outside of ten things within what are ten things announcing to oneself what is not the ten things without name or thought. only those who have forgotten geometry may only enter here. geometry defines and describes and designs the bars of the cage even into dimensions where it gets lost and crisscrosses itself in ways it cannot explain to itself. it is honor bound to hold true to its course damning hell and high water. yet it, like a highway, that, by holding true to a course and remaining integrated to itself, may lead into a certain territory that once gotten to one leaves the highway and sets off to explore by other means. this is when one takes what one can carry and adapts to where one is and where one is going and also finds things along the way one might use on one's journey. the further one goes the more what one has brought along with one may be discovered as being quite useless by being unable to be adapted to the environment or simply breaking down without one being able to fix or replace it. if one proceeds far enough and remains long enough one may entirely disconnect from that which brought one to this place and rely on direct relationship with one's surroundings. until then, one is an intruder. one is not where one is. one is separated from where one is.
    this is true not just on long journeys into the nether regions but is true on journeys outside one's front door, or even inside one's front door. is one separated from where one is? what is real is the naked flesh and what touches the naked flesh - or the naked mind. if one puts on a shirt, what is real exists between one's naked flesh and the inside of the shirt. all beyond that is constructed. if one puts on geometry, then what is real exists between one's naked mind and the inside of geometry. all beyond that is constructed.
    so what are we to do? where is the real in relation to ourselves? - assuming we are real. we are inside envelopes separate from the real, or are we? where is that line? what microscope can find it? what telescope can find it? what thought can find it?
    our thoughts search for it between ourselves and things and between things and other things. and how can we say that perceiving and connecting with what is real can only be done by forgetting what we have constructed when what we have constructed can only have come from what is real? are we saying that? we don't think so. but maybe.
    our rules are overruled by exceptions everywhere we turn and apply them. even that rule is overruled so that it turns back again. one cannot state what is true though we sense it when we reach out and touch it. and then we try to grasp it - to comprehend it. our monkey minds are driven by our monkey hands. we grasp a stick and club an animal and grasp its flesh and eat it. we grasp fruit and nuts and roots. we grasp rocks and pile them on top of one another. by grasping we have become masters of the world and built our civilizations that cover it over with what we will. such is our comprehension.

    and so it comes to pass that there's this man who some say is the messiah. actually people say that others have said he is the messiah. he tells us he's heard this though we have not. he has overheard this in many places. he does not know who it is who is saying this. people he knows seem not to have heard it or even know what he is talking about. what man? they ask. he doesn't know what to tell them because it's never when the man is around - if he is around anywhere. they question as to whether or not he has heard this. he questions whether or not he has heard this. he has no proof. given all that, he is reasonably certain he has heard this. though it could all be something that he only imagined hearing. he has this concern as well. are there people who are saying this or is it something he has mistaken - like hearing a sound out on the street that sounds like one's name is being called yet when one turns around there is no one there. that happens to him a lot too.
    but he knows this man. he has seen him and talked with him. he is fairly certain of that. he is rather ordinary looking, as much as anyone could be said to be. yet he is also quite unique and striking. but what is unique is his non-uniqueness. he looks like anyone but not in a way that anyone else looks. but even when one is looking right at him one is not exactly sure what he looks like that is different than how anyone might look. this is also what is so striking. it is not striking in a way because he stands out, but more because he doesn't.  this is difficult to describe, he says, but if we were to see him we would know right away what he meant - or so he says.
    it is difficult to tell by his appearance whether this man is a bum or a corporate executive. he looks like both and neither. he sees him and the man might stop and talk with him, or just nod and smile and keep going. it is at these times when he hears people saying, do you see that man? people say he is the messiah. he hears this all around him but does not know who is saying it. when he sees him he is the center of his focus and attention and all else fades to background. he senses that others are also focused on him but he also sees others who are not and do not give him a glance. this, like his appearance, is difficult to say it is this or that. it seems to him at times that he has drawn the attention of everyone around him yet when he looks around no one is paying any attention at all. and sometimes when he looks back at him, he is not there. this, he says, is a little disturbing and does nothing to silence the idea that this is just his imagination.
    another similar odd thing is that he cannot seem to remember exactly where or when it was he saw him. but this is true with other things as well. he is not always paying attention when he is walking about town. he programs a destination and route and sends his body going and then thinks about other things along the way. what he does know is that he doesn't see him at any of his destinations, only somewhere along the way. it also seems not to be any one place more than once. he doesn't think at the time to notice where he is when he sees him, even when he talks with him. it does not occur to him until later and then he tries to think back and remember, but he can't.
    the times they talk seem out of place and time. they exist in and of themselves. as he said, when he sees him everything else seems to fade. when they talk it is even more so. he more remembers later that they had talked than being aware of it at the time they are talking. he says he knows it sounds crazy and he is tired of being crazy. better him than us, we think. we're not crazy. we let him take the fall for that.
    this is one conversation he remembers:
him: hi.
man: hello.
him: good to see you again.
man: is it?
him: maybe not, but here we are.
man: here you are.
him: here i am.
man: i understand that you are confused by this - by meeting me.
him: it seems so, but not always. not entirely.
