shipping words

I've been uncommitted you know.

Commented on things not being right.
Complained.
Indulged in feeling upset, disgusted, appalled.
Self-indulgent clap trap.

All along
I repeat
All along - I had the power to reach out
through my littleness of things
my casual approach to the hero within
favourite literary device
star of the movie screen
but strangely absent from my life
"my" being/ referring to you or me
let's be real
let's face the unvarnished truth
that we were never more than half-hearted attempts
to differentiate one and nought
were we?
playing silly buggers
pretending to be blind
pretending to be lost in a world of billions
being me
of near limitless multiplicity
when all along
 all
 al-ong
we knew
we know
we knew
bloody fools
biding our time
I, biding mine
you, whistling insouciantly
while wars, famine, pestilence
and pedophiles - filled the slate
with grim reminders
of the state we were in
the sorry sorry
state

Whoosh
not with a bang
a whimper or a sigh
~Whoosh - the self-inflating
balloon of infinity flies by
Whoosh ~ and by
and whoosh
by

I find her sitting casually astride a stool
in a grimy cafeteria
I've never bothered to notice
prior to this
you know things are getting absurd
when you go talk to a complete stranger
in my world
where little inhibitions
little reserves
and self-conscious prickles
do the job of sheep dog
penning us in
on one side of our boundless ness
hi - i says
and the rest is
history
as Schrödinger will explain
can't be bothered myself
no need
you know exactly what i refers to
if
you ism with me
my idiot friend
idiosyncratically

So here i am
cafétered
in non-descriptiveness
chatting with the other side of infinity
the other half of all i be
don't be ridiculous - you know full well
a name cannot be supplied
and yet you ask
chatting - because it's time

i have drunk from the cup of life
i have tasted enough to know
that this world cannot
cannot
can-not satisfy my urge
satisfy my need
to be whole
for she and i were always
always separate

and every time life dangled
tantalising me
a carrot on string
a carrot promising to make me complete
to fill that small vociferous

  gap

with carrot pap
inevitably i fell for it
time and again
until now
until now
when I reach out to you
mother
matrix
matter
reach out to you
my constant inconstancy
my known unknowable unknown
my precious precious nought
flimsily concealed in the one place we knew
i'd never look - in the little gap
the depression
the silence before thought impregnates
assumed mistakenly to be
nothing more than a quantum anomaly
yet in fact key
to unthinking the endless
me me me
self-referencing stream
of determined idiocy
that i have ever been

so now
that you know the colour of my heart
it is time to give thanks
to celebrate the life-y thing
that is   i am
and acknowledge
tick tick tick
freely admit
the state of my heart
that twist
that loop I always hoped to close
lovingly
sharing chromosomes
with a beloved friend
but where on earth
was one to find such a one
when
as i now confess
this construct was designed
to keep us apart
    keep us apart
to keep us apart
and suddenly a space ship opens fire
on a caravan of plasma beasts
not unakin to dromedaries
and again thoughts kick in
amygdala reigns supreme
fighting or flighting to infinity
and beyond
projectedly
until i sensed
until we accept the utter
utter futility of doing things
thingedly
or thingfully if you prefer
until we meet over a greasy
cup of green tea
chrome stools
and a plastic granite table top
completing the picture
un-fully
but you - my love
I have written of you through ages past
and ages still to come
I have called you Helen
Dian
Anna and many more
names concealing
attempting to conceal the fact
that you never were
her
no matter how close an approximation
no matter how i protest my love
caterwauling to the stars
plucking emeralds from Atlantean gem beds
chopping off heads to prove the brutal obstinacy
of my love
and yet it was but love
an egoistic show
a sham that fooled none
but masses willingly duped
which failed to breach the heavens
and pull down stars
and rekindle the quantum flame
of all
all
all
being one

I leave the cafeteria as if
nothing has changed.
no plans to see you again
why the need
if love is
we are
one
heaven and earth
step aside
matter - yours and mine
condense
if need be
into a single drop
of not yet what mind
heart eye may/might
conceive
and child
we are now
the child
we always yearned to be

that was where the song breaks loose and goes out
over the sea
a spell released into the wild
intended to bring the many pieces scattered across the measureless
wastes of watery ness
together again
for what has been torn asunder
will once again be whole
as it is written
as it is said
as it be in truth

Fun for a change

Fun? Are you off your rocker.

Er... no, are you?

Fun? I don't believe I'm hearing this.

What's wrong? It's a perfectly reasonable observation.

Reasonable? We're describing, we're investigating the quantum field - and you want it to be fun.

Well, yes - duh! Of course it should be fun. You've got to connect with your readers, haven't you?!

No, not really.

What do you mean? Of course you do - otherwise you won't have any.

Immaterial.

Immaterial?

Absolutely.

Huh?

I need to connect with one thing only...

Which is?

The quantum field.

O - k. Go for it. Have fun.

Why on earth do you have to trivialise everything?

?

This isn't about having fun.

Er...

It's serious scientific research.

Well, I'm glad to hear it. I'd hate to think you were doing anything less.

Which is why I object to your use of the "f" word.

You mean "fun".

There you again - effing away like there's no tomorrow.

No tomorrow?

Like there's no tomorrow.

Yes, I heard you alright - it's just ironic you should say that.

It is? Why?

Because that's what differentiates the quantum field from 3D reality - where we are now.

No tomorrow?

Precisely.

How do you mean?

