Compleat Cat

Fury's Battlements

2011-11-30T03:13:00.002-08:00

Sometimes the head is spare.

Plus Nothing

2011-11-30T03:13:00.001-08:00

Count the many pleasures
and erasures. What goes up goes

Glass

2011-09-08T10:45:00.001-07:00

The cold, when filtered, becomes the light.

Levity

2011-02-19T17:36:00.002-08:00

As we are projectiles so shall we be
suspended
in flight.

Hope and Fear

2011-02-19T17:36:00.001-08:00

There should be a sign at the crossroads of History:

"Idealism kills."

Empathy

2010-10-24T22:51:00.001-07:00

I feel what the flamingos feel.

Truth

2010-09-18T03:42:00.000-07:00

To hide her secretive nature, she came out into the open. She smiled - the smile hid a silence...

She spoke, but there was stillness in every word.

This Time

2010-09-04T10:22:00.000-07:00

Pocket blossom: the heart

Where

2010-08-21T15:43:00.000-07:00

Where journeys are is where I am
How deep is within?
"Bounded in a nutshell"/ "Infinite space"

Ravelling and unravelling
The maker of the maze - where is his plot?

The thought was what stopped me
And space - where it started again

How is it I find myself?
A little lost
But not enough

This whiteness
Here

All the pictures were false
And the words - just were

"He's a Different Creature Now"

2010-07-02T16:38:00.000-07:00

The duck got made into goulash. He didn't ask for it, he got included. It was a freebie.

And so they wolfed it down, sitting in the forest, on the picnic floor. The wings made noise. No, the wind, the wind, made noise...

How good are your chops? It was a delicate experience. Yet they laughed!

As a man yawns, his soul falls away. Not that it happened once, not twice. Nor for a sliver of the moon. A process of slow agglomeration, one that convolved itself, and then the slayers came. With their brown bread.

If grub be the music of love, please stain yourself. The first incident would not live long. The last was the first. As with wool-gathering...

The shadow of the fishnet stockings would follow him wherever he went. The dog wagged its tail, but it had a frown in its eyes. A sad little frown. Called "Loof".

Insurrection (Minor)

2010-06-26T15:54:00.001-07:00

Push the clock's face in.

The World

2010-06-26T15:53:00.000-07:00

is under construction...

A poem

2010-06-05T04:32:00.002-07:00

A poem is a puzzled happening.

Microbes

2010-06-05T04:32:00.001-07:00

Dot dot dot
Twinkle winkle wod
...
Gro

The New One

2010-06-05T04:28:00.000-07:00

They say the new one has no name. They say it came of its own accord. They say it can think like the wind, it has whims.

They say many things, but the new one is silent. It stays crumpled in a chair, wearing its white stuff. Sometimes it goes to ground, sometimes it melts. In the night, it cannot feel a thing.

The new one breathes. I did not know it could.

Every day there are surprises. Round and round, each one eating the tail of the one before it. The new one waits and watches.

Clouds gather on the hill. Words thicken on the page. The new one is no longer new.

What

2010-05-09T17:26:00.000-07:00

Gathering the roots.

The Third Tree

2010-05-04T15:54:00.002-07:00

grew in its own shade...

Dreams and Seeing

2010-05-04T15:54:00.001-07:00

Eyes feed on the dark.

The Mind is a Plastic Knife

2010-05-04T15:53:00.000-07:00

The air its food...

It is the mirror that divides me from the rest.

Writing

2010-04-29T07:37:00.000-07:00

Writing came by in the morning. Settled itself down in the shed...

"It's much more purposeful, out there in the East." So I was told, in a whisper...

Flowers sprang up, busy as the news. Bitch had a litter...

"Where are chefs nowadays?" Sharpening their knives...

It would be strange, would it not, if summer followed winter. Strange as a disease...

You stand on a plinth. Your shy smile flutters...

I am on my knees. There are words in my mouth.