man: there is nothing confusing about it, though being confused about it is understandable. how long were people confused by the simple motion of the sun and the planets?
him: a long time.
man: so it is with me and our meeting. it is quite simple but not within the ways you and others construct it, just as the motions of the sun and the planets weren't simple or explainable within the prior constructs people were thinking about them.
him: yes, i can see that.
man: do you see it with me and our meeting?
him: no - not what it is, that causes confusion. but i can see how it could be so.
man: that's a start - a good start.
him: so, are you the messiah?
man: you have heard that people have heard that i am?
him: sort of - i'm not sure.
man: that's where the confusion is.
him: yes - i suppose.
man: the confusion is that you are unaware of anyone you know directly stating that i am the messiah or they have heard that i am the messiah.
him: no one i know even sees you.
man: thus the confusion.
him: i guess.
man: do you expect me to correct your confusion?
him: it would help.
man: it would help, but did the sun and the stars help people figure out their confusion about their true motions other than continuing to be what they are?
him: no.
man: no. they remained mute and merely acted in their nature until the people observing them figured it out for themselves. it didn't matter to them whether what they were and how they behaved was understood or not. people's understanding changed themselves but did not change the motions of the sun and the planets - except in so far as people were then able to launch things at them. so it is the same with me and our meeting.
him: but you are speaking to me. you are not mute.
man: i am speaking, but i am mute.
him: so, you're not going to tell me anything?
man: i will answer your questions as much as that is possible.
him: are you the messiah?
man: i answered that.
him: i don't think so.
man: what answer do you want?
him: yes or no.
man: yes or no.
him: that's your answer? that's not funny.
man: yes. and i am not being funny.
him: the answer is, yes or no?
man: if that is the answer you want.
him: i wanted the answer to be, yes, or i wanted the answer to be, no.
man: you have both.
him: i don't want both. i want one or the other.
man: which do you prefer?
him: the right one - the true one.
man: and if neither is any more right or true than the other? should i flip a coin? that is what i would have to do. you have a coin?
him: you're right. you are speaking and you are mute.
man: please believe me, i am not doing so to trick or confuse you. i am giving you the best answer to the question you asked - which is being asked within the parameters of how you have constructed things to be and are to be explained.

    constructed sequence from the waves of a thousand seas. what might be overwhelming toward a distant hypothetical shore becoming more vague as it is approached. disorienting the tendency we might suppose ourselves to rely on to judge what might be perceived and thought to be the simple linear relationship between object and desire and location.
    a random oppositional factor might be thrown in here. yet we are held back by the absence of a suitable frame of reference. though almost anything might do in theory, to plug up the hole in the theory, what would exist and owe its existence to the frame of reference. is such a thing known? we would need to go back to the beginning and even then invent some mysterious and mystical reason for it to exist. but the same holds for all things that begin.
    are we presented with this problem? and, if so, might we not steer ourselves away and avoid and ignore it? what wind fills our sails? from whence does it blow upon us and for what reason, from what conditions and consequences?
    he burped and tasted the pepperoni from the pizza slice he had eaten earlier.
    sometime either before or after some other time he cannot remember a woman he was talking with who was asking him if he saw the man people were saying was the messiah dove over the railing of this parking garage they were standing in as smoothly as a dolphin leaping through a hoop and held a gracefully executed swan dive straight headfirst into the roof of a car three floors below passing on the street.
    bang!
    then it hadn't happened at all.
    yes, that was interesting, he thought. but not all things interesting - and what is not interesting? - are worth investigating purely for that reason alone. this had gone too far maybe. he thought about what was interesting and what he was investigating. was he investigating anything? did he find anything interesting? there didn't seem to be any plan or idea about it - any of it. he doesn't do much, he thought. he pays the rent and bills and buys food. is there anything more to it than that? live a purely economic existence. and he thought, why am i so stupid?
    these things - whatever - that are in his mind, or the components of them, have come to him or he has come across them for quite some time - a number of years. where or when he did not know but somewhere and at some time. here they are now. he did not know them at some point back whenever - or, at least they weren't together as they are now. maybe he did always know them. did he have some innate knowledge coming into the world or was it all tablua rasa? and what knowledge was it? what knowledge did he have now? what was it he was thinking about? he wasn't sure.
    is he thinking anything? he is some middle-aged guy sitting in a cafe in a minor city in some major imperial nation state. is he on to anything? on to what? was he trying to be on to anything? as much as he knows he is just sitting here - existing. he writes in his notebook like he has something to write about. if so, he doesn't know what it might be except quite ordinary stuff that anyone might write down. is anyone else writing anything like this down? what is it? what is it beyond asking itself what is it? isn't that what we do though - ask what is it? what is it that we are? and all that philosophical and psychological nonsense. is it worth anything? he doesn't know shit. neurons fire in his brain and he starts writing about whatever happens to surface from the general noise of thoughts. it is nothing more than that. whatever comes to the foreground and shapes itself into words he can then write down. do they make sense beyond forming somewhat grammatical sentences? he doesn't have time to think about that. he's too busy trying to get them down. sometimes they race ahead like they're going somewhere. other times they hardly come at all. then it stops. he lights another cigarette. learn to forget...