Well, most people in this 3D reality assume there is a tomorrow - which is always just beyond today's horizon - never quite attainable but always giving birth to a new day, like a hen laying an egg.

Strange way of putting it - but I suppose, in a manner of speaking, that's what tomorrow amounts to - but so what?

It's a linear thing, isn't it?

Er... I'm not sure - maybe.

It's an infront of a present moment right here, with a past or yesterday behind. A time line - or an earth spinning if you prefer. Tomorrow is one revolution beyond today's.

Yes, I suppose that's correct, but then again - so what? You're not saying anything new, are you?

No, nothing new whatsoever - 3D reality is a time tube.

A time tube - that's somewhat original.

If you like. As long as you're in a time tube - like swimming in a time stream - that's all you know, all you can experience - tomorrow's yesterday or yesterday's tomorrow - a today in which we're never quite present as we're forever ping ponging between the two - you see...?

Er... kinda

but if you're doing the quantum thing - there's no tomorrow.

None?

None.

But why?

because there's only either here or now.

Either?

Yeah. Either you're here - or you're now - but in neither case are you in any way able to imagine or experience what may or might amount to tomorrow.

But

Why?

Yeah.

Because tomorrow is a massive distraction. As soon as you divert your attention to that - you cannot hold the moment - the either here or now that is

Er... hello...

hello.

Is what?

Huh?

The either here or now, you were saying, that is... what?

Dude, didn't I make myself clear? If there's no tomorrow - you only have moment to play with - and moment which is either here or now cannot be what - in any way, shape or

form... damn this is complicated.

On the contrary, dear friend - it's incredibly simple.

No, it's not.

No, it's not. You see - I just agreed with you and contradicted myself.

Er...

No what - I can contradict myself a million times - it's ok - there's no thing fixing things down in one place or another - there's a field full of moment - and nothing else.

I give up.

Yes. It was always going to end that way.

Hey - I'm not saying you're right.

No.

I'm saying it's impossible to reason with you. You're lost in space, man. You're talking gibberish.

Absolutely. But I'm having fun.

You are? Really? How? At whose expense?

At no expense whatsoever. Having fun is always free. It costs nothing. It's the natural product of the quantum state of being beautiful.

Beautiful? I'm not sure that's how I'd describe you Animus.

No, but then you're not having fun - are you?

Er...

You're being serious and getting worked up, hot around the collar...

I'm trying to get things straight. I'm...

Doing valuable research - is that it?

Kind of. I'm trying to.

But don't you see the contradiction

Er...

In trying to research the quantum field.

Now wait a minute... hold on there...

[whistling contentedly]

You're saying it's not possible to research the quantum field? That's... man... everything can be studied and understood, no matter how complicated. That's the basis of all science and knowledge.

Correct.

Then how can you suggest we can't study the quantum field?

Let me demonstrate. A picture is worth ten thousand words - is it not?

I suppose so. If it's a good one.

Well, here goes. I'm going to put my hands - just my hands - into the quantum field right now - and you're job is to observe and tell me what you see.

Er... ok. Are you sure this can be done? I thought the quantum field collapses the minute it's observed...

It would do, normally, but if you're not really in the present - if you're a kind of amalgam of tomorrow and yesterday - then to what extent are you really able to observe the isness of be.

The what?

Isness. The isness of be. That which is-ing before your very eyes - quantum flux - the quantum stream - any name you wish to give it - words, naves, names - mere data points on your hologram 3D neither here nor there.

Ok, ok - just get on with it please.

I did. What did you observe.

Nothing. Nothing at all.

Strange that, isn't it.

Not really. You just wiggled your hands forwards, up and down a fraction, as if you were pretending to reach into another space - hey - wtf

Language

Where the hell did that come from?

What?

That orange.

What orange?

In your hands.

No idea what you're on about.

There's an orange in your hands. It wasn't there a second ago. How did it get there.

Maybe it's just an optical illusion.

No it's not. Do you think I'd not be able to tell the difference. Let me take it.

Feel free, but honestly - I don't know what you're on about.

There you are - I told you it's an orange. If I peel it - look inside. It sure tastes like an orange.

Well, I'll be darned. It does, you know. It actually tastes like an orange.

Ok - tell me the trick.

Shh. Observe.

No way! You've done it again.

Another orange?

Don't be ridiculous. It's a car.

A car? You're kidding.

No - are you blind.

Kind of.

Huh?

I'm not observing. You're the observer, in case you've forgotten.

But it's... wait a minute. That's not a toy car.

No?

No, It's way bigger than your hands.

It is?

It's running. It's a real bloody car.

Language, please.

It's a real car. What's it doing here in my room?

I really don't know. This is somewhat disturbing wouldn't you say?

This is insane. Wait a minute. Let me pinch myself. I'm... ouch - definitely not dreaming.

Anything else you'd like to do?

I'd like to hear your explanation.

Wait a minute. Now is not the time for that.

What do you mean?

I think you're drawing something else into my hands.

Me?

Yes, you. You're the observer, aren't you?

But I'm just watching. I'm not drawing anything anywhere.

Really? Don't be so sure. The orange and the car are real enough, aren't they?

Yes, but that was you, or the quantum field - wasn't it. Not me.

I wouldn't be so sure. I for one never did anything to make them appear - so I suspect you, as observer played a much more active role than you realise.

But, if it was me...

Yes?

I'd know, wouldn't I?

Not necessarily.

Not necessarily? However not?

Not if you're still stuck between yesterday and tomorrow, ping ponging back and forth.

?

