psycho dogma. the killer awoke before dawn. he put his boots on. the crowd that had gathered to witness the ritual of this event cheered. all of those who came to watch someone else act out what they were too intimidated and powerless and out and out cowardly to act out for themselves in real life. they would rather dream. they would rather buy the t-shirts and posters and bumper stickers sold outside the doors of the temple. they would rather memorize the slogans instead of thinking for themselves. they would rather put on the costumes and the masks of the performance of individuality that  is acceptable and promoted by the group than to take a chance making their own decisions and risk finding themselves isolated and alone. alone alone. not alone with others who are alone in some form of solidarity of group aloneness. however small that group might be, still a group is a group is a group. and those who go along with the group are all the same whether it is a odd collection of bums on the street or a trillion dollar multinational corporate church. the same is the same is the same.
    and it all looked the same to him as he took his boots off and walked on out the door. walked on out the door to where his sister lived. walked on out the door to where his mother lived. walked on out the door to where his father died. walked on out the door to where the wilderness is. the door that led to where one is absolutely alone in the world. he walked on out to face that loneliness and call out its name. no one answered. no one was with him. no one had come this far. they had one by one deserted him on his quest and gone running back to where the others lived. back to where the frightened and afraid live huddled around fires in the dark moonless starless night. feeding anything - anyone - into those fires hoping they never go out. feeding in order to put off as long as possible the time when one is fed into them oneself. no sacrifice to the flames is too great a demand. he walked on out to where he could no longer see those fires the others camped around. he was eaten by a great big monster that lurked out there.
    he sat alone in a cafe. he drank endless cups of coffee and smoked countless cigarettes. he scribbled on more pages of notebooks than he could remember. he gazed out the window.
    he smoked another cigarette.
    he learned to forget.
    or did he find a ship and set to sea and came upon a storm that lifted his ship up on mountainous waves and crashed smashing down? and did he wake lying on a beach of an island? and did he lift up his head and push himself back onto his knees and then stand up squinting in the sun? and did he wonder, where the fuck am i?
    he learned to forget.
    forget about all the things the others told him he was to be afraid of and obey the rules in order to avoid them.
    forget everything but the fact that he was alone in the world. in fact, where he was there was not even the world. there was just him and him alone on an island in the midst of a storm that raged on an otherwise calm sea. and on this island was a forest where lived all manner of things of imagination and beyond imagination. and in the midst of this forest was a house built of wreckage washed ashore from shipwrecks in the past. he brought his own wreckage of that which had survived with him and built onto the house his own design.
    and there was a garden surrounded by a wall. the gate was both open and closed. he had to decide for himself which he wanted it to be. he decided it was open and he entered. and there was a tree. on the tree was the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. he had had enough of this knowledge - enough of that dream - so he did not eat though he was hungry. and a serpent then appeared to him and bowed and tipped its hat out of which hopped a rabbit or two or three. the serpent then raised its ugly head again and smiled and laughed and spoke to him saying, welcome to the club, my dear fellow. care for a taste of something sweet? and the serpent reached up and took down a fruit that seemed different than the one he had eaten before. try it now that it is in season, the serpent hissed. and he did. and he fell into another dream. this was not the dream of knowing good and evil, but of knowing life. and he opened his eyes and saw that he was not alone but was among the gods who were singing and dancing. he was home.
    and he sat in this garden as he sat in the cafe drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes and writing and reading and going for walks alone in the city and the forest around him. and he wondered the whole time which was real and which was the illusion. he hangs out digging it whichever way it is.
    the world of good and evil and the world of life.
    meandering through the maze of mirrors.
    and watching the madness around him.
    as the gods squabble and fight and bitch and complain too as the humans do, as the humans sing and dance as well. as long as neither bother him wherever he may be. he is happy. and any, god or human, who fuck with that will have a crazed and screaming, alive and kicking motherfucker son of a bitch to deal with who will be dead set and determined to send them all back to the forsaken hell they came from to burn and rot in their own teeth gnashing venom boiling vile stew inside them filling their heads and squirting out their ears and spitting from their mouths and keep them there for all eternity no matter how much they may hate and curse him for it, or else he'll die trying. and he'll laugh and enjoy every moment of it either way it goes. and so they keep their distance. none of them trust him any more than he trusts them. and then they die. even the immortal gods die after awhile. a long long while of lives measured by ages instead of years. but they die just the same. back into the mind they were originally imagined from in the beginning of space and time. the mind he knows as his and his alone.
    he lights another cigarette and learns to forget.
    forget all the layers of minds but this one mind. this experience of that one mind. the one mind that is all minds. those the mind chooses to remember written in a book. the others can do as they will and find what they can out of whatever is left. whatever the one mind leaves behind when it splits and forgets.
    but here he is. here he is now. flesh and blood like any other. how is he any different? how is he the same? how are they any different or the same? what is he? who is he? what and who are they?
    he's just an ordinary dumb fuck. that's what. that's who. someone hanging out in a cafe somewhere. drinking coffee. smoking cigarettes. writing or reading. going to school now to see about other things he might invent and imagine for himself. gazing out the window. talking with others who sit with him or talking with no one if no one's there. to him it doesn't seem to make much difference either way. but he seems to be watching and waiting for someone. he watches it and them all come and go. what or who he's waiting for hasn't shown up. it or they probably never will.
    the transformation. the transfer from one world to the other. the human among the gods exchanged with and for the god among the humans. the mortal for the immortal. the immortal for the mortal. each desiring to experience what it is like to be in the other's world.
    he is that point. that point is the bullet hole between the eyes that let's the light pour in as the light pours out from one world into the other illuminating both together until they merge into one the same.
    this is his madness. a human who is mad or a god who is mad, either and both isolated from their own kind of what is to be human and god.
    fuck the humans.
    fuck the gods.
    fuck anyone who does not come to sit with him. fuck anyone who doesn't join him here in the cafe in the city or here in the house in the garden. the same window looks out on both. he sits at the same table.
    he has no use for any human who does not know what it is to be god. he has no use for any god who does not know what it is to be human. to know both the joy and happiness and the pain and suffering. they are both the same. to deny one is to deny the other. it is to deny experience. or so he feels. and so far he seems to be alone in feeling that way.
    he'd rather die than to join either in the games they play. he'd rather cease to exist.
    this is his madness. this is his certain madness. this is the certainty of his madness that is his madness. there is no faith. there is no doubt. there is only the certain reality of it he will not and cannot question.
    let the others, humans and gods alike, deride him and laugh and call him a fool. let them hold themselves superior to him and look down sneering when they walk by. let them avoid him. let them exile him from their circles. let them struggle with one another for power and control.
    let them leave him alone, except those who come to him and call him friend. those who are his equal. those who are as human as he is. those who are as much a god as he is.