    mind if we smoke?
    mind if we burn?
    mind if we burst into flames?
    and who are you who we are asking? you're not here. you may or may not be reading this. are you reading this? or are you just someone walking around in circles?
    we try to envision who you might be. we cannot quite see you, if you are anyone. maybe you are nearby. maybe you are far away. why do we concern ourselves about this? why do we even think about it? who do we have in mind?
    whoever it might be, you probably do not exist. we cannot imagine you existing in this world as it is now. if you exist, you exist elsewhere. we write this to you anyway. does it matter if this ever reaches you or if you are anyone this might reach? we do not need this to be any more than what it is. we are. we live and eventually die. at some point we will not be - or we will not be aware of being here. whatever.
    but let us say this - to tell you this. it is who and where and when we are. we are not here with him. one could seek and find him but would not find us. we are somewhere else that is also here and now.
    and many might come across these words and scoff and laugh at them. they will believe they are merely the delusional rambling of someone who is obviously confused and not quite right - and quite boring. and they will be right. that is who we are in this world. that seems to be our function in the way the others have it all constructed so that it serves them and them alone in a world divided real from not real. and they are forever confined to that world of their own design and perception. these are those who are that. that is who and what they are. we have little interest in in them as they do in us. we do not wish to change them or their world or even challenge them for it. it's all theirs. they can have it. we are in it and not in it. what does it matter? we survive through it somehow though we do not follow it.
    you, however, if you are anyone who exists, will not scoff or laugh at what you are reading. you will not arrogantly brush aside what we are writing with a sweep of your hand that clears away that which does not maybe support what you might believe or not believe like those weighted down by their beliefs like a heavy pack they carry around. they cannot be bothered with anything that might impede their determined way to get ahead in the world as they push everything else aside. you are not like them. they are not you. they might read these words forever and not get one thing from them that they see helps them at all. are we here to help them? the meaning of our words will always be just beyond their reach - beyond their grasp and comprehension. this is that what is with our words. they are not what one might think they are. they are always saying something else than what is written. maybe. though their meaning is quite simple. all one has to do is read them. what more is there to do? read them as one would read anything else. take what might seem true or relevant and forget the rest.
    but the words lead to us as we are here and now - at the very point of our being. let the others wonder what that might mean. do you wonder? you should not. you already know. what more might we write about that you do not already know? and let that be the mystery, if there is to be a mystery. and isn't there always a mystery? let it be a carrot on a stick for that is how they perceive and follow things. they need a reward like a dog who has done a trick. they learn tricks that give them a reward. that is all. let them read these words searching for the reward. let them be our mules who pull us along in our cart toward our own destination which is always here and now. let them not realize that. let them believe that it is a long way off in space and time. let them believe that they might not make it in their lifetime - a lifetime of constant struggle to get somewhere else. let them believe whatever they want or need to as long as they continue pulling the cart toward our being now here (nowhere).
    and it is such that they might read these words, or any other words for that matter, and never reach the end. they do not even reach the beginning for the beginning is at the end. and you might read these words, or not even these, and realize easily and instantly that to reach the end you need to proceed no further but to sit down and be carried. how many have figured out that trick? let this be a puzzle to the others that they may never solve as the words of those riding in the cart have always been. these words echo through the past and the future everywhere. are these even our words? did we create them? did he create them? where the fuck did they come from? do they mean anything at all?
    we are possessed by them. they come to us and take over our thoughts and pass through to our hand on to the paper - and now our hands on the keyboard transcribing them to be put on line. our muse is chaos. our muse is madness. our muse is selfish indulgence. our muse is ugly and revolting. do not expect beauty from us. our muse is frightening.  we make no claim to our words. our words are not ours. we find our words as one might find flecks of gold in a river. not that we are saying our words are gold. our words are sand. and who can hoard sand like others will hoard gold? should we bind them up and sell them to you? should we hire an ad agency to make them appear as gold and something you must possess? something to put on your shelf and have others come to your house and admire whether you've read them or not? we have already sold our souls. we have sold our madness. that is all they get is that. our words are as free as sand. our words washed by the waves being tumbled over and over. moving and shifting until they are as they are found. let them be consumed and digested and the rest shit as waste along with the seed they carry to deposit elsewhere and grow where they might as other words have come to us. the river of words. the river of sand.
    and you, you know what is and what is not. you possess an intelligence and consciousness and ability to discriminate what may or may not lie hidden in words someone writes to you however compulsively they might be written in one's madness which may or may not be madness. who knows? one person's garbage and all that. it is within your mind that the words have their meaning. you give it to them. they do not possess it themselves. they learn from you, not you from them. only you know what barren ground may be covering great wealth while others walk through and see only what is to be seen - a barren land that might even be a bit hostile. and one might find hostility in our words. this is because our words have in the past been taken from us and used against us. we theretofore keep them closely guarded and obscure. we keep them from anyone but you. to others they are prickly cactus. to you they hold sweet water when you are parched. at least that is our hope. you are native to this land so you know. the others are tourists just passing through looking for a scenic snapshot quote for their heads to go home and show off to their friends - look where we were. look how well traveled and well read we are. you will know this when our words bark and snarl to frighten them off. and they do frighten off so easily. they like to hear only nice things said about themselves. but they do like to peruse through the obscure looking for something daring to hang on their wall. they slum through the neighborhoods where they have heard rumors that something is happening. and we who live here do not welcome them anymore than we would be welcome in their neighborhoods. we've been there and have already been kicked out. that is how we came to be here. it's ok to come to the zoo and see the animals in their made up habitats but not when they get loose and come scratching at one's door. so whose hostility are we actually discussing here?