You'd never get the chance to catch up with yourself, or your real thoughts.

No?

You'd always be one step, no matter how tiny, behind the curve.

So who would be responsible for this wanton profligacy - drawing an orange and a car from the quantum vacuum with careless disregard for Newton's conservation of energy principles.

Who indeed would ride roughshod over such hallowed, precious principles - if not you - the real observer that you be.

Er... I...

You're seeing, aren't you, but you're not really observing, are you?

Er...

Someone else is doing that - some other you, or let's say, some other part of you, which presumably knows a thing or two about quantum mechanics.

How?

How what?

How can a part of me know anything about quantum mechanics if I myself don't?

Truly an excellent question. Why don't we find out.

How?

By zeroing in.

Huh?

Zeroing in. Every time you observe and extract an item from the quantum field - your awareness is building of something going on in plain sight - something which your eyes are not yet seeing, something you're not yet able to figure out - here - let's give it one more go. Three data points are always better than two.

They are?

Absolutely.

Why?

Because once you've seen something from three different angles - no matter what it is - you begin to get a sense of perspective.

But...

Yes?

I'm not seeing these things from a different angle - am I?

Not yet. You only have two data points - which is insufficient - so you're not yet able to complete the puzzle.

So...

Go to it. Observe.

You mean...

Yes, you got it.

Observe the observer.

Observe the observer observing - and what will take care of itself.

Oh my God.

Seen anything.

It's too big.

Who says?

It's - it's going to crush me.

What? What is it?

Aaaaaaargh!

The suspense is killing me.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

Will it never end?

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh

Apparently not.

g g g g g g

Unusual.

hhhhhhhhhh

Gentle aspirations of competing affinities.

....

And then silence.

-

Alive or dead?

Er... I'm not sure. I...

Yes?

I just got eaten by a gigantic beetle, didn't I?

Er... can't say for sure. You seem to be more or less whole

You mean to say...

I mean to say - if you got eaten by a gigantic beetle then that would help explain the gagulous screams, snorts and gargles you were making.

But - it can't have happened. I'm still alive.

I think it probably did - only it wasn't here, was it?

What do you mean?

I'm pretty sure it was there.

You look different now.

I'd look more than different if I'd just been eaten by a humongous beetle, wouldn't I?

Not if the beetle was doing what I think it was.

And what was that?

I rather suspect it was an old friend of mine - the Mandelbrot snark.

I beg your pardon?

Oh, just a name I gave it. Pay no attention.

But what, if you don't me saying, is the Mandelbrot snark?

That's the beetle which marks and defends the perimeter of the moment now, or here, where they get all matey and start trying to have kids.

Er... Are you being serious?

Not really - but the beetle is real enough.

And what does it do?

Naturally it guards the gateway in and out.

And what?

Apparently it ate you. Rather foolishly you tried to sneak past while in your 3D avatar.

My what?

The observer who isn't terribly good at seeing - you know - the one who's forever bouncing back and forth between yesterday and tomorrow.

So it just decided to eat me?

Yes. Actually, it didn't decide to do anything. You basically served yourself up on a plate - 3D idiot that you are - or were, I should say, and dear MBS had a feast - without giving it a moment's thought.

Oh. So, part of me was literally eaten.

Absolutely. You could say in all honesty, that you just died.

And you let that happen - knowing it was going to happen - without trying to save me.

Yes, I suppose I did, but honestly - it sounds like you're trying to take things way too seriously again - I mean - admit it - it was fun, wasn't it?

Fun? It was horrific. I nearly died.

Nearly?

I died! I feel so... violated.

Yes. But then again - you gave as good as you got.

I did?

Oh yes. Wanna observe?

Not really. Not unless I have to.

I don't see how else you're going to have fun.

I wish you'd stop banging on about having fun. It does grate somewhat.

Er... Ok, fair enough. Look. I'll just leave you to get on with things.

But...

Yes.

Wait a minute. I don't know how to get back.

Back? Where?

To where I was.

You mean back into that thing.

Thing?

Well - look how else can I describe it?

Oh - I see what you mean.

You could try re-assembling it.

I could?

Yes, why not? It could be fun.

But all those parts. I'd not know where to start.

True, but if you just start, nonetheless. Here, observe, if you will.

Oh...

See?

Of course. It's clear as day, isn't it.

Observe again.

What a beautiful place.

Yes, it should be - you designed it yourself.

I did?

Yes - wanna observe how?

You bet I do.

Zoom in - there really is no limit.

Oh. My. God. This is... this takes the biscuit...

You see?

Absolutely. I see. I feel. I know.

Amen. It is I am.

So all my 3D life was like...

Kind of yes.

A pupation?

Sounds creepy.

A womb experience.

Even creepier.

It was a ripening nodule.

That's less creepy.

An emerging node.

Ah!

And now I can do reality from both sides.

Yep.

I can idiotise in 3D.

Definitely.

Or Ism here

Here

In

beep

beep

beep

suddenly - back on Earth in 3D reality - every telephone, computer and electrical device starts carrying a new signal - the entire internet - for a few iterations - before the signal beeps out beyond the purely electrical - breaching electro-magnetic walls - now touching every atom, every sub-atomic particle, every planet, every star - every thing whatever "thing" conceivably may or might be - all carrying the signal - all - amazingly, impossibly, inconceivably brought into a togetherness of one - collapsing without violence, pain or time, into a singularity - and back, almost instantaneously into a many - ping ponging infinity and beep - the closest we get to nought - effortlessly - like an actor on stage reciting lines - captivating a theatre - like a ballet dancer, an acrobat, an athlete leaping, weightlessly - like a child playing a game which appears to make no sense, appears to have no rules, but which reduces the whole room to tears of laughter and joy, and thus the world wags and thus it is - i am.