    got 18,000 thoughts spinning around in his brain.
    if he were anyone else he would be insane.
    but he's not.
    so please quit telling him that he is.
    just because they don't understand.

    and it's all nonsense - isn't it? is this guy seriously off his meds, or what? narcissus gazing at and absorbed in his own distorted reflection flip/flop perspective lost to the last echoes of someone who was trying to call him back but who is now long gone.
    it happens.
    meandering in the maze of mirrors beyond the hall of horrors.
    then there's this story about the sad little cupcake that he was thinking about this whole time too.
    who understands?
    who gets the joke?
    who is laughing while children are diseased and crippled and beaten and starving?
    who smiles while others bang their heads on the floor and pull their hair out in fits of agony and despair?
    who is silent while others are shouting and storming the barricades?
    who is at peace while the world is at war?
    who is joyful while surrounded by those complaining of all the pain and suffering that exists for no reason?
    who has gotten all that they have asked for beyond the riches of the nations while there are beggars in the street?
    who comes to join us here and now and not some place else or tomorrow?
    who is god and human both?
    who rules in heaven and in hell while still on earth?
    who knows the punchline?
    he's watching and waiting for someone.
    and it's probably not any one of them who think him strange and bewildering and perhaps a bit dangerous too.
    and he is - all that and more.
    and more beyond more.
    and more and more beyond that until there is no more beyond.
    where and when it's all here and now.
    and riddles of words and words of riddles.
    riddle me this.
    riddle me that.
    and you've seen him somewhere, we know you have.
    but perhaps you haven't noticed.
    he can be invisible.
    sometimes he only imagines himself.
    sometimes he only imagines us.

    a decay of connection with the socially perceived reality into the reality of the social fantasy.
    which is which?
    he functions in the mind while his body does barely anything.
    he can not move for hours.
    they function in the body while their minds do barely anything.
    they can not think for hours.
    in the mind he has discovered the machine - or created or invented - he has designed and had built.
    it has it's counterpart in this world.
    it is its counterpart in this world.
    one controls and is controlled by the other.
    he controls and is controlled by both.
    he and it are not divided yet divide constantly and merge constantly.

    and then there is her. she who comes from nothingness which he may have come from too but he doesn't remember. he was in nothingness and he began creating and/or becoming aware of something. he didn't know what. first it was himself and all he was which was everything including, he supposed, the nothingness. and while he thought about what this something that was everything that existed was and was not, she appeared. she knew his name. and he knew hers. they spoke each other's name. it was the same name but reversed from one another. his was gottok. hers was kottog. though these are not the actual names they spoke, they will do. the true names exist only in the mind. they are known and not known.
    so who was who here? was she him or he her? who was reversed (created out of) who? this is an argument they've had ever since they met. ask either of them and he or she will they you that he or she created the other. neither knows. both do not remember having not been created or existing. they come from the alpha and omega.
    and he's just making this up.
    dada-doo-wah-ditty and bah humbug too.
    ha!
    do you remember having not been created or existing?
    what is your name?
    expanding on a theme of variation. following one thing leading to another leading one thing following from another. it's not the story that should concern us here. the story can be any story. because he's writing it it's his story. it could be your story, or anyone's. who knows? who cares?
    humbug bah.
    it's now or never. but it's the beginning and the ending of all things. or maybe it's just him or him being here wherever and whenever here is now. just another beginning and ending here and now along the way turning and turning. a theme of variation.
    so it's what the story is that should concern us here. it concerns him because any story and all stories only represent something else. anything and all things only represent something else. and all that something else ultimately represents is nothing. at least to him. he remembers what it all came out of. he remembers what existed before anything existed. he remembers what existed before existence existed. he remembers what existed before he existed. or, he can imagine remembering. can you? can you remember nothing? do you remember not remembering nothing? do you know what existed before nothing existed? - before what existed? - before before existed?
    absurd.
    ridiculous.
    insane.
    irrational.
    stupid.
    yes! yes! yes!
    now remember before that. remember that brief yet eternal moment/infinity that existed in your mind before words similar to these popped into your mind. before you turned your face away from the oblivion of even oblivion. look back again. and again. and again as many times forever as you need to until you see it as clear as what you now see that obstructs your vision with noise and nonsense and dada and the kitchen sink to boot.
    yes?
    no?
    maybe?
    a story? you'd rather read a story? a story to calm you so you can have a good long night's sleep with pleasant dreams?
    to him, any dream but that dream - dream of the real - is a nightmare.