"Oh you kings of the middle level, you stars of the interregnum - such power you hold in this dream that is older, more tenacious"

2010-04-24T04:13:00.001-07:00

Zenith and Nadir were friends.

Nadir was a Moroccan boy of lowly origins. Zenith was a giraffe, with soulful eyes.

Their friendship blossomed. They walked tall among the trees.

But Zenith grew slowly taller. And there was Nadir, sucked back to his origins...

A friendship of the earth and sky. Could one touch the other?

Zenith could not find Nadir. She searched high and low, she hobbled. The tears rained down.

Nadir had Zenith, held fast in his dream. In this dream, everything was equal. Everything had collapsed.

Scramble

2010-04-20T03:21:00.001-07:00

e s pel

Sticks

2010-04-20T03:19:00.000-07:00

--

--

House of Sleep

2010-04-20T03:18:00.000-07:00

What does a tiger dream of?

His homely, whiskered face, maybe.
Or of being long in the tooth...

Mood

2010-04-16T15:46:00.001-07:00

Rhubarb.

Fragment: Telling

2010-04-10T09:36:00.000-07:00

It is a tale not easily told.

What is "it"? A tale not easily told...

Fragment: The Particle

2010-04-10T09:34:00.000-07:00

The particle was there, on its own. There, but merely. What of its origins? Nothing was known.

It did not move, nor was it moved. Nothing touched it!

Time circled, vainly. The spot on the ground. Above the ground

Fragment: The Guide

2010-04-10T09:33:00.000-07:00

You are looking for a way through. I will fashion you one.

Follow me, follow me closely, all the way around. To the door, beyond the wall, into the ground. When we rise, you will have your answer

and I my song.

Fragment: Visible

2010-04-10T09:31:00.000-07:00

I have had my fill of mystery.
There are those who must do without.

They rise in expectation
and in gladness. Poor, blessed ones

Other

2010-04-10T06:58:00.000-07:00

"My voice is the voice of the oracle."

(Is it the voice of the oracle which proclaims this, or is it mine?)

Voice

2010-04-10T06:57:00.000-07:00

Air
your words.

As It Is Written

2010-04-10T06:53:00.000-07:00

My spirit dove
beneath the dark,
and clear again.
It sunned itself,
in fond belief.
Yet, still, it felt
a startling need.

Vacillation: oscillation
of dread alternatives.
Rise into elation,
fade into superstition.
Charmed in the recess...
Stripped, and turned.
Where? Grabbed at.
A bungled dream.

The waves recede.
They bear more
than you ever could...

Come, stranger,
softly, cough your cough.
Smile your smile.
For whom? The distant note.
Yourself: the garbled thing.

Is this the Author?

2010-04-05T15:26:00.001-07:00

Am I the title?

Feet Have Eyes

2010-04-02T12:44:00.000-07:00

I walk on my shadow. Is that a solecism? If so, I renounce the text...

Gladly. The lights, the twinkling lights, they speak to me.

Far from this darkness, this white sky.

After the Night

2010-03-24T17:51:00.002-07:00

Say hush in the furred mind. May the wise one don the fool's garb (for a while). Clutch the wall. Say, confused...

Envy the half-formed ones their ordinary happiness. Be ashamed.

Why

2010-03-24T17:51:00.001-07:00

Because the moon is black; oh, you
are made of green sense.

Irony

2010-03-24T17:47:00.000-07:00

My eyes, my poor eyes. To see the whole sorry world inflict itself upon them.

They gape, they blanch. They will see the whole, and nothing but the whole.

Pieces of darkness, in the mind's fond recesses. But the eyes do not blink.

Open, smart from semblance. To seal the world within.

P'Quillet

2010-03-19T15:16:00.000-07:00

It's the new thing, you see. They're crazy about it.

Is it a game? Is it a dare? Is it the truth? Is it a dog? Is it a boon? Is it the earth? Is it a song? Is it your dream? Is it a question? Is it the moon? Is it your mouth? Is it a hole? Is it a word?