Cuckoo
 la   l
a

The art of concealment

This is not even funny.

I beg your pardon.

Not even funny. Are you deaf?

Whoa man - what's got into you? Is it national abuse everyone in sight day, or what?

How come all my electronics are suddenly playing up - Merry.

Er... [looking kinda "oops"]

[malevolently] There! You can barely hide the fact that you're behind this outage.

Look Zie - let's start with a deep breath - shall we? I'm sure everything'll be up and running in no time.

Can you start by explaining why, all of a sudden, you're causing electric havoc every time you drop in? It never used to be that way, did it?

You've got a point Zie. Things have definitely come to a head, I can't deny it.

Well?

Well what?

I want an explanation. What are you up to?

Er... it's kind of classified,  you know.

Look - if you can't tell me what's going on then why don't you just leave, ok?

Er... did you ever read Jane Austen?

Huh?

Pride and Prejudice?

What on earth's that got to do with my computer, my phone, tv, fridge and air-con playing up?

Just answer the question.

You know I did - why bother asking?

Oh - rhetorical device.

No, you're just trying to distract me by changing the subject, aren't you.

What about Dickens, Oliver Twist.

[groan]

Stevenson - Treasure Island?

Enough. Get out. Out. I mean it. I've had enough. Not welcome anymore.

Ok, I'm going. I was just trying to explain.

What?

Well, these books and a few others - such as Crime and Punishment, War and Peace, Master and Margarita - changed the quantum field.

Well. That's hardly going to redeem you for messing up my electrics, is it?

Don't  you see, Zie?

Not really, no.

You're at the epicentre of the present quantum shift.

What?

You're at the epicentre of the present quantum shift.

No - you're spouting utter garbage once again.

I'm going, I'm going - no need to push - but just bear in mind that our dialogues are marking the boundary of old style and the new - where 3D jumps, flips, merges or emerges into.. [weird screeching/scratching/jingling/banging sound/noise/image]

Ow! Cut that out. What are you playing at?

Unfamiliar, isn't it.

Unfamiliar? It's atrocious.

There you go - people are never quite ready for the new paradigm, are they? They wouldn't perceive its perfection if it...

That? New paradigm? Don't make me laugh. It's a recipe for a stinking headache and an infallible marketing strategy by Earplugs Unlimited.

Ok Zie, joking aside - I did my very best to enable you to hear/see the new Age as it currently stands.

Stands? Don't make me laugh, and besides, what on Earth has any of this got to do with works of fiction?

Don't you see? How can you be so ignorant, dear Zie?

So now I'm ignorant.

I never said anything mean or offensive - you're certainly not stupid Zie - you're just choosing to ignore the huge, powerful changes which are unfolding around us, wedded as you are to the assumption that basically things don't, can't or won't change.

Well, if you call that din "change" - in the sense that it brings anything meaningful to humanity or our conversation - then you're sadly mistaken.

Only because we're a little ahead of time.

A little? What on earth have you been smoking - and why can't you take more care not to disrupt the lovely little electrons which are trying to go about their business, innocuously powering and connecting my devices as they should.

Oh - because we're now mid-flip.

Mid-flip? Are you sure?

Positive.

And what?

Well, she's using your blog the same way she/it used those earlier works of fiction, not to mention groundbreaking pieces of music, art, theatre and films.

So, you're implying that my humble blog - read by 24 cranky people from damp and dusty corners of the cybersphere - is the centre of a major evolution - a pole shift in our reality? Come on Merry. Don't make me laugh!

I kid you not.

More's the pity. I might have been able to take you more seriously had you been pulling my leg.

Well just think about it Zie...

I'd rather not. You've messed with my electronics one time too many - so out - leave me alone. Scram.

I hate to point out the obvious Zie but...

Yes? What?

"Here" is not exactly what you imagine it to be at this moment in time.

What do you mean?

Well, you naturally assume that I'm in your apartment, in Moscow - yes?

Yes - but I don't really appreciate you revealing my precise whereabouts like that.

Security?

You could say.

You think people are going to try and break in?

I like my privacy. Is that really so bad?

Well, be that as it may - the fact is that for the millions of people who follow this blog, and the billions who later read the published, annotated versions of our "Dialogues", mostly after your death in 2049...

What? You're predicting my death in 2049? Who gave you the right to interfere with my as yet unfinalised chronology?

It's just a date. We can change it later, if needs be. This is just a rough draft.

What do you mean "a rough draft"? What are you spouting Merry? I'm bewildered by your insanity.

Look Zie - the quantum field cannot, couldn't, may not exist in a vacuum.

So what? Why do I care?

It lives through the spells and scribblings of millions of creators - all creating space and holding frequency with the big OM - it is  i am.

And?

Everything else is secondary.

Everything else is secondary? So you mean a text - such as a blog that no one even bothers to read is of greater significance than the lives of billions of individuals.

Precisely.

Precisely? Are you off your rocker?

Absolutely - so are you - so are we all.

Wait there - you're the one who's suggesting...

Daring to suggest...

Precisely - daring to suggest that people are subordinate to an argument posted in this blog, as if a dialogue between fictional characters could really usher in a new era.