    a wild form of disease. a prevalent discussion. a hostile face calm with fear. a co-operation of intent. talking down with knives jabbed.
    the committee. the circle of judges. the lowest common denominator of the highest expectations. the corporate wars. the shattered dreams. the people with no pulse. more is better.
    phrases and pauses.
    a tilt of mind. a zero envelope. a crazy-eyed man cracked but not broken. driven down. driven out. the lover of none. the lover of everything. what he feels could fill a thousand hearts. but no one wants to feel anything except the satisfaction of power and greed and the self-comfort of numbness it provides. smooth. mechanical grace fine turned.
    stabbed. again and again. there is no blood. there is no pain. there is no reason not to stab again. to continue relentlessly without awareness. he'll remain silent and take it. he'll hide the visions of violent destruction. later he will scream. later he will go berserk - when he is alone and no one gets hurt except himself.
    the bullets loaded in the gun given to him to point at his own head and pull the trigger. again and again. this solves all their problems. no one sees this and no one knows.
    a clock. the time of every moment counted moment by moment. hours and hours. thousands and thousands of years. millions of ages much the same. the world. the universe. the flip of a switch. it's all so big and all so small.
    doing it once or twice.
    doing it a thousand times.
    and none of it counts. none of it is recorded. none of it is remembered.
    a piece at a time. broken and glued back on. fake. the illusion of depth created by veneer.
    the illusion of faith.
    she smiles. only if she knew what he was thinking. only if she knew how she was worked into the machine he designed and had built. but he doesn't even know. he goes home. he takes his boots off. his feet stink. he lays down and falls asleep.
    meanwhile, on the job, she sweats it out but doesn't show a sign. that's her talent. that's how she made it so far as she has. however much she's ripped up inside she keeps it from ever being seen. she keeps her wits fine tuned and sharp ready to cut anyone down to size. bitesize. yum. that will make her feel better. it's almost like being alive. maybe.
    maybe he was dreaming.
    a slice of it taken out to be examined and cataloged and put in files forever. a memory. a broken record.
    subtract. contract. abstract.
    bingo bongo.
    a force fed realizing one is being force fed. choke. if you can't leave it, love it.
    jump it. hope you make it.
    dizzy.
    sit down and write a song about to sing to yourself and anyone who will listen. absorb.
    a theme of variations.
    a theme of convolutions.
    a theory of theories (he'd forgotten about that one for awhile).
    so what's left?
    fill in the blank. a variable that's open to have something or someone to put into it - or put it into them. what? who? an unknown. the whole rest of the equation is of a known quantity or quality. finite. one can read about it in any book or see it on any tv show or hear it talked about in any conversation. that part's easy to figure out. all one has to do is to memorize it. but memorizing isn't thinking - is it? he doesn't feel that it is. and all he pretty much has read in books or seen on tv or heard in conversations is what others have memorized. just the facts. regulation of memorization. nothing new. the same words coming out in variations on the same theme.
    what is the theme?
    digging down deeper and deeper into a hole. pretty dumb, he supposes. really doesn't do anything that gives him any goodies or trips to paradise like human activity is supposed to. he managed to get what he needs day to day in order to keep doing it. but he has yet to come up with anything that he can walk in some place and say, this is it. this is what is going on. not anything anyone will listen to anyway. it's not something one can memorize - except how to use a pick and shovel and learn how to dig for it oneself.
    what's happening? someone asks him.
    nothing, he says.
    what are you writing about?
    just bullshit.
    can i read it?
    if you want. here.
    one page. two pages. maybe three. four and he's amazed, then the notebook is closed. they shake their head and blink their eyes and push it back to him and forget. it's not something one can memorize.
    oh well. as he said, it's just bullshit. some people dig holes and come up with diamonds. he comes up with sludge and goo. nothing anyone can take to the bank. and it's all about what one can take to the bank.
    and she wants only his diamonds. she only wants his gold. she wants this or that from him but all he can do is grow old. oh yeah, baby, oh yeah.
    what is the theme?
    the only thing he wants from others is for them not to want anything from him. is that it? and if that's it, is it true? he wants (a) food (b) a place to live (c) medical services (d) coffee and cigarettes (e) notebooks (f) everyone's undivided attention. oh yeah - now he wants to go to school and wants a computer too. he pretty much gets what he wants.

    a disgusting thing. he shifted it. he shifted into it. what was to come? starving. cold and wet. naked to it.
    or not. part of the program. part of the fix. projection of the magick.
    driving through the desert with a dog in the back seat. no one beside him.
    she stayed home where is was comfortable and safe. holding on. she left it to him to explore the unknown spaces and to discover whatever. he discovered mainly that she was a dream. that the dream was that he had come from her - that she pre-existed his existence. if anything the reverse was true. but he didn't believe that. but he had discovered and he did now know that he had come from himself out of his own memory he remembered now - that he had come through her and she through him and her dream of him in his dream of her that he dreamed of her dreaming of him. but this was so much noise now. this was what he went out and discovered - remembered. when he was away and apart from her and her dreams.
    he drew in and let out a breath. a breath out of and into the void. he was still existing. he opened his eyes and saw the world around him. he was still existing. he was still alive.
    the flat earth. the opening. another disease comes to mind. a false face. broken ice. 19-a. a component discovery. drive down to easy town.
    a quick response in an age frozen in speed. headlong. wherever and whatever. who knows what everyone is running to? but we all know - or should know - what they're all running from.
    look behind you. what do you see? that is if you can look at it.

    he sits beneath a tree in a garden. the world revolves around him. he sits in a cafe. he drinks coffee and smokes cigarettes. the world passes him by.
    infinity - the difference between a circle and straight line.
    a state of forever. the thin ice again. the breath. he turns his head.
    him and his family which are the only ones who matter. let the others die off if they want to. let them have their ideals and politics of ideals that have nothing to do with him or his family. they raised them up like flags while his family went down. what is it to him? it's abstract nonsense. what does it have to do with life? what does it have to do with continuing? maybe something. maybe nothing. he doesn't care. they are lost to his memory.
    existence. nothing but existence. and digging existence. and passing on that existence for as long as possible to be dug by others. and that others are others who are existing and digging this existence is fine. and that others are passing on this existence to be dug by others for as long as possible is fine too. as long as it doesn't interfere with him and his. he digs it. that he was part of creating other human beings was the main thing that blew him away in his life so far. nothing else comes close. this is where he came from and where he's going. in and out of imagination.

