• SOUTH OR SO IT SEEMS

    It was tacky then, it’s epitome and six decades and unknown views later it hasn’t changed at all. You don’t expect tackiness to accrete, yet like a black hole this is irrefutable evidence it has. To say it is garish to insult the term, since it is so much more, beyond anything the term can…


  • SINGLE CUT

    Words have geographic homes and here old favorites seem ill at ease, fitting poorly into thoughts that demand their presence. I use them regardless, but we both know that they will hide their shadings, but in a world where words are the last option, we both know that I have no alternative but to turn…


  • VERBIS, VERBIS, VERBIS

    Whatever you do, do not open the closet in the back room. If you do, what would happen would rival a scene from countless bad comedies. Things pent up within would come rushing forth, a tidal wave that would certainly engulf you and leave you wishing you had never laid a hand on the closet…


  • AS IT SHOULD BE

    Day gives way to night. Life gives way to death. Truth gives way to truth and falsity to falsity. Nothing moves, nothing cedes, all is constant. This is enso, one stroke, complete and incomplete and this is mu. You may enter freely, but will never leave, and once captured you have never been here and…


  • WITH PEN IN HAND

    You never read the ultimate autobiography which doesn’t exist unless you live in an Oulipian world. You can write up to the moment Of your death, and we would, if begrudgingly, conceded the last moments incompleteness, but you cannot write a true and complete autobiography without falling into the recursive abyss where everything that you…


  • SPEAK NOW, OR . . .

    There is a great deal left to be said, and we assume more than enough time for the task, but the ferryman hews to his own schedule and our plans, intentions, desires are beyond his knowledge or caring. It is best to say what you need before recalling that silence is eternal.


  • TRIANGULATION

    He says that foremost Mao Zedong was a poet, and knew that all poetry must at some level be political, must incite the reader to rebel against complacency. I say that Zhao Zhenkai wrote as Bei Dao as the ultimate act of rebellion, sacrificing his very identity. He says that I am anchored by the…


  • UNKNOWING

    I don’t know what                                                I am, the Buddha said. I don’t know why                                      …


  • WHERE, EXACTLY?

    The one thing that will drive him crazy is a sign with a star, or square, or anything that says “You Are Here.” The one place he has never been, will never be, is standing on a map. He admits he may be nearby, but here is out of the question. He’s never really sure…


  • OVER UNDER SIDEWAYS DOWN

    He is fond of saying that it is “water under the dam,” and she constantly calls him on it, reminding him that water goes over the dam. He smiles when she does this and reminds her that it isn’t a dam if water is going over it, and it is mindless to say its water…