas.
Or, her Christian name: Beatrix Fortuna,
fallen from the cockpit
After that giant robot battle

One time, a lucky robot shook her hand
Her metal heart fell out of her mouth.
“Give it back,” she said, to the robot.
Instead, the robot kept it. He had won it, after all.

Then, he opened his chest cavity.
He pulled his diamond heart out.
He placed it in her palm,

Burning, beating,
oozing boiling mercury
down her metal palm.

Friday, August 24, 2007

aspirin love

barefoot, three coats, and smelled like sand
dude said the end is near, man, so, man, get ready, man
men in white and blue jabbed with syringes, three
dude preached the miracles from his gurney

she told me she’d do anythin’
if I was strong enough to love through ruin
she shot her daddy down and fled to Mexico
federalis burned her motel, nowhere else to go-go

heard they can take a cell of the martyrs
heal every sickness, ease all that’s harder
put one of those inside of all of us
we’ll charge the sky in electric chariots
lightning rods and tidal power

pasteurize the pity
with aspirin love
until everything is green
and everything is green

Thursday, August 23, 2007

somebody asked me today, what i am reading at the moment

i tend to read more than one book at once. i have a pretty good memory for where i am in what book, and have no trouble drifting between them like channel-surfing.

right now, and depending on where i am sitting in my apartment, i am reading these books:

On my dining room table, there are two books, depending on my mood and which side of the table I happen to be sitting on:




in my living room, depending on where i sit down, i could pick up where i left off in any of these books:






in the office area, wherein cats have staked strong claim, and i am lucky to find a place to sit most days:

Gulf Coast Literary Magazine, for some reason unavailable at Amazon.

also, this is a great work of literature that i read in that space, and don't tell me it's just an old video game. this is a novel-length work of staggering story-telling genius.


in my bedroom, near my bed, there are a dozen books half-read, half-opened. i shall share only three that i have been reading through lately.





so, what am i reading these days? this. also, at work, i've kept a copy of the epic classic, "The Song of Roland" that was translated in the sixties, and i bought for 88 cents at a used book store.

does this answer your question, or merely confuse you as much as it seems to confuse everyone when they ask me what i'm reading these days and i walk them around my apartment?

i think i'm going to go read something right now...

out of coffee

alas, i have run out of coffee.

this emergency scenario is exacerbated by the sad reality that i do not have the coffee necessary to be mentally prepared to go to the store and acquire coffee.

the last time i went to the store to get coffee in this scenario, i bought a bunch of tropical fruits, some ramen noodle soup, garlic bread, and doritos. none of these things, i needed. none of them were coffee.

before that, i went to the store, and spent all of my grocery money on candy. all of it. it was the first shiny thing i saw.

why, just now, i remembered that i had left garlic bread in my oven that i had bought the last time i had ran out of coffee. it's been sitting in that oven for over a week. i opened up the oven, thinking - whatever happened to that garlic bread i bought last time i ran out of coffee - and there it was!

i'm seriously considering eating the garlic bread, if only because i am out of coffee.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

just heard from...

i just heard from the literary e-zine coyote wild.

they want to pick up my short story "last star" for publication. i now must sign contracts, tell them where to send money, etc.

this is the second-best way to start one's day.*

i woke up. i made coffee. i started the laundry. i sat down to check my e-mail with my coffee in my hand. i filled out a big author faq for wizards of the coast's publicity firm. then, i found out i sold a short story.

i feel like such an authorial author-type of an author right now.

feels good.

watch for my story "last star" at this magazine: http://coyotewildmag.com/


*(the best way to start one's day involves checking the lottery numbers, realizing you've won, and still managing to celebrate without spilling your coffee.)

speaking of lotteries... this one's getting stellar reviews. maybe we should go to the store today and see if we can't find it, yeah?

Monday, August 20, 2007

china has apparently launched a television campaign

china recently decided to launch a television campaign to promote the safety of their products:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070820/ap_on_re_as/china_tainted_products

in other news, over 180 miners were trapped and doomed to death in the unsafe mines, where 13 people die everyday.

the country is accused of treating the coal miners like sacrificial animals. coal is the primary source of energy in the country. it is dangerously polluting. it is dangerous to the miners.

it is the power of the products that are going to get a nice, new ad campaign.

whether this or that product is safe for consumers, all of the products are unsafe for miners.

