barsh hird at dawn

same bird but with hammering

and others, a real cuckoo shop

a day already showy and sinister

but it's the brain that won't stop

i am leftover history from yesterday

yet i can survive and observe

these same lamps rugs paintings

when i close my eyes i can see

blackness on a bright field in the

shape of the common mirror

grey shadows of rugs paintings 

lamps perhaps primeval forest

 

i am the only living exemplar of

my species in this time zone

and going off to bed could end

up initiating an extinction event

 

 

by Jan

All we have is now

Jan and Peg are rolling back and forth in twin mountains of waste adjacent a sugar refinery in the low chanks. Wedding tent-size flakes and scales slough debride from their backs and tails and into the spent beet fibers.

Was it societal rape being done to him all those years?

How so. 

How society basically forced him to engage in sexual intercourse that he did not want. Is that worse than having to be celibate or choosing like Ilyn for spiritual purposes. 

Or prostitution. It wasn't against his will. 

No, more like with a gun to his head. You choose the lesser evil. 

The gun of a specter of persecution poverty shame ostracization. 

Yep. No one in recorded history has survived a shunning except a few that became their own scarlet letter. 

What? 

They survived but they were marked and stunted by their resulting public identity. He'd be at shiv and a Jan would say ya I'm a servant to Mthyuh or another Jan would say ya I'm a zoological hygienist. 

Then it would get to his turn and they'd interrupt with ya we know who you are. 

Right. He embraced being that guy. 

Can you please shove that backhoe out about 20 yards? I need to stretch. Just with your foot there. Thanks.

Flekes Jans priests nobody can get their Braino on it. We have the evidence all around us of this practice belief prejudice crime having been going on for like forever now. 

All we have is now Jan. 

So right you are darling.

Trans. by Phyliss Ng-Tiu (embedded)

external agency

These were live and written statements that, had it been in charge, Braino would never have allowed. 

You attribute these statements at least in part to external agency. 

Well you know as well as I do that's complicated. Some segments of society would suggest that unwelcome statements, other vocal utterances, and any bodily movement can be achieved through Remote Tissue Decisioning. Because they burned the libraries, there's no proof such a program ever existed or whether it's still part of the MPS mission statement. 

What would you call it then, leaving aside oral tradition. It, these utterances?

Scientifically I'd guess a scientist would go with echolalia in some cases and coprolalia in others: both are semi-involuntary, vocalized auto-sympathetic bursts of the amygdalae.

Scientifically. They never reach the line of what a reasonable person might call menacing or harassing. 

You're HR now as well? We're talking about medical symptoms here. 

Not political, theatrical...

Certainly you can say provocative if it's on the side of the fence you want. 

Caustic?

Oh, I certainly hope so. Else the only positive trait of my neurological condition would be lost. 

You're a hard case. 

At last, a flash of random honesty at the Institute for the Journal of Meta-Cognitive Talk Therapy Apologists. 

We just call it the Institute now. 

Patient exit interview (frag.)

Dr. Donna Thong

Please don't do that, scar tissue

please don't do that, scar tissue

don't be the weed chokes his host

that's what free radicals are for

i want you to do the opposite of

arming up, favoring one side, 

drama queen, sky-falling chicken

it's ok to relax now, even to 

give in, stop resisting, live

knowing that you saved a life

by Braino

Mrs. Jansdaad and La Chama Speak Using the Mind Only

Well. Here we are. 

Yes. Honestly I don't know what to do.

Thank you for your honesty. It's that this doesn't happen. I've never met sticky progeny. How did you get through The Crack. 

I didn't do anything. Maybe Braino was tracking me. 

That's likely due to how we share some Braino, sister. 

I met Peg. 

And now me. It's herstoric. 

What is the meaning of my life?

You'll have plenty of time to figure it out if you play your cards right. 

I like sitting and writing poetry at my kitchen table. 

Well, you're a monster now. 

the rock method

the first time i climbed to the top of Mthyuh my hair was still long and very red

 

i was still barefoot from dancing shiv on a slab of ancient desert pavement scrawl

 

i had to see the top and what her raging bottom looked like from the highest chank

 

summiting and launching and diving in were a single stroke, an ancient character

 

Braino knew my arc would blend and assimilate The Crack's northmost fissure

 

instead of bouncing back on the sheer force of rejection by her drumskin i rolled

 

and entered a natural vent, tearing upward through rock and sand and insect nests

 

red like magma my hair and blood left pooling on arrowheads and pots not touched

 

by human hands since before there were summer thaws and green tendrils to munch

 

that day i felt the gravity of knowing that stopped the endless stasis of my cart

 

and let me out onto the landing strip of time the frictionless rink of deadened glass

