"smoothing the parched and fissured floodplain
to your fine skin, silt and a foam of flowers left"
--Reginald Shepherd
Thursday, October 17, 2024
October is for visiting graveyards.
I don't think they should change the way software platforms work without leaving you the choice to make it go back to the way it was if you don't like it.
"this caterpillar
still not a butterfly
deep into autumn"
--Basho via @bashosociety
"Though bad feelings between philosophers and trans people were mutual, the former could be mostly separated from the latter by a wall of class access." (via @mckenziewark)
"Winter
Among the brittled grasses,
Frosting in the moon glare,
Tombstones are
Whiter tonight. "
--Jun Fujita via
Rotating-morphing hexagonal maplike form.
"Génocidaire"
as has been amply shown
murder on a vast
& automated scale
can easily be contrived
using the building blocks
of ordinary men
& itemized techniques
given a faulty premise
& that most deadly curse
instilled in us from youth
retains its first cachet:
the will to follow orders
"Rilke, upon reading Trakl: 'I imagine that even the initiated experiences these views and insights as an outsider pressed against panes of glass: for Trakl’s experience occurs like mirror images and fills its entire space, which, like the space in the mirror, cannot be entered.' " --@dreamsofbeing_ via @mcmansionhell
"wave after wave
on an incessant journey
another sunset
when I long to change the taste
of salt, the colour of the wind"
--Pravat Kumar Padhy via @ericcoliu
monkeyshines · shapeshifter October
the blinding or blacked-out · winding backstreets
i remember through house-moves · & plague years
the words fade · if they ever weren't false
to shapeshifter October · taker of summers
Wednesday, October 16, 2024
Random # 222 = 435 in base-7; 4 + 3 + 5 = 12 lines
the wrung thread that raddles
rapt dyspeptic grep days
burning that boil-garnet
above our crunk functions
i take my place in the flow
plumb out of chrome plated
plot twists here where thought churns
dronefire mires tomorrow
maybe a shelf labile
i find in my higher hurl
dyspeptic orb parboil
i prove with my allotment
A bank in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
"There is no I taken in itself, but only the I of the primary word I-Thou and the I of the primary word I-It." --Martin Buber (tr R G Smith)
“Through a partnership with Microsoft, Kroger plans to place cameras at its digital displays, which will use facial recognition tools to determine the gender and age of a customer captured on camera and present them with personalized offers and advertisements on the EDGE Shelf,” reads the letter. “EDGE will allow Kroger to use customer data to build personalized profiles of each customer, and then use those profiles ‘to determine how much price hiking each of us can tolerate,’ quickly updating and displaying the customer’s maximum willingness to pay on the digital price tag.” via via @adamjohnsonchi
cosmic
defunctive reds
dissolve into savor
of what we were when we were the
bright ones
i wasn't yet ten
when they threatened to expel me
for wearing a peace sign
all the wars since then
ladybug
on a tall, tall tree
"John Berger, on Simone Weil’s window:
'You stand at the window, you open it, you lean against the railing of the balcony on which no more than four pigeons could land, and you fly in imagination over the roofs and history.
It’s the exact height for flights of the imagination: the height of birds flying to the far edge of the city, to the walls, where the present ends and another epoch begins. In no other city in the world are such flights so elegant.
She loved the view from the window, and she was deeply suspicious of its privilege.' " --@lightinkpaint
Personally i think there should be a law that robots can't speak to a human without being spoken to.
Random # 85 = 151 in base-7; 1 + 5 + 1 = 7 lines
IV-tied & burned alive
not the way i'd care to go
US-made the armaments
silence or excuses made
now we graithe for Halloween
how can i be part of this
how can i evade it though
Goddess of the rune-carved mead mug.
The Incomplete Lojban language.
"Ghost Music
Gloomy and bare the organ-loft,
Bent-backed and blind the organist.
From rafters looming shadowy,
From the pipes’ tuneful company,
Drifted together drowsily,
Innumerable, formless, dim,
The ghosts of long-dead melodies,
Of anthems, stately, thunderous,
Of Kyries shrill and tremulous:
In melancholy drowsy-sweet
They huddled there in harmony.
Like bats at noontide rafter-hung."
--Robert Graves (via @poochigian)
"For example, in one of Asimov’s stories, robots are made to follow the laws, but they are given a certain meaning of 'human.' Prefiguring what now goes on in real-world ethnic cleansing campaigns, the robots only recognize people of a certain group as 'human.' They follow the laws, but still carry out genocide." --Peter W Singer via
"I want poolrooms to be real ." (Frutiger Aero-adjacent.)
"Till Echo, like an ancient oracle..." --J Stanyan Bigg
The Stream (Coming and Going).