Sunday, August 19, 2007

gossip's in the subtext

-why don't they get married?
-they want to wait until they're, like, financially ready. but, you know, they like to take it slow, you know.
-that's weird.
-yeah, she likes to flirt, but...
-i noticed. 'cause she was sayin' to me, "don't get married!"
-that's 'cause you're so young!
-yeah, but, still...
-she likes to flirt, but, you know, who doesn't?
-that's weird.

a young woman tells a story about how everyone she knew in high school got married right away, had kids, and then they all divorced. it was the love of their life. now, they're young and divorced with kids and that's how it is in small towns. she says, also, "if you ever go to a country high school - and i don't know why - but senior year, 1/3 of the people drop out. don't know why."

gossip is in the subtext. they were talking about something else, entirely. it had to do with love found, and love lost, i'm sure.

sometimes i think that's all people ever talk about, really. love found. love lost.

after dark crystals



years have passed, and still i recall the dreams i had after watching this film. they were not adventure dreams, like the star wars imaginary battles with evil dark jedi. the dark crystal dreams were deserts and jungles and primitive cultures rebuilding after an awful genocide. they were before the genocide, right at the cusp of disaster.

these melancholy dreams return to me sometimes, and i cannot remember all the details right. i cannot remember any of the details.

i think we are all amnesiacs reaching into the hidden pockets where our folded brains hold our lost selves like tiny crystals of black salt.

we search and search for the things that remind us of our lost selves, our lost selfhood. by searching through nostalgia and kitzch and old movies and collectibles and all the errata of youtube and google and boingboing, we are searching for that moment when we felt something.

Something powerful.

We have forgotten far more than we can remember. We have all become amnesiacs, grasping in the dark into the cabinets of lost memories, searching for the moment when we were in joy.

Saturday, August 18, 2007

the cover is done!

one of the reasons i have the amazon link to the right (besides the whole link-directly-to-the-bookstore-where-you-can-buy-my-book thing) was to see if and when the cover might actually show up.

i've seen that golden head in various stages, and supported it all the way.

the artist was Henry Higginbotham. the moment i saw the incomplete sculpture, i knew it was going to be perfect. and, there it is and the golden head of henry higginbotham is the coolest thing i have seen all day - and i went to the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art today and watched a Magnolia at the Modern Janus film!

Great job, Henry.

Super fantastic job, also to the art team at Wizards that translated a wicked awesome sculpture into a wicked awesome cover! If I knew your names, I'd mention them here because you all did a stellar job!

And, just because I can, a direct link to the Amazon page, complete with the cool cover!


Here's Henry's website, in case you'd like to know more about him:

http://www.henryhigginbotham.com/

Friday, August 17, 2007

hiraki sawa, and the guy with the oxygen machine

discovered the haunting work of a japanese artist named hiraki sawa at the fort worth museum of modern art.

he makes films like screensavers full of surreal imagery moving in mundane places.

if you have real player, you can check out the video that was showing in the fort worth museum of modern art (this website is in french):

http://www.arte.tv/fr/art-musique/die-nacht-la-nuit/Die-Nacht-_2F-La-Nuit-_2325/369052,CmC=369062.html

here's the artist's website with snippets and tastes of some of his other films:

http://www.softkipper.com/index.htm

whilst at the fort worth museum of modern art, i also caught a film. i sat down in back. i waited patiently.

then, this old man walked in and sat next to me in the empty room - not RIGHT next to me, two seats were between us - and he had a device in his hand that connected with tubes to his nostrils. every two or three seconds the machine made a whooshing whir of a noise, at the decibel level of a loud whisper. WHOOSH.... WHOOSH.... WHOOSH...

i don't want to kick him out of the theatre for his medical device, no matter how annoying. i do wonder why he sat down next to me in an empty room. he wanted me to move? he wanted to test me, somehow? what was he trying to prove?

i do not know. i got up. i moved to the other side of the room. still, i heard it in the air. WHOOSH... WHOOSH... WHOOSH...

the movie started, and i couldn't stop hearing it until about halfway through the film.