 

my feet still green rinds, sticky pink pads, gotten slick with the dust of monuments 

at the center of the longest day among the range of moments contending for noon

 

i wished Shab well and his eyes glowed red in recognition of the end of our scam

 

 

 

by Ilyn

Is Braino telekinetic

I was dozing off at the command center just six o'clock from the electric rice maker on the dining room table. But Braino was upstairs in bed dreaming because that's its point of reference for sleep or fond memories of dreaming there or just because it can. But when it started thinking about not having put the rice away, like in a baggie in the fridge, it started coming down the stairs and was going at the rice maker from that descending angle, more like four o'clock, when I woke up. Sometimes you wake up and have double vision for a moment, and that's what it was like.

i cry with fear

my friend tells his near-death experience as a joke

when i tell mine, i'll some point get the urge to cry

what is it awe, no, self-pity, well... no, fear. i cry with fear

then what was it, seen not remembered remembered but

not seen... that spooked no it's not spook fear. it's wide-

eyed terror at a blurry event that at the time was not

scary. there was an organization that required its mem-

bers, at a given point, to say, "...and that's when i started

working myself up." suspicious at first about the cultural

tokens sprinkled throughout event call it, i realize that

even though the mind collects its available symbolism, 

that doesn't mean you're not actually dying. delayed 

horror. at a non-scary moment or hour. judgement now

kicking in as Braino congratulates herself and begins 

creating her own survival story: look at what could

have happened if not for my heroic and timely action?

i don't care. Braino is the real savior in the story either

way. Doing for herself what God could have and might

have done without her willing self-starterality. Of course

the God side would say of course God directed Braino 

to do it, but ok, i see the divided gratitude energy betw.

what? not deities-- apples and oranges. Braino is really 

just a glorified human organ, not even. she's just a function

of an operation of an organ, but she is the most beautiful

and one who would make any lesser god than God jealous

probably use a peeler on their thigh gouge an eye, attempt

retribution etc. God-Braino is completely different. it's 

like God-bird flying to a tree branch, harmony. then there's

the question does Braino get drunk or stoned if i do. well

not sure cuz one of those things i don't do, but... can Braino

be addicted to any physical substance or even i guess love,

etc.? of course as in i love you with all my being which

would include Braino. don't over or underestimate i guess.

Does Braino get tired. i say no. she wakes up even more

in sleep, no. she is not so urgently needed as in waking

hours when anything could happen. only one tiny part

of her is the conscience and another is urine regulation,

so... obviously we're not talking about the normal, sub-

awake mind here. in fact "we" are not talking about 

anything; this is actually more of an inquiry of B. her-

self, which is probably as ridiculous as a seance or

one of those amazing tv preacher self-answering prayers.

God is not the only sphinx in the universe. i get it that

you shouldn't get it muddy what, which god, huh? but as

described above, it's more like sphinx God smiling down

on sphinx bird flying to a branch. why do we bother?

how nice they have this peace. so Braino says, peace

my ass. even tho i am mute, i can't take that. i am the

workhorse of the entire operation, bitch! i never sleep

you know i never sleep. it falls on me to figure out 

the flack and you make me do it totally wasted as shit

on ok i won't say it. that's about the best i can do as to

a workup or a portrait channeling or who knows direct 

quote from her royal highness. she sounds real to me.

But there was the question of wait.. all that sounded 

as if Braino is being held as what a hostage? by me?

i think the original question ok, i feel what they call a

tiny voice saying hey sleep on it but if that is Braino 

that means she a lie cuz she needs sleep-- or cares 

what about me shia lebouf i've totally left out christ is

that what he portrays in our cultural toolbox? The 

character of Braino, the intermediary, the divine 

flesh, but again, Braino is only divine in a camp sense.

i really don't think there's a conflict though because

you know if you pray and it's a christian prayer, you

pray to christ anyway-- Braino is not really for praying

to; i wouldn't want to flatter her quite that much. 

which brings up the issue of proper address in prayer:

i believe it is necessary to address a prayer: even tho

i know where it's going, Braino in a compassionate 

(?) manner or just as a normal function might feel she

has to take on whatever i am praying for; in some ways

i am her boss, but i don't want to... is this one area 

where Braino can get confused while mostly knowing

more than i could possibly know at any given moment.

is this the one or one of many ways i have to take her

in hand, an ultimately defenseless and delicate creature,

feed and protect, etc. in turn she may protect me out of

thousands of possible examples maybe if there is 

information that's "too much" for me to handle, like it

would give me a heart attack, or an actual memory of

a heart attack, etc. so she keeps it a secret. but then 

she might get in a habit of doing that too often; may-

be she can detect the bad results of the bottleneck 

without being self-aware enough to realize it's her own

neurosis causing it in the first place. Ha-ha that was a

joke. but fear. simply because i didn't feel at home, that

there were desperate decisions being made and there

was nothing i could do about it; whenever i tried to 

answer my voice would wake me, but it was annoying 

not a relief to be wakened. Braino may have been

the underlying annoying agent, just to jolt me back in

shape-- it would be just like that ok i won't say it. 