    bring it around.
    the theme. the theory of the theme.
    but the story. what's the story here? where's the story? nevermind themes or theories and all the rest of whatever dada. the story is what is important. it's what sells. and the bottom line to it all is what sells.
    so far the most valuable commodity he's been able to come up with is his madness - or whatever it is. more so than his labor or his intelligence or creativity. it makes money all around. probably 100 people or more are employed because of it - or so he wildly estimates more or less. he is his own industry.
    but whatever. back to the story. what was the story?
    and it turns and turns. he sits inside it. he walks through it. the faces that come and go. the voices that mix and blend together combining all into one face and one voice changing from one to another. colors, shades, tones, inflections.
    oh well.
    oh boy.
    ho-hum.
    and this is it. this is the show. this is the story. the story based on theories and themes - based on variations and other observations. the motives and the results - if there are any motives or results.
    the resultant manifestation disguised.
    he thought about whatever. all the people one knows while the others become abstract. what is the town or the city or the state or the nation or the world? nameless and faceless. let them live or die.
    a system of many things fluctuating between among and across many other things each somewhat similar to each itself. yet each and all altogether different. how does one compare? the objective, subjective, relative, associative all battle and merge, dominate and subordinate, equalize, cancel each other out, enhance the other or enhanced by the other. the glorious many splendored tangled web tapestry waving and weaving patterns inconsistent with any pattern or design becoming itself. the smooth and the jagged, the steady progression of intellect setting course on the swirling tides and currents and twirling winds of passion.
    to be exact. to accurately describe this vision unfolding itself before him from his own changing perception. the mind and the world. the chestnut of philosophy cracked down the middle with each a mirror template of the other. he views either from the viewpoint of the other. from the world, the mind seems unreal and imagined. from the mind, the world seems the same. the chicken and the egg thing - though he leans toward the egg. he is the mind. he is in the world. he knows where the world begins and ends - at his birth and death. from the view of the world the mind has the same beginning and ending. however, his experience of the mind has no beginning or ending. only when he looks out into the world and looks at a clock or calendar or the sun or moon or stars does time measure between beginning and end - the divided moment. in the mind is eternity that is the one moment undivided. but then he dies.

    following a drift of mind. something quick. a shattering.
    where did he stand now in relation to forces around him focusing to a point of spacetime?
    naked in stone. she walks by. all is frozen. a memory of dead desires wanting or trying to unite or reunite through static resistance. the face washed pure of emotion. the mind scrubbed clean of reason. like an apartment vacated and ready for inspection by the manager who will be pleased to see no sign or indication that anyone has ever lived there. she gets her deposit back.

    the fucking committee. their hands around each other's throats. they struggle against one another and trample over everything one may put together and build for oneself out of whatever resources one may find in the confusion. and this is called the balance of power.
    and now in this day and age what resources are left for one to find except that which is discarded as being useless toward this ongoing battle or is left in ruin because of it? one can only hope to survive. and from what one digs through one finds enough to get by day to day.
    and leading the committee, she smiles.
    he himself is one discarded and left in ruin. useless to the struggle and to those for whom the struggle is all important. those who wave the flags or follow those who wave the flags. he waves his own flag. a white flag. but a white flag dirty and stained many colors from the many battles it has been waved in - mostly blood red that has turned brown as mud with age. he waves a torn rag above his head.
    but whatever. this quasi-romantic imagery of dada. a fool dancing around a reflecting pool ignoring the echoes of his name being called to come home. he is enraptured by this glorification of himself. his god of gods. his lord of lords. his king of kings. the crown of broken debris he's picked up along the way he envisions as gold and jewels he places upon his own head. he kneels before no one but himself to receive it while the others kneel and pray in cathedrals and temples and schools and bars and the street before the devices of authority - that which utters the commanding voice - that which projects the image.
    he listens idliing dreaming of his own image, hearing his own voice which speaks in whispers while others try to shout above the roar of the crowd of those trying to shout above the roar of the crowd.
    the committee.
    the need of gods. the need of fools to dance before the need of gods. no need of praise for either.
    while others sacrifice, he plays in the meadow. or vice versa. either way it seems some opposite exchange of energy. his smiles cause others to frown and also the other way around. a positive/negative spark.
    is this love?