i don't know if it was a guilty noise, or an accusatory noise, or just some symbol of death on a friday evening. decrepitude walks among the young and hip. he carries his single lifeline in his hands, making annoying noises and warning of the time to come, when we will not be young or hip. we will have new hips that do not work as well as they used to. we will slouch not because we are pretending to have a reckless attitude, but because we cannot hold our own shoulders up.

gather ye rosebuds while ye may. death comes for us all someday.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

fall webworm

the tree outside my door has become infested with these strange, beautiful worms. they sew giant sleeping bags across the leaves of the tree that grow larger and larger like a big spiderweb, but it is only a tent to protect them from predators while the webworm feasts on leaves.

growing up, we had two trees in our front yard and two in our backyard that became home to these little, furry creatures. they fell into the car, into backpacks, into the cracks in the old house. like an old man's eyebrow that has come to life, these white bugs meander all over the walls of my memories.

now, they have found a home outside my window. the tree, like its hands are wrapped in bandages, does nothing to stop the webworm. the webworms crawl up and down the doorways and patios. they climb over windows. they tickle your hand in the dark when you reach for the door.

the fall webworm is harmless unless you are a tree. however, they do attract hornets that hunt them. more than one stray hornet has chased a fall webworm into my apartment, where the hornet becomes the hunted victim of a very agile cat.

all in all, i am fond of the fall webwrom. i feel like calling all of them mortimer. they all look like tiny mortimers, to me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_webworm

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

PSA from Stacy Whitman's Grimoire

from: http://slwhitman.livejournal.com/2007/08/10/

[quote]And now a public service announcement from the adult side of the books department. If you've seen the latest PW, you should look for the WotC Discoveries ad about halfway through--it's very nice. Note that they'll be open for unagented submissions next month, though agented submissions can be sent year-round.

Wizards of the Coast Discoveries™ is a fantasy-tinged speculative fiction imprint that discovers new worlds, new talent, and new voices for adult fiction readers.

Wizards of the Coast Discoveries, a brand new imprint debuting in January 2008, is looking for well-written speculative fiction. We will open for submissions September 1 and close for submissions January 15. Further guidelines can be found at http://www.wotcdiscoveries.com.

Agented submissions are welcome year round.

In January 2008, Discoveries will launch this exciting new imprint with Firefly Rain, a southern gothic ghost story by Richard Dansky. Further launch titles include Last Dragon by J.M. McDermott and Devil’s Cape by Rob Rogers, both first-time novelists who were selected from previous open calls.

Good Luck!



So if you've got a manuscript you think would fit Discoveries--I hear from my compatriots that they're looking for speculative fiction like magical realism, high fantasy that breaks boundaries (i.e., this is not your father's high fantasy), horror--they're pretty open right now, but it needs to be of a literary bent for adults. Follow the submission guidelines and don't submit until Sept. 1.

And feel free to pass this along to writers you know, writing groups, etc.[/quote]

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

brief exploration of robots

when we design robots, we make them look like ourselves, perform amazing feats of human genius. they play chess. solve rubik's cubes. they beat us at these things. yet, still we design them to look and perform like humans, measure greatness in the quality of the imitation.



but robots are not copies of our selves. they are a physical embodiment of a function. like these robots from cornell.



still, when we deal with rubik's cube solving robots, part of that function is showmanship. We make them look like ourselves to make people wonder at our self.



also, notice in this final video there is a young girl. children are the original extensions of self.

children: the original robots.

Monday, August 13, 2007

tiny pieces of glass from abandoned things

the pagan mountain god, El, made covenant with His servant. El divided bulls and doves and geese and dolphins in twain. leviathans divided in twain. fleas divided in twain. El divided everything alive except for a man and a woman on that long plain.
his servant, a diminished soul, trembled in the blood of so many dead things. he wondered how long ‘twould be before the divisions came for the servants.
the ritual was simple enough. one makes a vow. one passes between the divided beasts as many times as there are beasts. if one breaches the oath, one becomes divided like the dead beasts.
El made his vow, to his servant. his servant received it, in terror.
El’s footsteps through the bloody sands – red mud – steamed in the heat of the ancient fires. sand and blood melted into purple glass, cracking under the weight of the oath. In one long night, time slowed near still, and this old mountain God passed through once for each beast – a billion times.
the servant, terrified, watched as the old god made this vow. he aged a thousand years. he died and was raised from death a thousand times, watching this vow.
the cracked glass beneath the old god’s feet sparkled in the torchlight like the stars of the oath.
El had pointed to the heavens. El had said, “your descendents shall be as numerous as the stars.” to a foolish, dirty servant, as ignorant as the slaughtered beasts, El had withheld the truth. Your descendants shall fill the stars. Each and every star shall hold a child of man in the gravity well – a billion children of men. Let the universe fill with these creatures until a singularity comes where mortal passes – like waking up – into immortality.
after the ceremony, El returned to is family with the holy alphabet where soundwaves rattle and bend reality beyond the silver veil of atoms.
El had created himself in his own past.