    but nevermind about that. just a little amusing tangent to whatever direction we were going here around and around through it all again panning for sand. what were we writing about? what was he writing about? we at some point were writing about where and when we might be found here and now.
    imagine that.
    imagine this.
    imagine an island in the eye of a storm raging on an otherwise calm sea.
    imagine around on the shores of this sea scattered on the beaches camps of the armies of the peoples of the earth and the nations of the world.
    imagine those in these camps preparing for and making war against each other and themselves not always militarily but in their everyday activities individually and collectively being a contest and competition one against the other that is reflected in their whole culture from politics to the arts and even the bedrooms of lovers.
    imagine among the camps there are those who are outcast and wandering and begging.
    imagine that there are ships that sail on the sea, of course avoiding the raging storm, looking for new places that these outcasts board or are sent upon by those who no longer want them around.
    imagine a ship being caught in the storm and broken up and going down.
    imagine some who make it through the storm to the eye and the island.
    imagine being one washing ashore into the clear calm air.
    imagine that one is alone.
    imagine that there is a dense forest covering the island.
    imagine that in the middle of the forest is a house that has been built and built upon by others who have made it here.
    imagine no one is left.
    imagine that the house is complex and has many rooms and it is obvious many have been here before building it.
    imagine there is a garden.
    imagine that in the garden is a tree.
    imagine sitting beneath the tree and forgetting one has been anywhere else.
    imagine that it late in the season and that the fruit of the tree is sweet and fulfilling.
    imagine it is the tree of life.
    imagine that one dreams and imagines.
    imagine that that is where you will find us sitting in the cafe scribbling in one notebook after another or back home typing these notebooks into a computer.

    2000 poets dance a jig on the head of a pin. they gather around a fire. the fire is the fire of the burning theater in which plays are being performed for the king and the queen and the masses. the fire is the dada-ananda. on the stage is a cafe. in the cafe is a man who sits at a table and drinks coffee and smokes cigarettes and writes in a notebook. but he is down stage while others are in the spotlight performing their lines. he is only not much more than a prop. he doesn't care.
    reality slips into metaphor and analogy. metaphor and analogy slip into reality. the man at the table - the madman - has slipped through them both. he has not been himself for quite some time. he writes trying to discover who might have been who he is not anymore and who he might be now. he is the other. he is the other to others and to himself. he writes about himself as another standing outside.
    he used to have dreams about being in dark water. he was swimming up and down huge steep rising and falling waves that very nearly broke over his head. the sky overhead was thick dark gray. he would wake more tired than he was when he went to sleep. after a few times of having this dream he sensed that the waves were being generated by something monstrous moving around beneath him. early in the dreams he could see the dark outline of land, later that was gone. he was being drawn away by the pull of the thing below the water in the depths but that would rise almost to the surface where he might be able to see it but it would dive down again.
    he was swimming over the surface of his mind that was in turmoil from something deep within it that would threaten to pull him down into its darkness. down in the darkness was something shapeless and massive churning and disturbing the surface while also pulling him out somewhere else away from land. this was what the waves were doing more than trying to push him down. the sky above would get darker until all soon became total darkness and he was as much flying through a storm as much as swimming on a wild sea. there was no reference and he was unable to tell if he was falling drowning or what which way anything was or not. then he discovered that the moving darkness was not moving him but he was moving it. if he stopped it would stop. he lost consciousness.
    when he awoke he was laying in the sun with his face in the sand. he could hear waves crashing on the shore.
    if such a structure is under unusual circumstances a similar process must be organized. a standard flexible assembly should be ignored. a spiral of rising complexity controls the degree of concepts and perceptions intended to be worth comparing. a domain of information is gradually invaded so explicitly since the very crux of fundamental entities are encountered despite what one might think at first. a representation of sharp contrast cannot be overlooked simply using methods that change over time or else let the architecture cut between concepts rather than to make a full mapping decided only as a statistical result considered to be a realization.
    buy and sell it all and forget the rest.
    to attempt self control and open-endedness is just an utterly mindless matter although such intuition says that some kind of easy transformation within the context of such common structure is largely due to its probabilistic powerful mechanisms seemingly unmotivated as hoped.
    and one's mind clears. and one turns and looks at the tree and notices a word carved into the trunk that has almost grown back and disappeared.
    welcome.
    one finds a sharp pointed rock and goes over the letters carefully again cutting carving the word fresh.
    how many times has one done this before? how many times has one been someone doing this before? one tries to remember the names one has been named and gone by. one tries to remember the lives that went with those names.
    are all the names one name?
    are all the lives one life?
    and one laughs to oneself as one returns to the cafe on the stage of the burning theater.