Is it a rattle? It is a rattle.

_____cuffs

2010-03-19T15:13:00.000-07:00

Mano a mano (Man against Man). We wear our marks with pride.

But to see our dreams contend - now that is painful.

They have swollen heads, and their eyes, their eyes are elsewhere... Enter. The ring. Round 1. And around one. Rhymes - two versus two.

What? Yes, it's over, yes, it's just begun. Is there a match on?

Planning and Execution

2010-03-18T16:39:00.001-07:00

Logical. Chronological.

Draw lines from one to the other. Let them flow.

Flow like time. (You're caught in it.)

See them now? They have you in their sights.

"Planning" and "Execution". One's right, the next one's right.

Begone, be done with it. Say thanks for nothing new.

The plan's been executed, it's nothing now.

And then these lines we think.

Where must the flow go to?

Backward, all backward.

Demonstrably

2010-03-18T16:37:00.000-07:00

Not wisdom, exactly. But words...

Speaking Plainly

2010-03-18T16:36:00.000-07:00

When I was young, I spoke plainly. Younger, I did not speak at all.

Things became clear, and still clearer... And then there was nothing at all.

(Oddly dense, and oddly vacant)

2010-03-15T17:20:00.001-07:00

Laughter

Matter

2010-03-15T17:19:00.002-07:00

Oddly dense. And oddly vacant...

In my head, it's in my head.

Language

2010-03-15T17:19:00.001-07:00

The revivifying
hum.

Hesitance

2010-03-12T15:32:00.002-08:00

Sea uncle traces beneath whin
whether the scrambled cabbage burned aloft
or it twirled tender lap inanely in

Quickie

2010-03-12T15:32:00.001-08:00

Yeah!

John Prynne, Syntacticist

2010-03-12T15:10:00.000-08:00

What is intellectual, is old and dearly dull.
When he is deft, we are not deceived.
Touched by the lyrical, light fantastical.
Scorned by the wooden word, formed in need.

The Message

2010-03-12T09:35:00.000-08:00

"And now what Julius says..."

That is all I caught.

The message has escaped. Search for it near the river! Search for it in the loch!

O Julius, Julius, wherefore art thou Julius?

Julius is a cat. A cat with seven lives.

Julius is a king. (A cat may be a king.)

Julius, mon frere. Wherefore art thou, Julius?

Julius has escaped! Search for him near the river, search for him in the loch...

Search for him in the mind. (With its complicity.)

A Hierarchy

2010-03-04T17:25:00.001-08:00

Children
Dogs
Adults

In Passing

2010-03-04T15:45:00.000-08:00

"For people are only marginally themselves."

- Mark Strand, "Dog Life"

/

2010-03-04T15:39:00.000-08:00

Mind/Body
Simple/Complicated
Happy/Sad

Free/Lawful
Fearful/Blase
Silent/Voluble
Sane/Glad

Real/Mirrored

Pure/Touched
Cloven/Whole

Impossibility

2010-03-02T03:55:00.000-08:00

Looking for possibility... It is not here, there or anywhere. It is not in hiding, nor is it in plain sight. It is not on the fringes, nor is it beyond the fringes. It is not, it simply is not.

Is it on the horizon? Surely it is on the horizon?

There is a speck on the horizon. But it's not possibility.

We have not lost it, because we never had it. We are not disappointed, because we never hoped for it. We cannot look for it, because we do not know how it looks.

This is all clear, clear as the impossible day...

For getting started depends on possibility. We can never get started now, and here we are in the middle.

Grey Ghost

2010-02-26T05:19:00.002-08:00

The rain said, "I dazzle!"

She said, "You lie."

And the air was hollow again...

Self-

2010-02-26T05:19:00.001-08:00

Self-knowledge is the first step to self-realization...

And the last.

A Sane Man

2010-02-25T03:19:00.000-08:00

(1) A sane man in a straitjacket
(2) A block of ice

(3) A tree
(4) An unborn baby
(5) A barking dog on a leash
(6) A door

(7) An apple, as it falls from the tree...