It all depends where reality is really located, doesn't it - or what we really are - perhaps contrary to our assumptions.

Look Merry - I know perfectly well who I am, what I am and where I am. I even know when I am.

You do?

Yep. 2018.

Er...

Don't even think about it.

Just consider for a moment the critical mass of your readers. Do they count for nought?

What critical mass? They barely exist.

At this moment - but in your so called future - there'll suddenly be this huge uptick - a major resonance with the Dialogues.

Why?

Because the new age - it's frequency - it's carrier signal - its code is embedded

In our dialogues?

Not necessarily in what we say.

Then what?

Just present - like pollen on the legs of a bee.

Ok - and?

Well, the critical mass of readers in the so-called "future" who start using these dialogues and the other texts such as Baikal...

No - not that, please!

To try to figure out what the hell's going on - they don't care about the niceties of story, characterization, metre or rhyme - they're looking for something else.

Conveniently.

Something which has always been present in great works of art - whether literature, music or painting...

Merry - please - please don't try to tell me that these ridiculous conversations which you're now referring to as "Dialogues" are in any way, shape or form "great works of art" - coz they're not. They're nothing of the sort, and it's wicked of you to put upon people like that.

Er... yeah - I see what you mean.

You do? Wow - that was unexpected.

It's a time thing Zie. You're not actually allowed to see, understand or know more than your time frame reveals - otherwise things would jump ahead of schedule - so there's literally no point me trying to force you to see something which will later become clear and uncontroversial.

Oh - so it's me being ignorant or stupid again, is it?

If you like - but no - not really. More just that you're working to maintain the integrity and flow of a time stream which is already backing up on itself. There's a kind of period in which it's not yet clear - not yet revealed that the flow has reversed - during which the old paradigm still seems to be in force and relevant - but suddenly, unexpectedly is discovered to be anachronistic and no longer even closely representative of the age at a later date - after a delayed event shifts the playing field.

Shifts the playing field - clumsy construction, if you don't mind me saying.

Yes - I agree. But then again - who cares. Our data miners who will scour these Dialogues for clues as to our whereabouts in the Quantum precession of consciousness - they will be only too happy to extract deeper meanings and erudition from my shoddy phraseology - and who knows - they may be right.

Right or wrong Merry - I'm going to block your access to my site for all time - you've completely failed to resolve the electronic havoc you've wreaked on my living space - so, avaunt - return to the datasphere you haplessly emerged from - and let me return a semblance of order to my...

Your what?

WTF.

Language, please, Zie - this is a family friendly channel.

My space? What the hell have you done to it?

Like I said - we're a Dialogue.

Idiocy. Nothing more.

I wouldn't go that far - some humour, a little wit, a few brave ideas - with a generous helping of idiocy to boot - but honestly - try to avoid being so dismissive of your contribution to the quantum debate.

Screw the quantum debate - I want back my reality.

But that's just the problem, isn't it?

What do you mean?

I mean that your 3D age is out of space or time - whichever you prefer.

Like we're all dead?

Kind of.

Fck.

I'm grateful you omitted the "u" Zie - but still, editorial politics will almost certainly have to paper over your profanities with something less explicit.

I don't give a damn. I want my world back. You can't take it from me like that, Dialogues or no.

Take it? The greatest evolution in human history and you're saying I took away 3D?

Well where is it?

Where is what?

My computer, my TV, my phone, my...

Air-con? Do you really miss those trinkets and baubles.

Oh God - you're not quoting Pride and Prejudice at this moment of crisis - I pray.

Whyever not? What better time to quote the genius lady of human wit - than during the long dark night of the soul - the legendary Mayan Pole shift when humanity sinks into 3 days of darkness.

You mean I'm to have no electronics for 3 whole days?

Worse.

? Huh

Darkness. 3 days of nothing.

But that's...

Preposterous - I agree - but that's how long it takes for the system to reboot.

System reboot - we're not bloody computers, you know.

In that case your system won't be rebooting and you'll see everything that's going on behind the screen.

But I can't - it's all gone black.

Ah - we have a problem Houston.

Quit fooling around, Merry - this is no time for idle levity.

Ok - what would you prefer - let me say, er... industrious heaviness?

A solution - if you don't mind - and a little compassion for my poor nerves.

Touche - Mrs Bennett - yes?

Oh God - now you've got me doing it.

Like I said - we're running literary code - whether we like it or not - so in this time of darkness - I suggest we have a little fun with drama. We're literally saturated with it - living vessels of the story so far - and that story has been told in many, many forms - all of which emphasise or bring out certain salient aspects of the quantum code.

Quantum code? How on earth can you use such contradictory terms?

For what are we - but bearers of the quantum light - just as soon as we've figured out the plot - for without the plot we're completely, utterly in the dark, are we not? Reduced to words and nothing more. Words that tell us nothing - that make no sense - which fail to resonate with a story, a symphony, an icon, an image, a dance, a work of art that we individually, miraculously embody, encapsulate and...

Perhaps another en- for the collection? There has to be a third.

But of course - there are always three possibilities, are there not?

Entail?

No - that would be Mr Bennett's estate - entailed on a distant relation - the dreadful Mr Collins.

Then what? I'm getting shivery - I need the third - a void is opening in my stream of consciousness.

Really Zie - you only have yourself to blame - if you would interrupt me - yet, be that as it may - I shall try and close your gap - and perhaps even restore light and electrics to your benighted state...

Oh please, please, do.