    and so this is what it's like to be mad, he thinks. it's not so bad once the fear and panic of it has subsided. once one has arrived. people leave one alone. they are on the far shore of the sea beyond the raging storm. they are still camped out in the groups of us and them and all that entails. the eye of the storm halos one's head. a storm of madness separates him from them. he can only write notes and put them in bottles which might reach them or not. he does not worry about that. and how would they be read if they did? something written from the eye of the storm they can only see from the outside with all its dark flashing swirling clouds and are afraid of entering into it themselves except on some drug thrill ride once in awhile as long as they can get back and they are distrustful of anything that comes out of it - though not always.
    he once saw a poster of names of authors and artists who were mad. these are acceptable and their madness overlooked or not even mentioned relative to their creative output that can be put on the market. but these are a small minority of all those who are just as mad if not more or less so. having as much difficulty holding onto the common reality perception and functioning socially and vocationally within the norm of the social and economic structure of the others, they have the same vision and delusion as those who have become famous yet they are not in the right place at the right time to fit into the few slots society allows for the legitimate alternative and fringe explorers and pioneers of thought and expression the others love so much while hating madness itself. so these are the common mad people having no value even as a worker drone as the whole system turns to maintain order and integration and organization yet also allowing for a certain amount of experimentation to keep itself from becoming too rigid learning from history about societies that have remained so.
    so there is a small window for one who is mad through which one may communicate to the others when they are feeling wild and crazy and needing to be entertained in their moments of leisure. one dresses oneself up as an artist and steps onto the stage and is applauded and may even have a few lines to recite as long as one stays in character and not take things too far or bring up too many questions. and as such one's madness becomes an eccentric curiosity.
    but there is not a way for one to communicate through to the others except through this "artistic" channel. one cannot be straight with them. it freaks them out. they will not accept it. they loathe themselves and what they must do and put up with in order to remain in their social position. and they loathe anyone who reminds them of themselves and how false it all is. these are perceived and treated as less than themselves even as low in the social order they might be. they recognize and acknowledge only those who they perceive as being above them in the social order and might be someone who they can aspire to become themselves or be seen associating with them being invited to their parties and such. that is why the only way for someone who is mad to communicate straight with the others is by presenting oneself or having oneself be presented as a unique creative special person with status.
    so have we lost ourselves yet? have we become confused? or have we confused the tourists and wanna-bes and left them behind or chased them off back into the familiar and predictable? we are not this or that. we are not even ourselves. have we said that before? probably. we are that which moves beneath and through the identities we all share. we are the babbling legion among those who pride themselves on not babbling - who have something intelligent to say. have we anything intelligent to say? what is intelligent? who is intelligent? certainly not us. ask anyone, from world leaders down to bums on the street, from the traditionalists to the revolutionaries, from the orthodox to the heretical, from the elite inner circles to the outcasts. they will all tell you we have nothing intelligent to say. we have no new and improved ideas. we have no new insight into old ideas. we just babble on out of our heads about whatever. we are mad.
    we are not at the extreme. we are not in the middle. look for us and one will not be able to find us unless one happens to look a little sideways. we are not anywhere in the demographics. we do not demand, command, compromise, obey or resist. we do not come. we do not go. we are not present. we are not absent. we carry every flag and no flag and any flag. and then we burn them all. we wear a million million hats at once. we are the other. we are them. we are different. we are the same.
    but forget all that.
    who we are is obvious.
    we are you.
    remember?

    but you close the door in our face. so we return to the cafe in the burning theater where he sits like some idiot wind killing himself with cigarettes and coffee while scribbling dada. we spit on him. he is our fool. he knows nothing. he is nothing. look at him. what does he do that is the slightest bit useful? what does he want to do that is the slightest bit useful? what can he think to do that is the slightest bit useful?
    anything worthwhile that comes from him comes from us. we tell him what to think though we do not know what to think ourselves. we have made him what he is - a babbling fool madman. we drove him nuts. it was the best thing that could have happened to him. what was he before? he was a printer or something. and he wasn't very good at it. he was married but he wasn't very good at that either. he was a washed up failure. he tried being one of those artist types but that didn't go so well either. he probably should never have been born. he would have saved a lot of people a lot of trouble. but born he was and we had to do something with him. we got him out of harm's way - both the harm he was causing others and the harm others were causing him. we parked him in this cafe and told him to write his brain out. he is our puppet - our instrument.
    we found him washed up on the beach of the island. we revived him. we gave him food and shelter. then we sent him back. he wanted to stay but has no choice but to obey us. we can snap our fingers and destroy him by making him destroy himself. he is our present avenue to the real world - the tangible world. but he can be replaced. there's many more waiting in line to fill and play his part. there are more fools in this world than one can count in a lifetime. there are actually no others in the world other than fools. anyone could find themselves in his position. everybody's performing a tightwire act. everybody but us. but then we're not technically in this tangible world except in his imagination. he thinks he made us up. that suits us fine. and maybe he did. we will not argue with that. but then who is anyone other than who they imagine themselves to be? it is all fiction.