A Piece of Snow

2010-02-24T11:08:00.000-08:00

Ouch.

Life is Weather

2010-02-24T11:07:00.000-08:00

Sorry I'm late. The blizzard slowed me down...

Or if it wasn't the blizzard, it was the buzzard...

No, the gizzard...

What a joke it is. What a joke.

The Scent

2010-02-17T15:43:00.000-08:00

The scent of failure; To it

Not that failure; Repels me; Quite the opposite, I declare!

Why then; To explain myself; Out of this difficulty

That has arisen; In part; To explain myself

An opening; I sought, yes, an opening; What I sought

Out of; Mere native curiosity; A difficulty

Native?; No, Human; Say human, to explain yourself

Opening; Far from the scent; The difficulty

To explain yourself; For failure; Signifies

Something closed; A wound, perhaps; Something

Yes; So it was, I've forgotten; The scent

The Magic Box

2010-02-14T04:47:00.000-08:00

The magic box has magic seeds in it. And the magic seeds yield, naturally, magic plants. And what are the qualities of these magic plants?

They are invincible. You cannot root them out, hard as you try. But why would you wish to, anyway? They're magic.

They spread, inexorably. They colonize the parks, the streets, the houses. The animals. See that man stumble - he has a plant through his eye. They twist themselves around our necks, penetrate our souls.

The earth is soft now, silent. It is a violent silence - whoever thought there could be such a thing? But now there are no thoughts...

Such is the power of magic!

A Page

2010-02-13T09:02:00.000-08:00

Page upon page collapsed. Was there no way through?

The riddle at the heart of the book. Which book? Every book.

And so it goes...

The end. And yet again... The beginning.

Nightshade

2010-02-12T07:20:00.001-08:00

Was it your heart was poisoned, or your mind?

The poison bleeds, so gently. Through the surface, into our lives...

The air was stale. The night was worn; we were forlorn.

..............................................................................

The poisoned person has no passion. Put the poisoner in prison, please?

Peace.

"Peace"

2010-02-12T04:47:00.002-08:00

Is it harder to get started, or to come screeching to a halt?

Screeching Screeching

Sounds of the forest. "Peace".

But language rumbles on...

The beast has nothing to do. It yawns. It dreams. It kills.

Ellipsis

2010-02-12T04:47:00.001-08:00

And I...

Cut

2010-02-10T07:14:00.000-08:00

The lazy visionary slurped his ice-cream, noiselessly. Wind outside, and it chimed.

The wars were on; men in funny hats spilt blood with elan. That takes skill, so we applaud...

What is within is non-existent. "Non- non- non-" makes a music all its own.

On our own, we're beside. The grass endures, and it's cut, remorselessly.

Thin Reality

2010-02-08T05:00:00.001-08:00

Like a sheet of ice. No, like a sheet of paper...

What is imagined dissolves. What is real persists. An endless bubble, its skin.

Metaphor

2010-02-08T04:59:00.001-08:00

Space itself constitutes a bridge.

Negativism

2010-02-04T12:00:00.000-08:00

No no no

Thinking clearly.

Door

2010-02-04T11:59:00.000-08:00

I'm an interruption, yeah?

Question

2010-02-01T01:39:00.000-08:00

This five-fingered thing, which we call "hand", is merely an animal. It opens and closes, opens and closes, like a heart. It has own fine language, fluent, yet nearly mute.

It has a wrinkled face. No eyes. It has a neck, but no body, no tail...

And yet it crawls upon the table. It can soar. Or it lies upon the table, or on the chair, or somewhere, with no meaning. It pauses -

Exerts its muscular mind. Might it cramp itself?

Idee Fixe

2010-01-28T11:15:00.000-08:00

When I think, I think of that. That was an event. It came, and then it passed... I thought, "So that is that"

But no, it never was. Was, forever was. It came, and soon it passed... I think, I think, of that.