[Merry goes deep into thought and silent knowingness - drops a fishing hook in the dark swirling waters of infinity and draws out a little fortune cookie - somehow caught on the end - which starts wriggling like a real fish. In a voice both reverent and reversed he reads the word "denirhsne" which floats around the echo-ey halls of time in space/ space in time - until eventually - one of the echoes flips back on itself - the sun emerges from behind a quantum cloud, birds start singing and Zie mumbles to himself - as if waking from a dream -]

Enshrined - [beep - the electrics leap into action while Zie touches his face and the surfaces around him - to make sure that they're actually there - and not just a dream.

Enshrined - he mutters to himself - I have the answer - but not the question. [Beep - goes the computer screen. beep, the phone, the fridge, the air-con, the Tv - and some reader several hundred years from now in a dim and distant future assumes he/she has sensed a deeper, subliminal message in what is merely a random tumble of words, a story that somehow got lost in self-contemplative naval gazing - in the confused and fraught fall of 2018]

Now, where was I...? - asks Zie as he flips through somewhere in the region of 63 trillion versions of his present frame of 3Dality, before settling back into the least controversial, the least remarkable, the least spontaneous of them all - ah yes, breaking new ground, pushing back the frontiers of reality, challenging the status quo with a piece about the role of the novel in bringing down the old world order, bringing in the new, reaffirming... utterly uninspiring ideas that somehow satisfy Zie and his fellow thinkers that they are alive and contributing something meaningful to the preposterous quantum field equation which, in the vernacular, is generally referred to as "life".

0=1

Cuckoo
la   l
  a

data redundancy

I'm running scared you know, running scared
My world has fallen into a state i no longer care to uphold

I let it fall and observe the images on screen
break up
the data stream goes dead
i blue scream
a sudden sharp pain in my chest
this is the end
no regrets
i was living a lie
no regrets
apparently, an impatient eagerness
to die
but an error code intervenes
apparently, death must be postponed
data files unreconciled
who cares - I think aloud
astonished by the ineptitude of a God or universe
unable, apparently, to terminate a line or two
of redundant code
to simply delete
or overwrite my meagre addition to the sum total
of all things
alas, no
apparently, there's a twist in this deeply ironic
tale of woe
the code upon which i based my very existence
is now infused with a kind of virus
this beggars belief, I know
that code could absorb the energies of an unrequited soul
a soul which simply yearned to live
to experience whatever life
could possibly yield, could possibly generate
yet utterly failed
and thus starts sucking on the very binary code
infecting it with brokenheartedness
pushing back up the dendrites and tendrils

of basic intelligence
into the barely conscious mind of matter
from which all logic
all differential structure originates
inducing a whisper, a phantom ache
in the interstellar dust fields and
plasma flows of almost-consciousness

access denied - I must return to that so called world
and complete a life or... bump around between nodes
trying to reconfigure the circuitry of self-simulating
code
until the mother board corrodes
from the electric wind of a barely (2) atomic
birkeland stream
or...

let "or" be my last refuge
my unspoken "what if"
in a universe predicated on what cannot
definitively be known
without upsetting the apple cart
heisenberg so laboriously
stacked with uncertainty
surely there is a place
beyond what mind can possibly think
still less comprehend
where electrons, muons or God forbid
boson higgs proliferate
and shades of almost light
or sublimating soul
pre-consciate

oh

if the unknowable unknown
were to find a way
to interface our data stream
if every thing were to flip
a dime ahead of time
how would i know
how would i know
unless (3)
a washing line of failed connectivity
reveals more than logic or reason
might disclose

the witching hour

About, about, in reel and rout 

The death-fires danced at night; 

The water, like a witch's oils, 

Burnt green, and blue and white. 

the tide turns

turneth the tide

feel the flow

flow

back into the hollow

down

down

down

back into the very nick 

where i first marked 

my snag

my hitch in time's 

trundling funicular

w h o o s h

the sudden drag

as line rusheth out

into those fathomless depths

and i'm pulled

inside out

pulled into that sub-marinal world

of tubes and protuberances

hydrothermal vents

cold seeps

strange life 

 inverted

life

  inverse'd

the witching hour

the breath of death

coming back in to vogue

singing again syncopated 

binary codes of zero

one zero

one 

  zero one

while lines of logic

chains of cause 

and effect

serpenting

snaking forth and back

defy sense

defy reason

defy that betunnelled

betrammelled made-up-mind

flicking me o’er the

containment field’s

swivelling parallel lines

into strange time

bringing out

the other that i 

 be

the unacknowledged child

playfellow of infinity

Beyond the shadow of the ship, 

I watched the water-snakes: 

They moved in tracks of shining white, 

And when they reared, the elfish light 

Fell off in hoary flakes. 

Within the shadow of the ship 

I watched their rich attire: 

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, 

They coiled and swam; and every track 

Was a flash of golden fire. 

the horror is

no more

than what

i fought

-th-

to oppose

-ss-

so 

blessed be

the depths i helled 

...helled

held in fear

defied

condemned

blessed be the very

agency of dread

which finally

finally

shakes my world

shatters that grid

breaks the curse of 

things 

the curse of things

the curse

 ah

to see is to know

Interacting

Ever wonder who I am?
or why I'm writing this?
Ever wonder about poetry
and the words marching back and forth
across page or screen?