"smoky rubble
a bullet-riddled helmet
marked PRESS"
--@ericcoliu
spiral coil from spillth raised
aspire plains to choir on
nothing's own dark inning
erstwhile it's a burst hope
in your lane find fennel
phantoms among scantlings
spiral coil from spillth raised
aspire plains to choir on
let the wrong one linger
latticework & flat tire
home is a huge region
harrowed by pure fury
Long ago i figured why the two parties have been running almost vote for vote the same. Just imagine you have to replace a roll of toilet paper, & there's two ways it can go, but you don't particularly care which. Then it turns out some of the time one way, & some of the time the other. Even though people are roused to assert their tribal identities vociferously on social media, when it comes to actively participating in democracy, what many people feel is a tedious obligation, to be gotten through with as quickly as possible (like homework or jury duty). There really are not that many voters who think about it any harder than that (because, as i say, they want to assert that most precious right: the right not to have to think). So it's a razor edge we walk.
But on the other hand, to play the devil's advocate, there could also be a huge plurality of people with at least enough sense not to step in cowflop, except that the media needs the excitement of a "close race" so they only pay attention to data that reinforces that notion....
Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. (via @minxmarple)
"Love is not possession, but a continuous dispossession. It is the sweetness of pure shipwreck."
There is already a beginning of Gpt-authored & part-authored books flooding the market. You could say humans tinkering with the output has been a regular feature of cynernetic literature at least since the days of Racter. A podcaster Melanie is fond of "Wings of Pegasus" on Youtube) says almost all the commercial music coming out these days has been autotuned--even when the singer has a perfectly good voice. It's just the varnish they glop over everything to make it "finished". So this was easy for foresee. Will non-cyber-aided art become, like wood carvings or handmade quilts, a specialty with its own specialty audience? I like AI art for its weirdness when it's weird in a way no human would've thought of--when it too perfectly imitates mediocre human art, it just bores me. I think this is also an effect that will happen. Maybe there will be jobs for humans to add human-kind of imperfections, "texture", to those perfect AI-artworks.
Random # 41 = 56 in base-7; 5 + 6 = 11 lines
the cries of the crows · too long unheeded
this burning born · in the eldritch cathedral
done with the dawn · done with ev'rything
they runed Plutolight
portioned-out pills · plinked ragtime
on the fluttering floor where · discount flanges
(the rest is missing) · plenty of marks
to yammer at yet · before i've finished
my coffee the cairn · of skulls rises
to stifle the sun · it's a cold world
with a lot of ices
"You have entered the tunnel."
Tuesday, October 15, 2024
"The impossible in which I believe
Borges is in; this library
is more alive. When he arrives,
the possible becomes more so.
I offer him his cup of tea,
but it is seldom tea-time where
Borges is. In this library
the volumes ripple on the shelves
and yet keep rising like the fire
the possible becomes. More so
than you might think, these books extend
through time or space once it is clear
Borges is in. This library
is never ghostless as it glows
through dreams of visitors who know
the possible becomes more, so
much more than those who graced these aisles,
than dust that dances over files.
Borges is in this library;
the possible becomes more so."
--@amjuster
"a fork in the trail
the wind
takes our old map"
--@ericcoliu
"...I'm reminded of a recent conversation I had with a colleague who teaches our poetry classes; he said he writes his business correspondence in villanelles when he has to be especially pleading with the recipient." --@anonscone
(rhime rondeau)
the last stage of art
dispense with the angel
melancholia
the delicate yearning
of the short candle
shadows walk in amber
& tentative slag
progeny of Cthulhu
the last stage
a tightening coil
a rigorous ebbing
in games of closure
played with a paperclip
tipped high for the vap
the last stage
Jumbled careening cars & houses.
"Prologue of the Earthly Paradise
Of Heaven or Hell I have no power to sing,
I cannot ease the burden of your fears,
Or make quick-coming death a little thing,
Or bring again the pleasure of past years,
Nor for my words shall ye forget your tears,
Or hope again for aught that I can say,
The idle singer of an empty day.
But rather, when aweary of your mirth,
From full hearts still unsatisfied ye sigh,
And, feeling kindly unto all the earth,
Grudge every minute as it passes by,
Made the more mindful that the sweet days die—
—Remember me a little then I pray,
The idle singer of an empty day.
The heavy trouble, the bewildering care
That weighs us down who live and earn our bread,
These idle verses have no power to bear;
So let me sing of names remembered,
Because they, living not, can ne’er be dead,
Or long time take their memory quite away
From us poor singers of an empty day.
Dreamer of dreams, born out of my due time,
Why should I strive to set the crooked straight?
Let it suffice me that my murmuring rhyme
Beats with light wing against the ivory gate,
Telling a tale not too importunate
To those who in the sleepy region stay,
Lulled by the singer of an empty day.
Folk say, a wizard to a northern king
At Christmas-tide such wondrous things did show,
That through one window men beheld the spring,
And through another saw the summer glow,
And through a third the fruited vines a-row,
While still, unheard, but in its wonted way,
Piped the drear wind of that December day.
So with this Earthly Paradise it is,
If ye will read aright, and pardon me,
Who strive to build a shadowy isle of bliss
Midmost the beating of the steely sea,
Where tossed about all hearts of men must be;
Whose ravening monsters mighty men shall slay,
Not the poor singer of an empty day."