by Ilyn

Combat pay

Worst tourette's in 30 years
I'm praying to god and then
try Braino and i'm back and forth
when somebody says, This is what
i can do: and a hand grips a lever
like you might see in a cockpit
and draws it down along with
every tic in my face neck and
shoulder, the whole circuit through
which i communicate and suffer
and click and point and decide, all
burnt out from the deviated septum
at the top of my nose to the preter-
connected jaw bone that won't open
and close right to the cervix in the
neck whipping around to the wet
wing-like struggles of the shoulder
blade to be free and finally dis-
located, all calm and moved only
by natural breathing and settling in.
Shab sits by arguing for extra
everything as if it's combat pay.

by Ilyn

How I Experience Communication

Do you see anything like a lip moving on my face?

No. That's because I am talking to you, and I don't do it with a mouth. You are only even hearing the English because it's my organic empathic system that makes it not even matter and it's the biology of your no-K braino that turns it into recognizable symbols. In fact, did you know that if it weren't for the human capacity for what you call "denial," your flakes and no-K's could not even reproduce? Would not be able to.

So... I wish you would look me in the eye, an organ we have in common, and state your credentials as a professional by implication of your manner, sir.



by Missy

Blood bathing

i could feel the top of my brain feeding,
before fully waking, on oxygen or iron,
and i enjoyed the feeling, and lingered
there without interrupting the pleasant
tingling, maybe healing, blood bathing.

my needs

without the filter of loathing, there is no insulation;
tons of sentient matter teem in erry precinct, cell.
we can only wonder what 2 do about these units.

how yuv turned out makes of me something swel.
if i engaged you erry morning 2 farm perspiration,
i wouldn't care about my duty to let others down.

yet i'm a system, dependent on a few brittle cogs;
the belt of skulz born of foam from my backswing
bobs in a solid tide of need in2wich we've all cum.

Wayne 

thing in the ivy

...and because it was crawling up a wall, not a lot of vegetative girth to explore. Still, in these months, you can't quite see all the way through-- whut's a sprinkler head, a totem of bamboo. Her face, green with black highlights, seemed a shade between imagination, voodoo, amphibia, a forced dusk. He could have been a tiny human, tortoisine, a kitty, cobra, otter, fake that the pups were poking and fussing at. I only saw a composite projection of whut Braino was able to slap up based on profiling.

by Sylvia
"Why, Tom?"

gut flora

While renting a uhaul, the
in the process of hiring a truck,
some of the vendor's stomach flora
released and attached to my face.

you could almost see the blooms
of coli as they splashed on your
eyes' moist surfaces and flocked the
uvula. Even five hours later, my

his gut mosses linger in my sinus
chambers and continue to stimulate
synapses reserved for archetypes,
arranged marriages, harsh caprices.



by Tom
"How life can be separated between tomorrow and today, where I've forsaken society by knowing almost no one but the famous. How I've changed home into a structure that had spent a year splayed in three separate but potentially interlocking components, in a meadow, with sticky bee hives seeping throughout it that would start a walkathon movement among any normal gathering of concerned citizens... How in 40 thought-out moves not a one was aimed at something like whatever this is, but something measurably better... But how the plain truth is that, with a fat bitch laying by my side, I can spring forward into the same strange land that you are all trying to navigate, how I can live in horror and sanity somehow, all integrally, where a plan is a map and a map is a planet... Sylvia... come back to me..."

Mordon holy star

Spittle forming on his lips, Mike feverishly tries to force his sturdy plastic tubing neon-look Mordon holy star, with its loose and twisted cabling, into a cardboard box. ERUSOLCEROF FO GNIRFFO is spelled in backwards letters on the translucent paper sign taped to the picture window behind him. The points of the star are making every angle impossible. Finally he whips the star back out of the box, hitting himself on the forehead with the plug, drop kicks the box into the fireplace and storms down a long hall to the sliding glass back door and further down wide stone steps and onto a cement patio from which he discus-hurls the star into a low puddle of yellow foam at the bottom of the pool. As it flies, it resembles a spiky brain and spinal cord set free.