Anyhow

2010-01-27T16:46:00.000-08:00

Quibble. Thoughts come unbidden.

If you play the game, you lose the game. If you don't play the game, you lose the game. Such is the game. Scrabble?

I spoke dinner...

A man flies over the moon.

The Thread

2010-01-27T16:44:00.000-08:00

I go to the space in the garden. Give me some thread. I will unravel, for that is to be myself

Not for human eyes, that. Fear not - it is strange. The leaves have eyes, bushes are made of words...

It is late, soon it will be early
It is dark, soon it will be dark again.
And other truths unravel

Here. The space

Famous Yaks Through the Ages

2010-01-18T14:04:00.000-08:00

Zhudeba the Magnificent
Ripnor the Pragmatic
Boraly the Dour

Hipatop the Comedian
Ahgenc the Reformer
Xyxyx the Magical

Fumer the Hoarse
Daryush the Frivolous

Queqqegroqqnoqq

Fancy

2009-12-11T12:09:00.000-08:00

Clods are clouds.

A Story For People Who Like Stories Too Much

2009-12-05T11:35:00.002-08:00

They needed a story, so I picked one out for them. It was about three shapes, they had no relation. They didn't fit together. So they went for a walk.

Lines in space. Aged lines. It's been a while, really, sorry they keep disappearing...

You can ask me again. Well, they're all changed now, it's quite alright! Nighty night.

Dot dot

2009-12-05T11:35:00.001-08:00

dot.

Doyen of Night

2009-12-05T11:33:00.000-08:00

So many delicate threads,
unschooled.

It's not unhappiness. It's the time
before writing.

Sequence

2009-12-02T09:57:00.003-08:00

My eyes were blank. I looked at the blinds. The sun shimmied in. It was soft to the touch.

Orientalism

2009-12-02T09:57:00.001-08:00

Dosa rhymes with sari, I don't know how

Physics

2009-11-30T11:54:00.001-08:00

He and I approached each other along a thoroughfare.

I reasoned thus: "If I continue along my present trajectory, we needs must collide. But if I swerve (to right or left, it matters not which), he'll swerve too (to left or right). He's human like me, our fate is symmetry. Calculations of the rational animal... A gesture of genius is required, the genius of simplicity. To show for once and for all who I am and who he is not... Let me stride boldly forward!"

He reasoned thus: "If I continue along my present trajectory, we needs must collide. But if I swerve (to left or right, it matters not which), he'll swerve too (to right or left). He's human like me, our fate is symmetry. Calculations of the rational animal... A gesture of genius is required, the genius of simplicity. To show for once and for all who I am and who he is not... Let me stride boldly forward!"

And so we walked right into each other. We walked right through each other. When we emerged, everything has changed. I was now he, he was now I...

Quite simple, really.

Lament of a Much-Married Man

2009-11-30T03:43:00.001-08:00

Always the bridegroom, never the bride...

Once

2009-11-30T03:41:00.000-08:00

Once I was the victim of a fierce assault by my own umbrella. I barely survived.

But I did exact a most terrible revenge. I took the guilty brolly to a place which was absolutely dry. Where the air was absolutely still. And I folded it down...

Now all the rain is within.

Request

2009-11-28T10:38:00.003-08:00

Why is meaning?

"Poignant are the Memories of that Enchanted Night"

2009-11-28T10:38:00.001-08:00

I smile as I write this, and yet there is no malice in my smile.

The Colour Green and the Colour Black...

2009-11-28T10:36:00.000-08:00

were brothers. Thick and thin. One evening out, they espied a red antelope. They ran. The bushes came alive, the dark was fearsome. And still they stumbled, crying, through themselves. Green spilt his guts out. Dark collapsed.

Who was Alexander Search?

2009-11-24T05:10:00.001-08:00

Charles Robert Anon.

"far far away from anything and anywhere"

2009-11-24T05:09:00.000-08:00

He's such a non-conformist he's almost a conformist...