    we have placed him here. for us he is a window into this world we are not otherwise aware of and not all that interested in. perhaps we should not say that. how could we have placed him here if we were unaware of this world to place him in? and why if we were not interested?
    this world is a possibility. it's a formulation of various lines of thought and imagination. the result of a series of ifs. it is the manufacture of the machine. the machine is of the mind. or it could be argued that the mind is of the machine. the machine and the mind are one. there is no argument. however it is meant to be argued and never to be resolved. the argument is living and dynamic. the resolution is dead and static. but that too can be argued.
    we have set up arguments to confuse the mind and stimulate the machine.
    our interest in this world is that it exists. in almost all probabilities of all possibilities it should not. not as it is. it is the manifestation of possibilities out of imagination. the imagination of the human gods. our interest, however, does not include any interest - any active interest - in it continuing to continue any longer than it is or will be. it's like a soap bubble momentarily gliding in the air. it amuses for awhile. it is marvelous to behold while it exists but when it no longer does, one turns to other things. it is such a fragile thing. any tiny thorn might break it. even a blade of grass.
    and he is our window into it. his experience is our experience. as well, our experience is his experience, though this has only occurred late in his life. he was too busy going insane before. now his madness reaches us as we reach him. we gave him hints of our presence earlier on but he ignored them and we wished not to disturb him or his experience we wished to live through. but toward the end his experience turned into a nightmare and he went into a tailspin of withdrawn depression interspersed with fits of rage battling back against the unseen forces behind the grinning faces around him as they turned on him. we had to rescue him - which we did. we brought him to our island - which isn't really an island at all in case you haven't figured that out. but what else do we call it? now he knows us as we know him.
    it is all me, myself and i.
    me is the emotional and instinctive - the heart.
    myself is the intellect and reason - the mind.
    i is the being and experience - the soul.
    and we are all together.
    if one has this experience then it is enough. if one does not then nothing will be enough - no words or drawings or diagrams or charts or graphs or rituals or drugs or anything else. it becomes merely and understanding of knowledge. and knowledge may be a great and wonderful thing to understand and even to use for one's benefit, but knowledge isn't experience. neither will it lead one to experience. only by experience itself will any knowledge bring one back to this experience. we cannot know how many, if anyone, are included in this. he may be the only one. there may be others in this world. we do not know.
    this is not truth nor is it not not truth.
    this is his madness.
    this is only presented as possibility. let those who hunger for truth chase its fleeting image forever to wherever it may lead them - hopefully as far away from us as possible.
    it.
    they will not find it here. this is all lies.
    none of this is true. none of this is even real. it is all made up. that is the only truth and reality it has if it has any - and we already stated it doesn't have any. but we may be and in all probability are wrong. and not just wrong about that but wrong about anything and everything including this sentence we are now writing and you are now reading. we have our doubts.
    wrong wrong wrong.
    not true. not real. can we possibly make it more clear than that?
    yes? no? maybe?
    whatever.
    let us continue now that that business is taken care of and settled - if it is settled - and fuck it if it isn't. we don't care. well, we do, but it doesn't matter if we do or not. and even if it did, and we thought that it did, it would probably be wrong too. so how much can it matter if we care or not? we don't see the world coming to a stop either way - do you?
    so. dada. quack.
    nefg hag upodej pudques banjolpx.
    and so he sits in this cafe most of the time wasting time as time was meant to be wasted and he's become a professional at this. drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes and gazing out the window and reading and talking with whoever comes to sit with him and writing this idiot nonsense. and all of that is as it seems to be. at least that is what he tells himself. he's not too sure if it is or isn't as it falls this way or that way on either side of the line dividing everything in two and three and four... all the forks in the road. all the spoons in the sea. all the ducks in a row.
    because to see it that way is to see only part of it - a fraction of it. and that seems to be all that most are capable or willing to comprehend even that. and what is that comprehension? can it be called comprehension, darling? what is comprehended but a glimpse of part of the whole shit on a stick? yin/yang. spin it away. come back. go away. here and there. now and then. if that is comprehension then what is it when the whole is comprehended? can the two be described by the same word?
    let others lose themselves in that. we know better. we have other goose to fry. we've been to the end of the endlessness of it - beyond the end which there is no end or whatever. and we've returned without having begun.
    the face of probability.
    the grin of possibility.
    5:25 pm 6/19/94 ce.
    a prediction of zero.

    what happens now? what is it compared to? our past experience? our future expectations? that narrow margin between the two? the thin ice?

    and he knew this world was killing her. but what could he do? what was he willing to do anymore? he would survive no matter how bad it got. he was still the cold killer.
    she doesn't talk to him much anymore. not too many people do. certainly not people who have reputations and careers to protect. not anyone concerned with maintaining or raising their fragile status.
    and she never listened. she had all the answers she felt she needed to get her to where she wanted to go - which was where he had come from screaming and running as fast as he could for his dear sweet life. he tried to tell her and warn her that there was this beast that indiscriminately ate people alive and whole that nothing he could do would stop it. she told him it was all in his imagination. and she set out perhaps with some idea that even if there was this beast that she could befriend it and tame it with her nurturing and caring skills like she does with all her boys. he wished her luck. perhaps she was right. they don't call her the whore of babylon for no reason. the queen even the most powerful kings ever to rule the earth kneel before and beg her to shit on their face. the queen of their dreams with dolly dagger spike heels and the lashing whip more stinging than the simple nun's ruler. the cold stone eyes that no love or lust however passionately or poetically sung beneath 1001 moons dripping soft light nor forests of fragrant roses can melt or even cause to blink. forget it. the bitch is back in town and heads are gonna roll until she's the tallest of them all. she's here to show the old men in the back rooms who's boss. cut off their little peepees and sew them all together into a strap-on well hung donkey dong dildo bend 'em over and fuck 'em one by one. their worst nightmare (and secret desire) come true.
    hooray! the world is saved! let peace reign at long last. let the old church bells ring one last time in a new age. mommy did love us after all. just look at the wondrous radiance of compassion she shines. the goddess reborn. now we can dance in the streets rejoicing. no more pain. no more suffering. no more torment. no more sorrow. no more loins or tigers or bears. no more bogeymen lurking in the shadows in this glorious city of benevolent light.
    and peace.
    sweet sweet peace.
    hush now. let your weary troubled head lay down and sleep as the soma coma cloud descends from the heavens and settles in like a chill gray fog he screams and runs for his dear sweet life. she did befriend and tame the beast and brought it back on a leash.
    he climbed the walls and cut through the fences and dove and scrambled through the thickets catching and ripping off his clothes until he fell naked and exhausted out in some god forsaken wilderness of ruin and trash heap mountains. maggots and roaches and rats. he got real hungry before he got an appetite for that fare and choked it down washing the taste down with oil slick stagnant water.
    he got real sick and lost all sense of time in maddening demonic fever too weak to stand, shivering and sweating to the breaking point. and it did break. he had closed his eyes knowing there wasn't a chance he would open them again in this world. but instead of waking up dead - though he wasn't sure he hadn't - he was still breathing and his heart still beat steady and smooth. he sat up and looked around. what the fuck? where the fuck? how? when? why? but no answers came in the silence. there were words once but not anymore. he stood and noticed far away - was that the direction he had come? - billowing dark smoke rising. he could smell the stench of something foul burning. but near him he was distracted by movement. there it was. he slowly bent down and picked up a chunk of concrete and aimed and threw it. hit! rat breakfast again today. yum. oh well. maybe someday there would be something else. he smiled. he was alive another day.
    and he woke from this and he laughed. such nonsense. such deluded nonsense it was. where did it all come from? he'd picked it all up from the world around him. just images. a story. a story of theories and variations on themes. an old game. just a game. the world of belief that overrode the world of reality. the world of doubt. the world of madness. the human mind playing tricks on itself.
    and we go on day to day hoping for a tomorrow that might be better - or at least won't be any worse. a tomorrow that by definition does not exist in reality at any time. all the fantasies of tomorrow that keeps them working and busy and not going around causing trouble for the rest of us who are kicking back and enjoying the moment of today with whatever exists here and now or not.
    he laughed again. if they only knew. but they don't.
    wake up. get a grip. get a life. how many times had he heard that before he actually did it? he forgot the fantasy imagery of dreams put into his head about tomorrow and all related. and here he is now. maybe not with much but with enough. at least in a position to directly perceive the world as it is - or as it was. and what a different world than the world he was led to believe now that he doubts everything. when all the props and costumes and masks are invisible and everyone around him are walking around stark naked. how foolishly proud they are of their new clothes they sold their soul for.
    jesus h. fucking christ.
    are they that blind? are they that stupid? what else explains it? and no one forced them to do it. they chose to do it of their own free will. the choice is always open. they are always choosing. it's never too late to change one's mind though the consequences of doing so pile up the longer one puts it off. the higher they climb the farther they fall.
    he knows that. his own house of cards fell down. he was glad that he hadn't built it up that high so he didn't have far to fall. not as high as the house he was born in - his mother's and father's house. he was glad he was such a failure to begin with.
    and blah blah blah...

