One

Years ago, in the middle of the night back at the place we used to live (which has since been torn down), I woke up thinking something wasn't right. I got up and turned on the lights. The apartment layout was different, with longer rooms, no basement, and very little furniture, like we'd just moved in. So anyway, I heard them before I saw them. The apartment was full of ants all over the floor. There were millions of ants, possibly billions of ants, all over the place. I said, "There are ants all over the place." Mary sat up. "There are?" "Look." I swept my foot across the floor and the ants bulked up visibly, like a crawling mass of iron filings approached by a magnet. "Wow!" she said: "I guess we should call someone." I swept the ants into the next room. There was a brand-new colony of mice in the next room too. Would the mice happily eat the ants? I didn't know. There was nothing to be done. I went back to bed. The ants were crawling on me, in my ears, on my back. I got used to it. You can get used to anything.

 

***

 

Dream is a spiritual child of the god of the wind.

Dream has no limits to where he can go or be.

Dream is bigger and biggest.

Dream is our greatest warrior. Dream is our greatest lover. Dream is our greatest mourner.

Dream was there when it all went down.

Dream had a good laugh when he got influential people to buy into something called surrealism.

Dream dreams lucidly.

Dream is so omnipresent Dream is ant colonies.

Though Dream is named Dream, it's always mispronounced.

Dream has no space through which to penetrate for Dream is the hole, the bullet, and the topology.

Dream doubles everything, at least.

Dream lives, cuts, holds, slips, clicks, dies, tocks, makes, steals, and gives.

Dream is a frightening being when you really think about it which you do and he does.

There is more of Dream than in the wildest dreams.

He's like space but greater, like time but longer, like air but thicker.

[Thirty-two million two hundred and eighty-six thousand seven hundred and fifty-three paragraphs missing]

Dream sleeps, and dreams about his double and his double's double.

Dream says to everyone: "You live in near-infinite dimensions, but you can only talk about one."

 

***

 

Subject like all (meaning every thing) to time who is the king of infinite, deathless, and eternal destruction,

I, at every moment, without being aware that my subjectivity was subservient, like fishes to water, spiders to gravity, and salamanders to fire, to time,

lost, as of a thing which one once possessed which had become invisible not only to one's present but to one's past such that either only its negative imprint faintly remained or not even that,

every thing I'd ever experienced first- or second- or even third-hand, owned or rented or even touched, or considered for a decade, a month, or even a minute,

and

I, so limitlessly lossy that I did not even recognize any thing's un-existence after it had become existentially un-existent,

liked, with the sensation of a light-making unburdening much like the sweet sensation of drifting into weightless sleep where there is no sensation and the senses have been conquered or rejected,

losing them, for the moiety of experience is entirely dreadfully awful while the remainder does with time lose its sweetness to become either bittersweet or slightly sour, like condensed milk in a cup in a six-days' sun feeding moss are all my memories.

 

***

 

Well ... that didn't work either.

We had to find another tack. The failures were piling up high.

Everything we'd tried had failed. A better way had to be found. We consulted the same old books again.

We designed a much taller building. It looked like a much shorter one. We bought a whole new bag of tricks. It was labelled: AS NEW.

We put on some soundless subliminal music. We didn't have much time left. "Horses are massing on the plain." Even that had been done, more than once, before.

We thought of diversifying us market-wise. We hit each other with things. We held a 24-hour creativity orgy. Only the passive tense was employed. We could have turned against ourselves.

We put on some ear-splitting music. We built an exquisite corpse. We painted our bodies with bodies. We went running in the rain.

We bought us some more coffee. The can promised to wake us up. We all transcendentally meditated fiercely. We walked along the riverbank.

What if we added an extra day? How would the world respond? We racked our brains fearlessly.

We cut up some newspapers, again. Something new will be found.

We can never give up.

 

***

 

Dream is a spiritual child of the god of the wind.

Dream has no limits to where he can go or be.