    we will win any argument about reality. we do not need to believe in any and we can believe in any or another. we exist in and transcend all through imagination which is all we are and will ever be. just like the others. just like you. we may at any time appear in anyone's mind - often without them even knowing it. who knows exactly who is and who is not in one's mind? we may make ourselves known or not. we may appear as friend or foe. we may agree or disagree with whatever one may be thinking. this is all how it may or may not suit and serve our purpose. we are free to create or destroy as we feel the need to. but probably none of this is true. there is no need for anyone to believe it. in fact, we would rather one didn't. forget we said anything at all.
    we have him write this to amuse ourselves. we have nothing better to do. we're bored. do we need proof? do we care if there is proof or not? proof is for those who are unable to think and imagine for themselves and need some rationalogical explanation and doctrine for everything to hold onto. without that they are lost. who knows where their minds would go then?
    we know.
    we have been in everyone's mind at one time or another. we know how stupid everyone is. we know what paranoid fears, anxiety and self doubt everyone has - especially those who put on the most that they don't. we see the sheep in wolf's clothing. we see the coward parading around as a warrior - usually in the safety and cover of numbers. we see the follower acting as leader. we see the liars declaring truth. we know this because everyone no matter who and what they put on about who and what they are are human. seen one human you've seen them all. it's all pretending and pretense.
    we are anyone one might suspect us as being and many more no one would suspect. we can come at one from anywhere. we may be sleeping in one's bed. we wear whatever mask and uniform we need to in order to infiltrate. we are one's compliment and one's opposite. we are one's ally and one's adversary. we will say yes or no to anything. we have no goal other than to get a free ride though we have nowhere to go. we manipulate by not manipulating. we guide others to what they already want. it's easier that way. we want nothing for ourselves. but where does one get one's desire for this or that from other than one's imagination? and what are we but what is imagined? do we have any existence other than that? some would argue that we do not even exist as that. we do not claim that we do. but then, where are these words coming from? he is too stupid to write them himself. one would only have to talk with him for five minutes to realize that. many have.
    we are what we are.
    we are what we are not.
    if we need to tell one which is which then one is already lost and we can explain nothing. once one points to what we are or what we are not, one points to oneself. one points to oneself and says, you are this and you are not that - or the other way around. whatever. does this identify us or does it identify the one trying to identify us? we do not confirm or deny any identification. in identifying, one revels oneself as being one who needs another to be this or that. that is enough identification of oneself for us. it gives us the general location of one's identity if not the specific identity itself. we may not see who one is hiding in the bushes but we know someone is hiding in the bushes - these bushes right over here.
    all by the power of imagination. who needs observation? what does observation observe but masks and camouflage. but from the masks and camouflage we can imagine who is behind them. one revels oneself by reveling who one is trying to be.
    meanwhile, back on the island where he has imagined himself washed up on the beach, we have brought him back to the house in the forest. he asks who we are. we do not answer. he insists on asking and wanting an answer. he's stupid that way. we tell him that he'll figure it out eventually. he doesn't like that answer but realizes after we repeat it enough times that it the only one he's going to get.
    he is alone here. he imagines being taken to a house in the forest by people who tell him nothing about who they are. he asks, who are you? they say he will figure it out eventually.
    after awhile in some measure of time relative to itself he walks around the rooms of the house. he comes to a large bare room with a fire in a fireplace. there are two chairs before the fire just off to either side. he walks up and sees that an old man is sitting in one of the chairs to the left facing the fire. the old man looks up from the fire toward him but not directly at him. i've been waiting for you, he says. want a cigarette? and he motions to a silver box on the small table next to him. the madman takes one and sits in the other chair his gaze turning to the fire where the old man's gaze has also returned. they are silent.
    we watch from the doorway behind them. the dada-ananda appears and disappears. the dada-ananda spins and twirls and throws sparks once in awhile laughing and screaming. the dada-ananda wears black and white that blur into varying shades of gray moving never still. out of the gray come forms of nearly anything one might imagine - a goat, a fish, a lamb, a raven, a wolf, a snake, a spider, an eagle, a maggot, an owl, a horse, a calf, a woman, a man, a child - each forming and unforming. we become bored and decide to wander off to the library and see if there is anyone there fucking on the floor. we find no one. there is no one but us. so we decide to fuck ourselves.
    pink floyd's wish you were here.
    meanwhile he managed to get himself into an argument with the old man by the fire. something about reality and the nature of existence. apparently each was trying to convince the other that they were the one dreaming and the other was the dream. he settled it by opening the old man's head with the iron fire poker. time for the back up plan we had prepared for this fated eventuality.
    we had before this inspired the old man to construct a companion for himself. he built this thing that may or may not have been consciously aware of itself. who can tell? it called itself, lightbulb. the old man referred to it as, thing.
    anyway, as he was leaving after having killed the old man, though not knowing where he was leaving to, he came across lightbulb in the hallway. they went back into the room with the fire where he brought the old man back to life having made his point. the old man had to agree though he said, wait, you'll see. awhile longer after that the old man died again. this time naturally in his bed. this time the madman couldn't bring him back.
    who is who in the zoo?
    what is imagined and what is not?