    an extra bunny. a head. shapes of shapelessness. shapelessness of shapes. can you imagine that? nevermind. whether it is possible or not, get past that. don't let that hold you back. and don't be frightened. it will all always be here just the same as it always was when you return. just a little bit different. you'll see it a little bit differently, that's all. but not really. you'll see it as something that no longer has the power over you to restrain you to remain within its limited parameters. dig? wouldn't you rather be able to look at the world that way? wouldn't you rather have another option open? of course you would. you're no different than we are and we went for it when we saw it open up and how to get to it. and we found it. and it's not all that complicated. it's rather easy in fact. well, sort of. it's easy once one sees it. but getting to that point where and when one sees how easy it is can be difficult and complicated to the point of being or seeming to be impossible. but that depends on what one defines or has defined for one about what is and what is not impossible. once one defines nothing as being impossible (yes, there is a trick to those specific words) then everything is possible (ditto).
    huh?
    what the fuck?
    nevermind. we are obviously writing this to someone else. excuse us. we mean no harm. don't panic.

    a phantom of it. not human. an adjustment. poems for little boys. while where he's at walking down the street past the houses people got themselves locked up inside while he's talking to himself because no one else wants to hear it and they've got their tvs and stereos and all else going so they don't have to hear and they quack quack duckspeak at each other to not hear anything and not say anything that needs to be heard.
    but what needs to be heard by those who already know what they feel they need to know? and what they need to know is that there's this guy out on the street who needs to be kept out on the street - preferably in someone else's neighborhood - because he doesn't know what he's talking about and he's useless in terms of their plans to grab as much as they can for themselves and he's probably potentially dangerous - dangerous because he might take away what little they got so far while they're working so hard and struggling to get more.
    but they still need him despite how much they feel they don't and how much they hate and despise him. that's what they need. while they're safe inside their houses they need someone outside on the street to be safe from. if there's not anyone out there they feel the need to be safe from then all they're doing, which takes up so much of their time and energy until they're exhausted, is for nothing. that is what must never be spoken or heard inside their walls - that everything they are doing is for nothing.
    if there was no one there they would have to make someone up.
    while he walks out on the street with no walls, with no security systems, with no weapons, and no one bothers him - though the cops slow down and take a good long look. no one tries to take anything away from him though it would be easy - though what does he have that anybody would want? and he's also been looking for this bogeyman that he's seen on tv who is supposed to be out here around every corner who is so nasty and cruel and dangerous that it takes all those walls and security systems and weapons they put together to protect themselves. he sees no one like that.
    except maybe it's him.
    he laughs.

    but then they laugh.
    if only he knew. if only he knew how easy it is to step into the world and possess it all. but possess what? what does one hold in one's hand that lasts? what does one hold in one's hand that doesn't last? ah, such questions.
    he can only possess what physical space he is in in the moment. he can only hold one thing in his hand at a time.
    but such is such. he now holds a pen in his hand. once in awhile he puts it down and picks up a cup of coffee, or something else - or nothing.
    his other hand sometimes holds a cigarette.
    both of his hands have held many things. his hands have moved things from here to there or from there to here. pieces in a game played by many players. who does not play this game? players playing many roles. he plays many roles.
    he enjoys playing whatever it is he is playing which he isn't always aware of exactly what it is or isn't. he can only assume others enjoy it too. it's all an energy thing. it's all a this and that thing.  whoever gives or takes or has it given or taken. what is whatever. or so it seems to him. and all the rules and regulations that we make up about it that are also given and taken.

    zero dose. a clearing in the order and the chaos. an open containment field. an island out in the sea. an oasis in the desert.
    zero as one.
    zero as many.
    zero as nothing, anything, something, everything.
    whichever way it goes.
    he sat watching the waves and the shifting sands. he sat in the sun.
    once in awhile someone wanders in and sits down with him and tells him of all the troubles of the world. and he says, oh well. and they say, oh well. and they wander off again.

    anyway.
    anyway he was sitting here. he sits everywhere - except when he's walking from one place he was sitting to another place he will be sitting. he's always been sedentary, even as a child. like some ape in the jungle or a zoo.
    but mostly wherever he is, sitting or not, he's in his head. he's in his mind. the mind. where does his mind end and the mind begin? where does the world around him end and his mind begin? where does the mind end and the world around him begin? is this strange to you? it's all too familiar to him. seeing it otherwise - the world, his mind, the mind as being separate and distinct is strange to him. yet he gets the impression that it is familiar to the others.
    yeah, well - so what?
    he doesn't know. or maybe he doesn't care. is there a problem here? he has no problems. yet he so loves to observe and scribble out endless dada about the problems others are having or that he perceives that they have. but that's their problem.
    and we deny our own existence. we are no more than a figment of his imagination. no one can reach us because if and when they do they'll only grab him and we will poof into thin air and all they'll have in their hands is this idiot broken down old fool who babbles to himself and drools and pisses on himself. without us he's just another burned out vegetable.