Dream is bigger and biggest.

Dream is our greatest warrior. Dream is our greatest lover. Dream is our greatest mourner.

Dream was there when it all went down.

Dream had a good laugh when he got influential people to buy into something called surrealism.

Dream dreams lucidly.

Dream is so omnipresent Dream is ant colonies.

Though Dream is named Dream, it's always mispronounced.

Dream has no space through which to penetrate for Dream is the hole, the bullet, and the topology.

Dream doubles everything, at least.

Dream lives, cuts, holds, slips, clicks, dies, tocks, makes, steals, and gives.

Dream is a frightening being when you really think about it which you do and he does.

There is more of Dream than in the wildest dreams.

He's like space but greater, like time but longer, like air but thicker.

[Thirty-two million two hundred and eighty-six thousand seven hundred and fifty-three paragraphs missing]

Dream sleeps, and dreams about his double and his double's double.

Dream says to everyone: "You live in near-infinite dimensions, but you can only talk about one."

 

***

 

How mighty's this? Hanumat leaps to Lanka, uprooting trees and rocks in his slipstream. It's quite the leap, that. A mountain rises from the ocean to give him a place to briefly rest, but he sees it as an obstruction and blasts through it. He's in a hurry. He's already late. He hasn't yet found Sita, and the world will end if he doesn't find her. This is mighty. Hanumat tenses his muscles. His tail is like a serpent. His fists are tense on the ground, and he leaps. It's some forty miles to Lanka. He is the son of the wind and the brother of the king of the birds. While he is in his leap, all the gods watch and comment. They've never seen the like. Flowers and trees are being swept away in his wake. If he does not find Sita, he will have to sit down and starve to death. The mighty son of the wind is leaping across the ocean to Lanka, taking trees and flowers in the air. The ocean is churning, excited by his great energy. This all happened in the most recent Treta Yuga. Hanumat is leaping to Lanka, across the ocean.

 

***

 

God visited me last week. Or maybe it was two weeks ago, I don't remember. He pointed at me and said, "How goes it?" I said, "Not bad. My baggage is getting heavy, though."

We walked for a while, like we were friends. I was dragging my baggage all behind me, in a big red sack.

He asked: "What's in the bag?"

I said: "As if you don't know."

He asked: "What's in the bag?"

I said: "You know: it's all of it. Things. I was too weak to not go along with the things."

"The bag isn't pulling you."

"No."

"You're not moving backwards."

"No."

"What's in the bag?"

"I never meant to start accumulating it all. It more simply happened to me."

"As if."

"It's full of bad things. Evil things."

"It doesn't look that heavy."

We walked for a while, like we were friends. I dragged my red sack.

He said: "I have a suggestion."

"Oh?"

"I think it'll make you mad."

"Go right ahead."

"Why don't you simply let the sack go?"

That's why I got angry. "What? Surely you realize I'd have no baggage left to hold me here!"

"You're wrong."

"Then I'll be wrong!"

 

***

 

Before we begin our critical theory seminars, during which we will diss Shakespeare, Homer, Montaigne, and the bible--note that I am using a lower-case b--and praise instead a select portion of things written since the day we were born, let us here honour the ancestral and originary possessors of the land on which we speak, for we are late-comers and we should trod lightly but never ever leave it unless we get better offers from other places.

Let us honour the beings upon whose land we speak. Let us honour the frilly triceratopses who never deserved their fates, and let us honour the mighty stegasauri, who were probably vegan; let us honour the numberless sauropods some of whom were really really big, and we honour the brontosauri, the beloved lizards of thunder, always peaceful, and honour we give to the pterodactyls who flew higher than anyone else, and we must honour the third cousin once removed of the Piltdown Man who probably stopped here to look up at the night sky and wonder what it was all about.

Have you all received your name-tags? There'll be a break after the first session. Fair trade coffee will be served.