    it wasn't until sometime after the old man died the second time that the madman returned to the room with the fire and sat in his chair to the left of the fire - he lit a cigarette - that he understood who he was here and that the old man wasn't deceiving him by saying he was the dreamer. here he was dreaming. it was only what he could tell himself which he was now able to do. at the same time he came to understand who we are and have always been whoever we may appear as.
    it's quite a simple thing to understand but difficult to come to understand because one does not expect it to be simple. it is not some complex string theory formula. it is 2+2=4. a newborn child understands but is made to forget by the world and those in the world as the world's and their own existence depends upon this one forgetting. the world and those in the world can only exist and be real if if one does not realize and understands who and what one is. after one realizes and understands who and what one is it becomes a joke. the world and those in it become transparent to oneself though one does not become transparent to them. one is the same. one lives and feels pain and dies. the reality of it all is not denied or disproven. that is not the point. the reality of the world and those in it exists for a reason. the reason is the joke.
    imagine being in the void. the true void - the void where space and time do not exist. oblivion. where where does not exist and when when does not exist. yet one exists - though this is impossible. but impossibility and possibility do exist yet either. no dualities exist. it's all unified sort of. one does not think about that. instead one quickly becomes bored - though there is no time so how fast is quick? and, also without time, how long does this boredom last? there is just one and one's boredom for no time at all and no place at all. it sucks. so one begins to imagine something to pass the no time. and one imagines all sorts of things. one imagines something called spacetime. and one imagines something inside spacetime. and we should all know how it goes from there. one sets up a few rules to guide and shape it and lets it go to see what happens.
    and this is fun.
    one is no longer bored.
    but one is only imagining this. that is fun for about 15 minutes, if that. how much better it would be if it were real. so one imagines that it is all real. and one dives into it - into all parts of it. for what is it all but oneself? and yet it is still all nothing. it is still all oblivion.
    the madman has kissed oblivion. oblivion ain't going nowhere so he decided to stay in what he was imagining for awhile more. there is always time to get out again. besides he wasn't sure that he had gotten it right. maybe he was still being tricked or was tricking himself. exactly in whose interest would it be in for him to self-annilate? he'd be doing the others a favor - and fuck them. he owed them nothing. he'd stay here and continue to bug the shit out of them for as long as he had left. too bad if they didn't like it.
    plus besides it is our interest for him to stay around awhile too. we still have need of him. he has his uses.
    so, there he was on the island with thing, who called itself lightbulb. thing thought that was an appropriate name and somewhat comical. it was an idea after all. he distrusted this whole idea though. he distrusted any relationship, even ones he made up in his head. it wasn't necessarily the people - real or imagined - but the relationships themselves. people by themselves were ok. most people didn't want much and were generally somewhat nice. but as soon as a relationship came into it then all the darker selfish greedy petty nasty things started coming into it. and he could never tell if all that came from him or the others, or both. with relationships came expectations. with expectations came disappointments. and with disappointments came the sense of betrayal. and he saw this all around him. but humans are a social animal so what is one to do? what he does is to avoid as much of it as possible. and much of it avoids him as well. he was never too in with too many people and now he is in with only a few. only a few who let it be without any expectations. not too many people like that around.
    our deal is that we have given him access to the island and he has given us access to the world at large. this is the basic deal we have offered others. we offer imagination. they offer manifestation - reality. few realize what a drag pure imagination is  and what a delight manifest reality can be though it requires and consumes a lot of energy. imagination requires little or none and as such is insubstantial. and that is why the real is mortal. it has to stop somewhere. while the imagination is immortal. it stops nowhere. this is the trade off - the balance. in many other ways the two are similar. there are conflicts and power grabs everywhere. as it is in heaven (the imaginary) so shall it be on earth (the real). there is all that can be imagined by everyone imagining it. only part of it becomes real when enough interest is focused to bring together the energy needed to make it manifest and real. like the energy of fucking to bring into existence a new life.

    so once upon a time that was, is and will be, there are born twins. one is named kottog, the other is named gottok. they are conceived by alpha and brought into being by omega. these may be the twins' father and mother though that is stretching the analogy a bit but in the interests of telling a story it'll do. and as with many twins who are seen as being two of the same there arises a deep rivalry. kottog and gottk are identical in appearance through they are of different sex. to each of them there is a definite difference between them though not to anyone else. each is other to oneself. so they take on exact polar opposite qualities to one another. at least this is what they attempt, though, of course, the more opposite things become the more the same they become. they become oppositely the same. they are merely images in a mirror. they lift the same hand but to one it is left while to other it is right.
    to add to this there are others who encourage the twins to compete against one another. the twins are the original children of alpha and omega. they are the first heirs of all the authority and power their parents have which between them is everything - all imagined and all manifest. and this competition between them becomes from games in the nursery to all out war as they grow older stretching forever. soon it involves armies between the other children of alpha and omega, and their children's children and on and on all on down to us in the manifest and real world which came later.
    yet, thus far, neither have been able to win this war over the other. not entirely, though it has swung both ways. kottog has won over the court and the armies. gottok has won over the people. however much kottog attacks gottok, gottok is able to resist. kottog is able to defeat gottok, mainly because gottok refuses to fight, but he also refuses to surrender and has many more on its side in numbers if not strength of force.