Sunday, August 12, 2007

i don't know which is worse...

1) being last on the list... dead, stinking last.

2) getting the book description horribly mucked up.

http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6465832.html

Saturday, August 11, 2007

upon the death of my corn pops cereal

alas, my corn pops cereal was infested with a horde of hungry ants. i had left the box upon my counter closed and - i had thought - sealed shut. but ants broke through my little efforts. they climbed down into the golden stash of sweet, corny goodness.

angry, i threw the whole box in the trash, wishing ruin upon those sneaky ants.

yet, the ants were not so cursed. they were broken from their tribe - this is true - but the little beasts could live their days in peace and gluttony among the corn pops and all the other bits of filth that fill the trash bag, and the dumpster, and the dump truck, and the dump.

i was no psychopomp of damnation. i was an angel of mercy, tossing these blessed thieves into a paradise. the only lingering pain is the loss of the tribe.

yet, this is also a loss of duties. these ants, with nothing but time and ample food, might create a new language of smell in the filth. they might craft tiny baubles and compete for the aesthetic pleasure of their tiny eyes and sensors.

i have created a convent in a plastic bag. i have created culture.

yet, i would trade this new ant civilization in a heartbeat if i could still eat my corn pops.

Friday, August 10, 2007

bits of paper

crumbled bits of paper tumble out of pockets at the end of the work day, after good citizens have stumbled home from traffic and gymnasiums and happy hours and everything they do before they turn off the lights and think about death in the dark.

televisions drown out the worst of it. but even those get turned off.

then, crumbled bits of paper emerge from the bottom of pockets. some of them are receipts. some of them are notes. i pushed the papers open, searching for phone numbers that might have been slipped inside by some anonymous paramour.

i found nothing. i sat in the dark, and i thought about death until the dreams came.

Thursday, August 9, 2007

about texas summers...

in my corn pops, i acquired a spongebob squarepants pencil topper with big poofy hair. the green hair is supposed to change color when you warm it up with your hands, or your breath.

i blew on it a while. i rubbed it with my hands. nothing.

then, i remembered that i lived in texas, in august. i put the pencil topper in the freezer for a while.

it came out with blue hair. i rubbed it and blew on it and succeeded in making green hair.

the directions say that the hair is supposed to change color when you heat it up. around here, that means you have to cool it down.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007

mr wu is my hero

boingboing is awesome. thank you boingboing for this amazing discovery.

http://www.boingboing.net/2007/08/08/chinese_robot_farmer.html

here's the youtube video:

Tuesday, August 7, 2007

things that make you evaporate into thin air

a robot designed to perform a simulation of an electronic simulation of primitivism.

a.k.a. a simulation designed to simulate simians with the task of a simulation of simians simulating simian precognitive sentience.

anyday now, we will all collectively evaporate into thin air and wander ethereal streets leading nowhere.

turtle



there he is, soaking up the sun where the teenagers usually put their shoes when they're swimming. this is a swimming hole, and it is supposed to be full of people and blue water and that rock is supposed to be above the water. it is a lovely place to sit and watch the wind blow through the trees on a warm summer day. it is the place where teenagers line their shoes up like little turtles on the stones.

it rained and rained and rained. it rained so much that shoes turned into turtles to protect themselves from the rain. the only shoe left is the one that could transform into a turtle.

perhaps when the rainwater washes downstream, and the river isn't so fat and brown, the blue water will bless the turtle, and he will be a shoe again.

Monday, August 6, 2007

invisible deer



invisible doe
eating invisible grass
did not run from me

Wednesday, August 1, 2007

busy week

i'll be back later. subscribe and you'll get an e-mail.

tschues.