 

***

 

I was out having dinner with the wife and she ordered up a glass of wine. She tasted it and said, "It's no good."

I tried it and she was right. I said, "Then ask for another."

Waiter came over, she told him the wine was off. He bowed and took it away without a word.

I said, "You'd think there'd be an apology."

Suddenly this man appeared. "I would like to apologize for the terrible wine. I don't know how we can be forgiven. For hundreds of years, this--"

I interrupted, saying, "You look familiar."

He appeared to blush. "Well, I AM the Prime Minister of Canada."

"What, are you moonlighting?"

"No. I am taking responsibility. For hundreds--"

"Why are you in California?"

"Well.... I consider myself foremost an internationalist."

"Do you represent the, um, vintner?"

"No."

"So who do you represent?"

"How about: um: the West? the Patriarchy?"

"It's an eight dollar glass of merlot."

He fell on his knees, sobbing. "Please, please, simply accept my apology!"

"It's got nothing to do with you!"

"You, sir, are wrong! I am to blame! I have supreme guilt!"

"You want me to stomp you?"

His eyes lit up.

 

***

 

The studio engineer found a cat meowing in the garbage can outside. He decided to bring it into the studio and take care of it there, as a mascot.

A year later, a big rock group decided to session there, seeking to channel what they called the local Tuckmeister Sound. They had lots of money and were booked for four months.

A month later, the drummer brought in a bigger cat that proceeded to attack the engineer's cat. It's no mystery why he did this, and the studio suddenly had two mascots.

Three week passed before the bass player brought in an even bigger cat that proceeded to tyrannize over the other two. Somehow it was seen as being 'good for the groove' to have three cats always fighting on the mixing board.

Sometime later, the rhythm guitarist brought in the biggest cat he could find: a Maine coon. Suffice it to say that some blood flowed.

Finally, the vocalist showed up, with a border collie. The collie chased the cats all over the place until they were all hiding, terrified. The engineer complained there was something unfair about it all.

The vocalist said: "Nope. I named the dog Cat."

 

***

 

"Ada Lovelace, take that!"

The arrow went right into her forehead.

My partner cried, "Good shot! A free arrow if you can do the same to Turing!"

I pulled back on my bow. The leather covering my fingers was damp with power. I took careful aim at the black and white enlarged photographic target pocked with our previous hits, and let fly. The arrow flew off, and thunked soundly into Doctor Digital's left eye.

"You owe me an arrow," I cried triumphantly.

"Ah, but that wasn't his forehead. It was his bleeding eye. I give unto you ... a half-arrow credit."

"Fairly done, fairly done. I wonder how the dog is doing."

"He should be wholly edible by now."

We moved to the fire upon which the dog was roasting merrily.

"Look at that fine haunch! Give, my man, give!"

We gobbled away. Far off, we could see the battle raging brightly though we could hear but naught.

"They can't last much longer. There can't be that much energy left for them."

"I suppose not. I give them another six months I suppose."

"In the meantime, we wait."

"Soon, the cities will be mere junkyards of hardware."

"Let us hope."

 

***

 

We got the genre chosen, posted, so's the customers know what they're in for

We got the signs all ready for the outside of this the Metropolitan Theatre

We've put glossy advertisements in the three main dailies serving the area

The National Bugle, the Starbound Inquisitor, and even that parody weekly

We got someone to write it, the recitatives, the arias, and five laments

And someone's cousin who's a whiz at pop tunes turned them into numbers

We got some guy for the love-interest fellow, just recently from Italy

And for his counterpart this blonde who'll do anything for an advance

The juvenile's a guy who's a perfect fool, beat him up why don't you

A punch-drunk idiot who grew up, whenever he wasn't ignored, abused

And the orchestra's filled with not-quite-humans, simians, in fact

Who can't read a note, but it's not like anyone is around to care

An the stagehand work on spec, dopers all, no matter the quality

And the curtain-man is happy, he's got but one job to attend to

And here he goes, the curtain going up, the actors and singers

Are going to put on a show, a little love to make, with drama

 

***

 

1. Again: from the perspective of a being living in two-dimensional space, a three-dimensional sphere passing through (along the 3rd axis invisible to Mr 2D), Mr 3D would appear as nothing, then a dot, then a circle, then a dot again, and then again nothing.