--William Morris
Poems about being scared, poems about being tired, & for variety poems about being scared & tired.
"Sometimes
I leave footprints the shape of blood; sometimes glass
flows through broken veins, and I glitter."
--Reginald Shepherd
Another overcast day here in magical Glastonbury.
(rondeau quatrain in rhime)
The dying singer of a dying day
Grows wistful in the reaptime
Grows wistful in the reaptime
The dying singer of a dying day
The trammels of unruly peace
Run circles on the catafalque
The dying singer of a dying day
Grows wistful in the reaptime
Our tutelary ark
Is crawling with the will to punish
Twilight of the truth
The army runs on fumes of smoking bible
The dying singer of a dying day
Grows wistful in the reaptime
Grows wistful in the reaptime
The dying singer of a dying day
Monday, October 14, 2024
Random # 48 = 66 in base-7; 6 + 6 = 12 lines
doublure soft & blurry
blandishments come thrumming
as if somehow after
all that we know · snowing
tickertape conniption
& toke like Bram Stoker
doublure soft & blurry
blandishments come thrumming
desire zoom-calls dimly
xerox of crag ragtime
i climb as cursed cloister
clattering de-platforms
"They were always at work revising the secret map."
— Robert Aickman via @isidro_li
"scoured to pewter, dulled aluminum: willows will bow" --Reginald Shepherd
Immigration and Naturalization.
Now it is cicalatide
& all the treetops loudly churn
with frenzy that the bugs provide
Their buried sleep transmogrified,
with urgent lust their one concern
now it is cicalatide
a jazz that will not be denied
though all around them riddles burn
with frenzy that the bugs provide
on such hurled rage our futures ride
however we might wish to learn
now it is cicalatide
let no collective suicide
persuade us yet—overt or derne—
with frenzy that the bugs provide
Be silence, not this noise, our guide
As massed catastrophes slow-perne
now it is cicalatide
with frenzy that the bugs provide
(2016)
"Maybe we are all writing to animate dead matter."
Sunday, October 13, 2024
"The word ‘unflinching’ made me pause for a moment, because I think of myself as someone who is almost permanently flinching." (via @jorie_graham)
writing on the body · beringed
inlet · all these errands prior
to the cool savvy sunrise
empty halls under fluorescents
sleep like a slanting rainstorm
"fiction should only be precariously there, it should always be toppling away into something else" --@mjohnharrison (at mastodon)
"... I got to Denver to see my work projected onto the Daniels Fisher tower."
"You can take sides in religion, you can take sides in history, and there are others with you, you are not alone. But when you take the side of love, the opium of love, you are alone." --Anaïs Nin
hour’s sharpener · & shade-filler
i manage to measure · a miss it says stand down
there is nothing for you here
save the groove followers · of grisly set-to
a gaggle of them clogs the doorway
i’ve little brief · with the low-informationed
except as they harsh my vibe
fuel for the Pyro Piper
& the terrible talons · that tear my liver
to fetch back · the fierce mechas
cerulean under
poems posted · appease them nil
is there any light but mercy?
ears ring ragged · with restive unsong
bay clear to the bottom
in the blurred spume · a spider dozes
misses the web quiver
darkness dilates · with instant dowse
signature of so much force
the mechas fierce · as they batter down
each painstaking construct
“Always now the thought of the perfume in its cheap fluted glass bottle with gold paper label brings me back to that shitty room, its darkness, the blue typewriter on the folding table, the bad linoleum, these traits a carapace camouflaging a small freedom that gently expanded inside me like a subtle new organ, an actual muscular organ born of my own desire for what I took to be an impossible and necessary language. Its sillage was an architecture.” –The Baudelaire Fractal
Illustration from Parsifal. (anagram-rhyme)
“A gritty Frog and Toad reboot where the twist is there has only ever been FROG” –@hottestsingles (via @chuckwendig)
burnished steel door
moth on the doorframe
have hustled through
without noticing
the new ringtone
this toast, another
the next room's hum
& gathering reasons
not even handful
seen in a book once
full-page plates
drawings of fossils
Saturday, October 12, 2024
Random # 61 = 115 in base-7; 1 + 1 + 5 = 7 lines
the mechas move · marching stiffly
dark shapes · in the crashing shadows
who can handle this · horrid crime
no one watching · works at mechas
it's like they loomed · out of nothing
caused that carnage · for no reason
far off planet · placed here to kill
"pebbles and purple petals streaked with rain" --Reginald Shepherd
Vamos a la Playa. (via @brianroemmele)
“first there was brightness,
then it suffered;
suffering invented shape.”
—Brenda Hillman, “Sorrow of Matter” via @dentzshira
"a cacophony
of sirens, shouting and screams...
a girl curls up
next to the wheels of a stretcher
that holds her bloodied siblings"
--@ericcoliu