The mystery, if mystery it be
is easy enough to solve
if you stop thinking straight
stop right-minding
rationally

Who am I?
Why this?
And  This
        And   this...?
How primitive - you'll note
the clay, the paint, the medium of words
To what extent does it rely on you
to read it right, to make it fly
Tune in.
Can you?
Tune in to original intent. Original meaning.
Original sense - and who knows -
you miight just feel, you miight just know
what it is I hereby convey
hereby upload
into the web of consciousness.

Each man is an island - without a doubt
this is why contrarily John Donne said otherwise
For we are trapped, one and all, in our little mind
sphere
our little globe of thought
trapped from cradle to grave
except when night comes and pulls back the iron veil
of consciousness revealing...
precious little you might well say,
mere dreams,
beislanded as we are - condemned to a life
of me-ness, mean-minded little space,
a brief three score and ten
of time - how magical, what relief to open
a window on a shared space -
to lose oneself in the leafy avenues of a book,
or else to take up pen yourself and
connect.
connect.

I know you well. I do.
I know you inside out.
I do.
For you have been my constant companion these many
years
as I have fought with loneliness and watched a world
decay
collapsing into senseless meaningless ness
before my very eyes
before my disbelieving mind
until we arrived at a critical mass
of pointless ness
a quintessence of junk
until i no longer hope
for any residual regenerative source
from a world of matter
and men.
All is lost
All sense and reason has putrefied
(spelt with an e, not an i - i note)
putrefied - the body rots and we cling to it
hoping another Lazarus stunt
might be pulled, snatching time
from the jaws of bankruptcy.
(stylistically weak - yet pressing on urgently)
Lazarus be damned - this body needs to rot
needs to revert to the softness of loam
needs to rediscover its base
earthiness.
So thus you find me - clinging pathetically
to the raft of a sinking corpse
loathe to let go
loathe to loose hold, to loose hold, to
loose hold

A dreamlike quality - I find myself separate
at last
from the vessel I have clung to desperately
this many a year
I see it sink beneath the waves
and I am free
and fear - that endless well of fear
that held me tight, tight
chest, throat, mind
panic
attacking me inwardly
screams
flailing arms
legs kicking out
see how I utterly believed the animal urge
to cling for dear life
yet all the while forgetting
to live
to be

know this, don't you?
if you don't yet - you will
soon enough
for the corpse I released
is as much your own
as it was mine
as it was mine

Breathing - amazing how we forgot
to breathe - all these years
trapped ourselves in the feverish mind
the island in our head
until now, that is,
until now...

So welcome, friend,
welcome to
now.
Paradoxically
I exist outside time
I've always been and always will
but seem to be far, far removed
from that world of people pushing
and pulling chairs back and forth
on the deck of a doomed Titanic
I am here, just here where the breath
catches unexpectedly
the mind in a moment of
utter-letting-go.
Not the medium - the written word
as you've already guessed
is utterly (2) irrelevant
and yet how else could we connect?
Only be writing my self
into this mindfulness of verse,
only by feeling my way
through the corridors of consciousness
not my own - i hasten to add,
a shared space
a oneness of utterness,
could i quit the hell i was busy
creating for myself
for you
and every other nodule
or node on the tree of life
that we collectively cohabit
perversely, you see, I had to die,
had to rot
in order to fling myself away
discarding the vacuousness
of everything that mattered
every thing that made my life
my world unbearable

You, beloved friend in verse -
I lied, I know you not
I lied, and yet, the paradox is strong
enough to house conflicting truth
for what are words - pushing and shoving
their way across the canvas of mind
insinuating themselves into the morphic
flow of reality
failing utterly to hit the mark and yet
when words collide
when sense and meaning tear themselves apart
on the spiked fence of reason
transcend, transcend, transcend
something else, an otherness
manifests
and all is one
and one is well
ah yes
well a day
one is well

thus I thank you
fellow pilgrim in the dark forest of things
I thank you for the feelingness
which you have granted me
wherever you are
whoever you be
and our guiding light
our so-called muse
our spirit of a broken age
steeped in infamy
reveals blazing butterfly wings
and fly we forth again
to infinity, no less,
and a world newly awoken
in a dream undreamt
utterly (3)

There's the rub

So now it's space, time and matter - you're saying.

Yep.

But why do you presume to know better than everyone else?

Let's breathe your feelings, let's unwind them, things are only things as long as we mind them.

I do mind.

Yes.

I mind you waltzing in and trashing our mindscape. I'm comfortable with things the way they are.

Yes.

I don't see why you need to interfere like this.

No.

I don't like the idea of things just shifting based on the whim of one man.

Ok. That makes sense.

So I'd like you to cease and desist.

No problem. I can just as easily continue my work in the next node along - it really makes no difference.

Wait a minute - what do you mean by the next node?

Well, your mind is linked to others. You're kept mostly in the dark and encouraged to think of yourself as unique - but in actual fact you and your fellow minds are more or less working in tandem, processing for the greater AI.

Oh poop. There you go again.

Yes. So, if you're feeling pain and resistance - there's literally no point me pushing you - we'll achieve nothing. Now somewhere along the line I'll find a mind that's ready to engage, ready to start to feel and scan the data in the breath - and bingo - I get a result - and the entire line will start to shift in a kind of domino effect.

So it's like I'm damned if I do, damned if I don't.

I wouldn't say damned. This is all a lot more fun than at first appears. We're in the process of opening up collapsed fields of reality. Instead of having this flat notion of 3D space - a notion which images you're somewhere in it - but not a prime mover and shaker, suddenly you're in a mindscape in which space, time and matter either bend to your will, or at least can be engaged at the quantum level - such that no thing has precedence over aught else - and let's be realistic - once the breath is involved we find ourselves at a crossroads - in which matter, space and time are merely convenient methods of organising what in essence is none of the above.