B. Someone is at the door.

C. A woman looking for someone named George. I said there's no George here.

4. In exactly the same way, a 4D entity passing through a 3D space (such as ours) would suddenly appear as if out of nowhere, exist in our space, then vanish without a trace, along some unknown axis.

E. Again there's someone at the door!

F. Some guy. "Is Becky home?" "No Becky here, sorry."

7. Now: we know, for we are 4d, that the correct application of the above principles are at bottom the key to most common phen

H. George and Becky are here. How did they know where to find me? I haven't thought about them in years.

9. omena, for we know that things continue to be even when we are not looking at them. They've temporarily left the plane.

J. Becky: Like another body's soul.

What's happened to my indexing?

 

***

 

The sun was high in the sky and the mud was warm. I swam off the bank to get some of that good ol' water all over me. I thought I was doing just fine, there with the rest of the bloat. "This's the life!"

"Hey, sonny." I moved around. Some guy was looking at me. "Waddle on over here, lemme learn you some stuff."

I waddled over. He said: "Think you got it sweet, eh? Eatin' grass, sunbathin', lettin' birds pick through your fungus. Well, lemme tell you about the big city."

I said: "They cain't have no better waterin' holes than this un, can they?"

"Hah! Bigguns, an' all your grub for free."

"Free? Where do I sign up?"

"Come along, come along."

I followed him across savannas and steppes. Finally we came to a fence.

"Other side o' this fence it's cityfolk," he told me.

We went along the fence till we came to a gate. My new best friend said: "Sign on the dotted line," so I did.

And in I went.

And it's great in here! Good food, good water. I even get baths. All I have to do is sign something, every two years....

 

***

 

When I saw that a social media service was promising me untrammelled access to everything known everywhere in the world, I shouted, "Sign me up!"

And sign up I did. The cost was a reasonable fifteen bucks a month. I entered all my credit card and banking fizz, filled out a simple survey, wisely skipped over the Terms of Service, and clicked OK! LET'S GO!

I got an email informing me that the system was processing all the data they got and would respond shortly.

So at midnight last night my printer woke me up. Page after page spewered out, and they were all photographs! A picture of my mother preggers with me, one of me being delivered, two of me as a toddler, young boy at summer camp, me and someone having sexual intercourse, a picture of me taking a history test, a picture of me setting fire to my garment warehouse, one of my children avoiding me, me dead drunk, a picture of me dying of cancer, and a picture of my gravestone. Then the printer actually ran out of ink.

I'm going out now to buy more ink cartridges. I want to know what happens after death!

 

***

 

After looking at the clock, and next the calendar, and following a telephone call to Saint-Cloud and an email to Leipzig, Becca slowly opened the beige parcel: but not slowly enough! In less than the blink of an eye out popped a green goblin-like thing with as many eyes as birds in a flock.

It requested being let in to her. Becca asked the consequences of refusal. It stated its response in daemonic tongues. Becca sighed. It self-lubricated. "I misread the email from Leipzig," said Becca. It replied: "You will like this." Becca did.

There was a sentence here reading something like: "Nine months later, her home was filled with as many eyes as sky stars."

There was no more to it than that.

The file came to be called After looking at the clock((Unsaved-306997701888888080)).asd, for a limited time.

The golbin-like things have more eyes than molecules. They are more than everywhere. Becca, more than all of her, felt her regrets being replaced till they were replaced.

The replacement of everything with gobilns has reached stasis. There is only one non-gobiln anywhere in the three worlds. All's been ringed by Becca's care.

Do not revenge; mark it down to ...