    in a re-creation of time. what is divided and remains apart. what is shattered and remains broken.
    he must learn to speak.
    he must learn to listen.
    his is an ill-mannered ill-tempered undisciplined beast. an ass.
    he must learn something from all this that is happening. what conclusion does he draw from it? the only one seems to be is that he cannot make up his mind unless and without being forced to one way or the other.

    in the broken romance of blood rose red while others make things go boom with the brief flash of orange fire he stands frozen with his pants down distantly startled. he is not awoken. he is still raging screaming and shouting. he is still crashing on the runway. he's forgotten in all the excitement whether he was taking off or landing.
    there is no happening here. they can neither laugh with the victory of good nor cry because good is vanquished. and evil does not triumph nor is it fallen. no flag can be raised on this battlefield. it is just cowardice and a confused panic of bumbling slaughter. no one dies for a cause but because they couldn't get out of the way of the hysterical stampede of those who could. there is no charge of the heroes overcoming all odds for a mission and a purpose but only those pushed ahead and forced unto a path of least resistance. this is not tragic. it's not even comedy. it's the acting out of pathetic boredom of those who lack imagination to do anything different.
    and are we to feel compassion here? who is villain or victim? how do we sort out the dead? if we mark the graves, who comes to visit them? how long are we to honor this memory out of a sense of obligation when all other feeling is gone? when they are no longer faces but the face of stone their names were chiseled into long ago by someone who is also by now forgotten.
    how long are we to recite the stories to our children about who is innocent and who is guilty? how long are they to live their lives in shadows of tombs that have become great houses of all that is holy and silences all questioning?

    and a cracked mind randomly connected through a variety of overlapping viewpoints that see each other as other and strange with only an abstract understanding that they are parts of a whole that contradicts the experience of each being whole to itself and independent of the others which are each and all alien in an uneasy alliance forced upon then since they share the same general space and time and resources and information.
    slipping out of it. a becoming through the destruction. the parameters of whatever sense of it we can speak of. a dreaming.
    he could try to begin it again as he has tried beginning it before. but where and what? a birth? a conception? the two who fucked and brought his energy into this world who were brought together at that time by the gathering of forces of that energy like the building up of charges that manifest the lightning bolt?
    out of the friction of existing manifest forces of energy he was conceived and made manifest. as was anyone - everyone. there is nothing special or unique here, but it did seem a bit odd.
    and he was born and grew into his own experience. he was given certain information that seemed to be ignored by the others. he became strange to them. was this odd? was this special and unique? he thought of things in the larger contexts. he saw visions of the world and universe while they kept their heads down and eyes on the ground. was he someone different and removed from them? he learned that this was called madness.
    he sees it many ways that none are the way they see it. the god who is human or the human who is god. the gathering of the forces of energy. gears in the machine that don't have to think about what they are doing. their function is to turn when the proper energy is applied. he's tried explaining this but he realized that he might as well pick up and explain it to a rock.
    so he is alone in this. he'd rather it wasn't so, but it is. he can create that which amuses him but to create something that is his equal seems to be something that is beyond him. it was too much for them. and it's too much for him to bother while they look at him like he's nuts.
    he tells them to first look into the mirror.
    to have them maybe glimpse it for a moment or two and then turn away and not remember and he would have to begin again. to lure them away from their desires and calm their fears. but their understanding cannot grasp what it cannot reach though it is right in front of them as their eyes glaze over and their mouths drop open. lost.
    but those few moments when they realized used to be worth it, or so he thought. because in those moments their faces would shine with radiant awareness and joy at what they were seeing. their eyes and his would meet and there was no question. their was no separation between them. they were in the same place at the same time here and now in synch smooth turning about one another with all turning about them. and this was where and when he was always - alone. always forever alone. but to have at least one other for those few moments here and now with him experiencing what others can only promise and hope for with their prayers. that was his purpose for being here in this world. what other purpose was there? to be yet another in the game there were too many in already that those in it have to fight like dogs over a scrap of meat? to fill a position that ultimately means another gets pushed down and out?
    he got tired of all the insults and accusations thrown in his face when he spoke to them of something that blew away all they held as real. and he supposed he couldn't blame them. it can't happen all at once. it has to be worked on little by little. but where were they while he was doing this? he remembered when he had to get through that thinking he'd never reach it or not knowing if there was anything there at all to reach. and he would have liked it if someone had helped him but no one did. he had to figure it out on his own. but that doesn't seem to be the case with them. they see only what is taken away not what is there to replace it. they always thought he was trying to trick them. so he said fuck it. let them deal with it themselves on their own. let them crawl through all the shit on their hands and knees like he was left having to do. but he doubts they will. they're too important for that. ah, these proud ones who still nonetheless with all they have gathered around themselves still clench their teeth.
    he will no longer serve them. he clenches his teeth as well. he can grin that death grin with the best of them. he can turn up the cold colder. he can shut himself down for longer. he's rewired himself internally. he's built self-gratifying systems without external imput. he's closed off all but a few central rooms. he can wait them out. no one can get to him anymore. he's designed a labyrinth with false doors and walls and other misleading traps to utterly baffle and frustrate the most determined. he has become entirely defensive because for once he has something to defend.
    let them kill each other. let them starve. let them die. he will do nothing but watch and wait even if he does so forever and alone. better that than what they have to offer him - annihilation and oblivion - their ultimate reality and truth. let them prostrate themselves and worship its ugly face. let them dance before it and offer it their sacrifices they offer to hold off the time they are offered as sacrifice to buy others protection themselves.
    he laughs.
    he comes among them while they are sleeping and feasts on these sacrifices. he is gorged while they are wanting. he grows fat while they waste away into nothingness. it is his face they cannot bear to look at.
    ah, this madness is complete. it fills his mind with visions he delights to behold whether they are real or not. who cares what can be substantiated by others? who are they ? where are they?
    and he sings - my dear one beloved, you too know of this madness. you too share it with me. you too know how we are despised and spit on by these monkeys who have gained the intelligence to put 2+2 together and pull a few rabbits out of hats and believe that makes them masters of the world. but look at them huddled and cowering together when darkness surrounds them. look at them seeking and finding strength in numbers because each of them alone is weak and frightened. we are alone among them and our solitude is our strength. they need the masses and to win their approval. fuck the masses. fuck the group, mind large or small. you and i know no one can be trusted but ourselves. and we need no confirmation of ourselves and our existence but our own. let us dance alone together. only you and i know how this is done. others need others. they need to nod their heads in agreement. they need to recognize each other because they cannot recognize themselves.