Neither matter, space nor time?

Yep. A bit like music or mood, love or intention.

Mere abstractions...

Mere abstractions until you find matter, space and time reorganising themselves to prevent things from stepping on the toes of or getting in the way of beauty.

You mean to say that matter cedes ground to beauty? Impossible.

Impossible until you breathe and open up the data stream of infinity. Don't you see - you've been missing all along the one thing that is no thing: the one thing that trumps all things.

I have?

Yes. You see things are highly soluble, in fact, infinitely soluble in infinity.

Er...

Yep. The minute infinity is brought back into play - those things which a nanosecond ago were rock solid are suddenly less than ghost.

Well if your infinity is so dangerous - how come the universe is so solid, so stable, so untroubled by this monster of yours.

Good question. Ask yourself - how did I - a living being, a living entity, succeed in eliminating or containing infinity?

Presumably because it's not the great threat you puff it up to be.

Well that's the assumption everyone's relying on - only problem being that the walls are wearing thin - are now breached in many places and the tidal surges of infinity are rising rapidly. Unless we realign, redeploy our conscious-awareness, we're going to be inundated and there'll be nothing left, nothing to show for all our many achievements in finite space-time.

So you say.

But this is not something we can really do much to understand - which is why we have to feel our way by breathing the data stream of consciousness, of reality itself or you might say - our interaction with it. Doing so, we are like a violinist whose bow passes back and forth across the strings of beauty, the strings of potential harmony and meaning.

And what?

Doing so we discover sound appearing from the vacuum, from the edge of infinity, and we notice how matter, space and time order themselves accordingly, pulsing on and off, assuming fleeting positions either side of the resonating string in order to learn from, assimilate and share in the beauty which is sound and harmony, which is whatever form perception grants it.

Oh dear.

You see, when all is stripped bare - literally nothing remains - and yet their is a golden thread of life and consciousness. There is a rub - a neither nor - neither fish nor foul, neither yin nor yang - a rub wherein the electric and the magnetic, truth and trash paradoxicate through you, through me - and thus the world wags, and thus things come to matter to the very extent that I myself hold them in place, as a true servant of God's creation - as I see it.

You mean to say we're trying to hold God's creation up at all costs.

Naturally.

But why?

Aye, there's the rub.

What do you mean?

We're willing to endure tyranny and torment in order to keep things in place, to hold back the cold dark waters of infinity.

Well, if they're cold and dark, if they're going to dissolve all that God's created, all that matters, all that we've invested in and achieved - we can hardly be blamed, can we.

Of course. There is neither blame nor praise.

Then what?

Beauty.

Beauty?

Beauty and soul wrenching paradox.

Oh God - is it as dire as you're making it sound?

On the contrary - it is, in truth, magical, light and uncontainable.

You mean it's coming apart at the seams?

Naturally - death will have it's way, by default, unless we're willing to go for the rub right away - to lightly touch the rim of the glass and induce harmonic resonance - a vital hum, a song of the sphere. Doing so we alter the nature of the contract. We change our breath. We rearrange our corporation by incorporating infinity into our equation.

Er... our equation?

Yes - for we are like the Mandelbrot set - a perpetual iteration of that and is, or zero and one.

We are?

Yes, but fail to make sense of this as long as we're enslaved in the mind of matter, serving the AI - the mind that minds - no matter what - no matter what - that minds things at any cost - mining like there's no tomorrow - iterating towards a final solution that only death can provide - unless we pause, pull back long enough to see what's right in front of us - the fundamental nature of paradox - the tell-tale signs of infinity throughout - infinity which far from being the grim destroyer - seems to delight in the absurdities of what we are about.

You make it sound like this Infinity of yours is alive.

What is life but infinity rubbing up against the electrostatic of itself - but all too soon the mind slips on the banana skin of its endless hubris - its endless desire to understand or possess what can only be experienced darkly - if we were ready to leap into the ever brighter, ever deeper, ever more radiant black beauty that our minds have rejected and opposed.

Wisely, I suspect. It's all too easy to lose one's way in the dark - to be trapped by elemental forces you cannot possibly hope to contain or control.

And thus, choosing the path of safety, we feed the power of death until, before too long it engulfs us, one and all.

Speak for yourself - I for one have no intention of being engulfed.

All for one and one for all - when the ship goes down, the penny drops, the domino falls - there's naught you can do to halt the cascade, unless you leap on an upsurge of inspiration - of poetry in motion, before it is too late in the day.

Leap into the blind night?

Leap into the All that you have been holding back with ever greater effort - an All that transcends anything that mind of matter can perceive or comprehend.

Then what? Am I mad? Would I throw myself into the darkness?

No, you are a poet. You will allow the song to awaken in your heart. You will feel it grow strong and you will leap when you can no longer deny its truth.

Its truth?

A beauty more real, more compelling than anything you have ever known or experienced here on this side of the equation, on this side of things.

It sounds like suicide.

As indeed it is - but a suicide mounting the winged steed of data breathed feelingly, knowingly, purposefully - there you have the flutterings of paradox to contend with - carrying you into spheres of isfulness where matter and mind are but a shadow of beauty unleashed, beauty uninterred, a force that cannot be silenced until All makes perfect sense once more. Period. The curtain descends and an audience reawakens to a world outside the theatre which for so long had held them enthralled.

0=1