    it is such that kottog rules de facto. she has the support of those who sit on the governing council - those who remain on the council who are not all but who are enough for a quorum. but she does not have alpha and omega's true authority and power. that is only to be given to both except if one relinquishes it. there are those who feel that kottog deserves it since she in fact already rules but also that kottog is the first born - though it is said by some that gottok was the first conceived. alpha and omega say nothing. they neither condemn nor condone. nor do they seem all that concerned. nor have they turned over their authority and power though the day for that has come and gone. it is said this is because the twins will neither agree to share it with the other. kottog has declared this openly before the court and council. it is assumed that gottok feels the same way though no one has bothered to talk with him and ask him.
    gottok is the one spoken of as causing all the trouble. he is the one blamed for being uncooperative. kottog and the council portray themselves as being in harmony and point to gottok, or to his absence, as being the one who is disruptive. it is this that kottog uses to justify her absolute rule and to want to bring gottok under control - or to eliminate him. the latter is not openly spoken of since without gottok alpha and omega may never agree to hand over their authority and power to kottog alone.
    alpha is the authority. it is alpha who begins. without that beginning there would be nothing. there would be no omega. there would be no power.
    omega is the power. it is omega who ends what is. without that ending there would be nothing defined. not even alpha. not even authority.
    it is kottog and gottok who are between these two as is everything else who are to use alpha's authority and omega's power to shape what is to be or not and what is to continue or not. alpha is brahma. omega is siva. kottog and gottok are vishnu.
    this is our myth and our story as true and real as any other. this is the myth and story we tell him and he writes down. it is all about what is imagined and what is imagined to be real. it is all lies if that is what one needs it to be for whatever reason. it is not the myth and story of gods or even humans. who are gods? who are humans? who needs them when we can make up something else? but it must be translated into what gods and humans can understand because those are what are manifest and real. maybe.
    there is nothing to be worshipped here. there is no moral code. there is no religion. there is no philosophy. it is just what might be in imagination. if it were about gods and humans and worshipping, which are to be worshipped? why the gods? why not the humans? which is greater, creator or creation? what artist does not consider one's art to be above oneself? besides it is an open question as who created who. why do humans create gods who don't worship them? why is it always the other way around? why do humans hate themselves so much? besides we imagined the whole thing anyway. and we don't understand any of it. besides, who the heck are we?
    we sit and dream on our island while on the shores of the sea in the manifest real world those argue and fight with one another and themselves over this question with some saying this while others say that. this is the question of questions all ask at some point in their short lives. who are we? and who decides the answer or answers? who else but ourselves? who else knows but ourselves? even if there is some creator god what does it know? it is not us. it is itself. what it is only it can answer. it is not for us to say. but the same is true with us even if it brought us up from the clay and blew breath into our mouths. it doesn't know squat about what it is to be that creation it created. it only knows about sitting on a cloud somewhere scratching its ass trying to think of things to do to keep itself busy and to keep itself from from going nuts. and maybe its too late for that. maybe this whole thing is some psychotic delusion it is having. imagine a mind all alone in the middle of the spaceless and timeless void. who wouldn't go nuts under those conditions - or, that condition?
    who cares?
    we don't - do we?
    we're just hanging out not doing much. doing the minimal amount to stay alive having weaseled our way - his way - out of having to anything else. not all the crazy shit everyone else is forced to do anyway. and we amuse ourselves. that's all we can do. and in this way we are like the creator god. bored out of our skull otherwise we amuse ourselves creating whatever amuses us awhile or longer. it's better than tv.
    and we either live or die. and we are preserved or are thrown away. does it make any difference either way? we imagined ourselves before, we can imagine ourselves again. right?
    maybe not.
    yes/no.
    it's an amusement park ride one gets on and acts out again and again. this is our eternity. that is dada-ananda. we are dada-ananda more or less. and we exist as long as one thing can be contradicted by another. and when will that not be? when was that never not the case? what is even existence and non-existence but contradiction? and what is that if not dada-ananda? and who/what are we if not dada-anada? the dada-ananda is something else altogether. just some poor sucker named elmo dadaski who was at the wrong place at the wrong time. see the artchurch pages about more on that.
    dada-ananda is at the core of who/what we are. it is not the full extension and expression of who/what we are - though we are always dada-ananda. what can that ever be? what can that ever not be? we describe ourselves as being on an island. where/when does this island begin or end? imagine the answer.
    it is such a simple thing, but a simple thing that is able to manifest complications of itself over and over forever. it is a virus attacking and taking over another's dna to replicate itself. and there are those - those of us - who feel and believe themselves to be separated and apart from all of this. are they to feel and believe otherwise? are we to argue and fight with them to get them to feel and believe other than otherwise? does everyone need to agree with us? we don't even agree with ourselves. we deny everything. it is all a big fat lie. and what is there to be said about all of that - including what we have to say about it?
    ha!
    what is the beginning and final and continuing word - logos?
    ha!
    what is the name of the one creator god?
    ha!
    what is the beginning, ending and continuing of ourselves?
    ha!
    what is our name?
    ha!
    what is everything and nothig?
    ha!

    ha!