Dreams

2009-11-21T12:40:00.000-08:00

1. I dream of a world where the world is made of language.
2. Where not merely the world, but language itself is made of language.
3. Where word is being, and being names word.
4. Where "is" is is...
5. Where I

Nightmares

2009-11-21T12:39:00.001-08:00

1. A baby with a face like a football
2. Noon in the morning
3. Grass stained white

Transparency

2009-11-20T12:14:00.001-08:00

Veil upon veil.

Interview with a Bystander

2009-11-20T06:38:00.000-08:00

Interviewee: "Greetings, Bystander!"

Bystander: "Eh?"

Interviewee: "I'd like you interview me. Come and sit down on this chair here, with your hands on your knees. And get that earnest look into your eyes..."

Bystander: "I don't know you."

Interviewee: "Nor I you. And so being equal, let us begin. Where was I born?"

Bystander: "How should I know?"

Interviewee: "You shouldn't - that's the beauty of it! Sit down, stop fidgeting, and I will tell you. All you need to do is listen. It's not very different from being a bystander - passivity, attention to what is happening around you. You're quite well-equipped already..."

Bystander: (looks away)

Interviewee: "I was born in Utgult-Metchold on the 5th of December, 1314. In the waiting room. And then the war erupted. Seven days later, a surgeon who thought himself the bee's knees arrived to perform a miniature transformation on my left toe-nail which would render me immortal. But I had flown away, I was a soul by then. It can happen.

When I fell to ground, it was Thursday. I went and bought myself a Big Mac. You could say it has been an interesting life.

I like the colour red. When the praying mantis comes for me, I lie in wait, and I strike. It thrills those who like tragedy, and for the others, well, tough luck!"

Bystander: "Are you mad?"

Interviewee: "Without a question. I'm glad you asked, it shows you're getting into the spirit of things..."

Bystander: "What?"

Interviewee: "My, my, what an interviewer we're turning out to be! This is encouraging, very encouraging..."

Bystander: (walks away)

Interviewee: "Well, that was intense, but in a good way. I've learned some lessons for next time: talk more, listen less, and bring some rope to keep the interviewer rapt."

Interviewee: (yawns)

Interviewee: "What a beautiful day for a bystander."

The Third Man

2009-11-19T09:25:00.002-08:00

The third man was a snail.

Trip

2009-11-19T09:25:00.001-08:00

I took the drug, and I waited. For what seemed like a very long time...

"Seemed" - that is the essence of things.

Flopflop

2009-11-19T09:24:00.000-08:00

Flop, flop;
away we hop

over the tendrils,
over the top.

And never ever ever
never never never

skip to a stop.

Anew

2009-11-17T03:23:00.000-08:00

There are too many things in this world, and not enough names.

Let's go christening. Giubert! Warhorf! Sponiq! Treeth!

Dran.

Critique

2009-11-17T03:22:00.000-08:00

What?

The Conversation

2009-11-17T03:19:00.000-08:00

The conversation had moved in an uncomfortable direction, and we tried to pull it back. But it would not listen, it had a mind of its own. It moved farther and farther away, we found it hard to keep up. Soon it had disappeared, gurgling, over the horizon. We looked at each other silently, haplessly.

We tried ping-pong, but it wasn't the same.

So we trudged back on sad feet to where we had begun. We resolved to think about it, form our own conclusions. Why was the world in such a sorry state? Look at that speck of sky - so uninvolved in things, and happy to boot!

This was how it ended.

What I Said To Her One Silent Morning

2009-11-15T07:45:00.000-08:00

"The simpler you reveal yourself to be, the more mysterious you become..."

[Simple as a poem. Silent as one.

In this maze of deliberate fictions, one wrong turn must lead to dumb reality.]

Flight of the Ukrainians

2009-11-15T07:43:00.000-08:00

"We're talking about the Ukrainians."
"Why?"
"It's one moment closer to oblivion."
"See how many times the grass has waved to us."
"This spot."
"Forlorn."