    and always faking it for somebody or someone else. always playing dumb because they need a fool while it's someone else they take seriously. but what does this someone else give them but all the misery in the world? but they seem to enjoy wallowing in it.
    he writes it out. and he writes it out again. arranging the words first one way and then another and another. each time he sees a little into it a little more and is able to connect that much more of it together. where someone else would see circles of repetition he sees spirals of comprehension. peeling away the layers. how else is it done? over time there is progress although in the moment there is an awful lot of frustration. he is learning, or trying to learn, how to ignore that. he wears that down layer by layer too. he fights fire with fire. he frustrates his frustration. it still pisses him off though. but not as much as it used to. for all the failure there is success.
    it comes to nothing. but in nothing there is the possibility of everything. something simple. but when it is simple they say it is too simple. something complex. but when it is complex they say it is too complex. too hot. too cold. too far to the right. too far to the left. too far ahead. too far behind. too high. too low. too black. too white. too strong. too weak. too happy. too sad. no matter what it's never quite right. too much this. not enough that. they whittle it down from every direction with their discriminating demands until there's nothing left. they have fine tuned their expectations to the point where it is gone. they have taken it all and thrown it all away. then they turn on themselves because there's nothing left to lose. but what is there to gain?
    sound familiar?
    it's all too familiar to him. he's witnessed it far too many times watching them doing this to one another until they end up destroying all they touch. as the doors are closed and locked and the shades are drawn and the lights turned out.
    and he's waiting for the show to begin. the grand full tilt worldwide freak out finale that has been promised for so long it's not true. he sits by the window, front row center, and drinks his coffee and smokes his cigarettes.
    it shouldn't be too long.
    and he won't be satisfied with his own discriminating expectations for anything less than that anyone can give him until and unless they've gone through that wall first and come out the other side with just a big fat grin that won't quit and eyes that shine and sparkle because they're now gazing upon what it is without the layers and layers of built up illusions blackening it and they sit down at his table and say... well, they don't say much of anything or what they say doesn't make much sense because they're in the process of having their minds blown by the most wonderful amazing neverending kick ass euphoric ecstatic joyful rocking awesome radical fresh on and on experience ever possible beyond all reason and imagination that might have been possible and what they do say a lot is, yeah... yeah, oh yeah... i dig it...
    but he sits. and he watches and waits. and no one fitting this description has yet to show up. he just sees those with scorn on their faces. he sees those troubled by disappointment after disappointment. but he also sees those - everyone - moving closer and closer to the breaking point. that's what he's watching and waiting for. when it all breaks. when they are forced by circumstances that are theoretically beyond their control to let go. when the thin ice that has been cracking finally collapses beneath them and they are plunged into the cold dark waters and they either make it to the surface again or they don't.
    he never did.
    he tried to. he surfaced but couldn't climb out. the edge kept breaking and those he held his hand out for kept backing away as the cracks he was creating zigzagged under their feet. eventually he gave up. and at that point of giving up he relaxed and grew calm. his mind no longer screaming in panic. and what had always been inside his mind was reveled. he was drawn to it. what was at first an almost imperceptible spark became glowing coals becoming kindling flames becoming a burning fire becoming a radiant sun. he forget how freezing cold the world was outside around him and how frozen cold he was in it. he forgot about those skating away to keep moving before they fell through too while he slowly sinks to the bottom and the hole he fell through freezes over again and he is gone and forgotten.
    going insane is such a wonderful thing.

    and there are always angles to it. it's seen one way or another or another. there are many images of himself he can conjure up to present to whoever he feels the need to present them to. to one he presents the babbling fool. to another the silent mystic. to another the plain ordinary dumb fuck. or the artist. or the poet. or whoever else as the need might arise. to one he is desired. to another he is hated. to another he is ignored. he is looked up to and down upon.
    and none see him at all. no one sees him watching and waiting for them - any one of them - to get it. for at least one of them to come to him and show him they've got it. there is nothing he wouldn't do for this other. he would save the world. without that one he watches and waits and he'll watch and wait while the world around him goes straight to one hell or another - there are so many to choose from. and he won't blink an eye. and he will do nothing more than light another cigarette and learn to forget.
    he forgets all who he was and more. all he wanted was some peace and quiet.
    and now she runs the world. she's finally gotten out of the kitchen and now she's a master of business and war.
    and he's got his peace and quiet.
    she leaves him alone. she's forgotten him. but she has her spies who will report to her if he gets out of line.
    all he does is smoke another cigarette.
    he doesn't look back anymore.
    all he has to do is dig it.
    tomorrow he dies. he's to be shot at dawn to make way for her brave new world. his name erased and forgotten from record and memory. he digs the moment where there is no past and no future. he leaves it to her and them to rewrite the one and replan the other. he has surrendered and given all over to her and her armies who shout her name.
    all but what he has stolen and hidden away leaving the rest a barren wasteland pillaged and poisoned to the point of death. that dies with him.
    his last request will be another cigarette.
    his last words will be - i forget.
    bang bang. shoot shoot.
    the king is dead.
    long live the queen.