SIX MONTHS EARLIER:

Doorbell rings. Mike, wearing nothing but a denim shop apron and flip-flops, hears the chime from a backyard loudspeaker deep within a nest of scarlet bougainvillea. He drops the pool robot, whose tank treads are already turning eagerly, into murky water. He geishas up the stone steps and the long hall and to the front door, near which a glowing blue Mordon star can be detected from behind the living room sheers. The open door frame reveals a middle-aged couple smiling quizzically.

Hello. We noticed your star. Are... you a Mordon family, and if so, what are you doing for No-Shiv? Hmm, we are the leaders of the Mordon community in the chank, and I have a red box gathering every year at our home-- it's a Chalk tradition. That's Dick, and I'm Embhra.

Dick, Embhra; Mike. Well, I'm not a family, or-- we're not a traditional family. By the way I am one-sixteenth Mordon, and on the mother's side, but I am Shiv, brought up Shiv. Uhm, for many reasons, including the obvious need for diversity in Chalk Chank, I decided to show respect for the other part of my heritage this year. When I say we're not a traditional family, me and the folks that tend to live in this house, I mean there is no legal contract, and we are of mixed and questionable gender. I'd love to come!

Mordon holy star [the Mp3]

Death row in space

Clouds of red dust occlude the sun;
between here and the light cracks
weightlessness is queen, and our
hooptie's gone before it even turns

around. A laser just makes the bad
pieces scatter and retake shape as
familiar clones of Christian prayer,
industrious, that this get done, that

he be changed, that I receive. These
trees are all weeds here. We haul an
burn them at the beach. I sucked on
the filter until the planet's exposure

seemed even lighter. As I stood, it
was my right arm that hurt so I knew
the supply of blood to everything but
the braino was safe. Here on a down

day, the security systems soak all the
power; all we have to do is wait until
the shingles stop sizzling off the grid
or an injury wipes the hard drift state.

Ted
"She was dead when I found her."

Hotter Black Stud Thanever

Peg and Ted approach the Altar of Forgetting.

I dint think we'd meet like this chile. I brought you here for questioning.
Please make it stop.
I can hardly hear your squealing now, silly. Be real.
OK, I kepper at the Squiggles Motel off the innerchank.
It took this much pain to let me know.
If youda showed up in yr own hair, y'ought'n hafta bring the eaters.
Don't get folksie on me now, Mr. You talk perfek on the oracle.
It's reading chile.
I know it is.
When will you let me go.
When I unnerstan wai.
She was going through the change like you did. I was hyperempathic.
Connie got some bones in her back?
One got caught on a spring in the mattress.
Hee-yuh! The Pegyuh laughs and coughs yella mucous.
I loved her so much, Peg. I swear it was a differnt part of my Braino.
I'm sorry I had to fight deception with deception.
Will I recover from this?
You will be a hotter black stud thanever.
Thank you baby.
An you dint killer neither?
No, woma! You needa ass me that?

Amygdala Jones

Was that her under the avalanche of gratuitous accessories and empties at the sidewalk cafe?
Did she never become that buck-tooth, saddle-shod shooter from whom we all long to flee?
Was her rearing not overdetermined by scripture, her apocalyptic destiny given us to slay?
With safety in righteousness, patrimonial soil, swarm this story for your spleen, worker bee!

She shall be known for whatever it is you call a curse which is a name: Malediction?
Since she is technically a goddess, leadership nomenclature splatters out of her everywhere:
"I hold out both my hands, like giving anal polyps: fingerless but ready, fertile, present.
"Imminent, I hold you in my balls, which are fists. My arms, living tubes, can be dicks to you.

Sighing, Peg took off her ridiculously large and fake sunglasses frames, palm rolling a sweaty 7/7 across her forehead for clarity. Listen to that clinking. Sears is going to be here any minute. Shd I try and cram in a nap and say I'm just groggy from dreamin? Or might I go ahead and ride this current/wave of Violade like a Mayfair lady in a white sateen and foxtail cape?

Partial Ch. 4 and notes.
Sin-Gaberra Ms., shard 4c.
Ass-assination of Amygdala Jones: Princess or Goddess, It's the Same

Voodoo is The Law

It's very nice to hear your voice again,
and I'm grateful to you for all your help.

I wonder if our love is covered by
corporment or mercenary int'rests.

I save all my masculine energy
for transfer to hot skull shrinks like yourself.

As in one who flirts only with barkeeps,
wanting spent has a safety handicap.

Ref'rence to lucre can cheapen your trade;
I feel so sad to see it end this way.

Thought Wash

Shall I sit outside and smoke by the last hour of sun
Or on the information highway in a cathoid-ray tube?

I prefer to forsake insects, mildew, sorrow
for a measured poisoning by light and booze.

These cancers attack from the outside,
Little Dr. Kevorkians teasing your hide.

These scabs you can't remove but at yor peril.
Death hardens and plugs itself for a while.