If the body's a few grams less
the moment after death, what about the everyday weigh-ins?
Add your post-barber weight to the by-product of the trimming;
it's a little less than your mass before you sat in the chair
unless you are really pleased with the cut.
I am inspired by only one poet
who only wrote one book
and I wonder if my words come
from the soul of his favorite pen
that one day ran out of ink
and if maybe my pen is jealous.
So all these words, like all my words,
are a switchtrack between quoting
him and quoting his thoughts in me.
The lines that you like are mine
and the ones you don't are typos.
Welcome to Psychedelic Truth,
population: the internet.
A suburb of the city which
has no name, The Metacommittee
governs how people think of authority
and decrees that phone numbers
cannot be chosen, will not be another embarrassment
like vanity plates. Codes of communication
should be random.
That's how David Berman would have
ended it. Not with this line.
p.s. Or maybe he would have but definitely not with
this one.
This one.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Why? Oh, You!
It's that moment when you've walked ten minutes
from your house without seeing anyone alive,
the stoplights glittering like decorations
in the early morning light, and you start to think:
There has been a pandemic in the night,
everyone in the world is dead and I somehow survived
but then a car drifts by and you think:
"My God! The only other person left. I wonder if they know yet."
That's the moment that makes you realize
that morality is just a word that means,
"Everything that is done is better if its done
my way."
It's that feeling that everyone knows around noon
walking in a mostly empty park you become
unshakably convinced that someone is watching
you, and that the sky is a giant bluebird's face
with an eye that shines light into everything.
That's the feeling that makes you realize
that mortality is just a word that means,
"Deep down, we are all exactly the same.
Hooray."
It's that decision in the evening that you must
find the meaning of everything before going to bed;
then after looking in some obvious books you look
under the couch, you stretch and reach deep down there
and realize that the strange twitching surface
at the tip of your finger is really the very sole
of your own shoe.
That's the decision that makes you realize
that you is just a word that is spelled
nothing like how it sounds.
from your house without seeing anyone alive,
the stoplights glittering like decorations
in the early morning light, and you start to think:
There has been a pandemic in the night,
everyone in the world is dead and I somehow survived
but then a car drifts by and you think:
"My God! The only other person left. I wonder if they know yet."
That's the moment that makes you realize
that morality is just a word that means,
"Everything that is done is better if its done
my way."
It's that feeling that everyone knows around noon
walking in a mostly empty park you become
unshakably convinced that someone is watching
you, and that the sky is a giant bluebird's face
with an eye that shines light into everything.
That's the feeling that makes you realize
that mortality is just a word that means,
"Deep down, we are all exactly the same.
Hooray."
It's that decision in the evening that you must
find the meaning of everything before going to bed;
then after looking in some obvious books you look
under the couch, you stretch and reach deep down there
and realize that the strange twitching surface
at the tip of your finger is really the very sole
of your own shoe.
That's the decision that makes you realize
that you is just a word that is spelled
nothing like how it sounds.
Extended Metaphor #178
My brother tried to argue, perhaps for the sake of the argument itself, that pragmatism was useless. Ideas, passions, and loves, he said, were what our world revolved around. We no longer required such heavy things as food or sleep, our needs had become lighter than air. And what is more important (he asked me what I thought) food or beauty?
I said that perhaps he was right, as you say to a brother for brotherly reasons. I said that perhaps our world revolved around ideas and beauties and such. According to the theory of general relativity, the Earth revolves around the moon just as much as the moon revolves around the Earth. No one fixed point has preference. But it's the Earth's heavy gravity where we live, and we can only look up at the airless and pretty moon.
I said that perhaps he was right, as you say to a brother for brotherly reasons. I said that perhaps our world revolved around ideas and beauties and such. According to the theory of general relativity, the Earth revolves around the moon just as much as the moon revolves around the Earth. No one fixed point has preference. But it's the Earth's heavy gravity where we live, and we can only look up at the airless and pretty moon.
Friday, September 26, 2008
On an Unstoppable Train II
When she said this place had become a dump
I held her close and in a whisper asked
if she thought that all the world
was just something to bitch about.
She is the rails and wheels on them.
"What the fuck does that mean?"
she asked, and I realized the person that I
once loved was still there and quite well,
unchanged by time (an oxymoron)
for better or worse.
She is the woman in the red dress
a few seats up. She is the engine with
a screaming whistle. She is the coal
waiting to be burned. She is everything but me.
But are all of these substances
one big misunderstood absence? She asked
for help cleaning up and said, "vacuum."
I'm sure I misunderstood that.
Is there a vacuum inside the machine?
A little black hole
where all my dust goes?
My relations with mechanics are faith-based. Science
is a holyman's game.
I don't know how this rail-machine works
for there are never any stops.
I cannot get off
for I am not even a passenger on it
but am all the passengers
and the train too.
On and on and on and on
AND on & on AND on & on
anon anon, anon anon, anon an
unstoppable train.
I held her close and in a whisper asked
if she thought that all the world
was just something to bitch about.
She is the rails and wheels on them.
"What the fuck does that mean?"
she asked, and I realized the person that I
once loved was still there and quite well,
unchanged by time (an oxymoron)
for better or worse.
She is the woman in the red dress
a few seats up. She is the engine with
a screaming whistle. She is the coal
waiting to be burned. She is everything but me.
But are all of these substances
one big misunderstood absence? She asked
for help cleaning up and said, "vacuum."
I'm sure I misunderstood that.
Is there a vacuum inside the machine?
A little black hole
where all my dust goes?
My relations with mechanics are faith-based. Science
is a holyman's game.
I don't know how this rail-machine works
for there are never any stops.
I cannot get off
for I am not even a passenger on it
but am all the passengers
and the train too.
On and on and on and on
AND on & on AND on & on
anon anon, anon anon, anon an
unstoppable train.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Movie Review in an Experimental Form: Burn After Reading
What was the movie trying to accomplish?
Taken point by point:
- Find comedy in tragic events happening to inflated, larger than life characters.
- Explore the nature of fate and epic coincidence, leaving a taste of meaninglessness and doubt.
- Give the rare opportunity for incredibly talented, but not "conventionally attractive," actresses to act in roles that are fun and entertaining but not necessarily high art.
- Show greed for what it is: the cause of all human pain.
Taken point by point:
- No. There are very few actual laughs in this movie. The off-beat script combined with the star-studded cast turns the whole affair into a contest entitled "Who Can Play The Quirkiest Character."Of course, if this contest actually existed, Frances McDormand would have won it, but more about her anon. The few laughs in the movie come, not from the machinery of the movie, but from the deliveries of the individual actors. The shining example in this movie of mediocre punchlines delivered for the best possible laugh is Brad Pitt. (A quick note on Pitt: I consider him a great performer and not really an actor at all. He has a way of making each role he plays a pleasure to watch, without ever engaging in the art of acting. In this way he provides a service, and does it very very well. Like Google. That is why Pitt has about a billion more dollars than other equally attractive and charming actors). So the movie as a whole isn't funny. If there is a dark pleasure drawn from the preposterous tragedy of the plot, I wouldn't really call it comedy. Oh, and J.K. Simmons brings the heat.
- Yes.
- Yes. It must be really annoying to be well-respected actress in Hollywood that isn't a bombshell. Agents would be constantly pitching you scripts, saying, "It's a modern re-telling of the Ophelia story; but instead of a Hamlet, it's AIDS." And you'd reply, "Would someone please give me a cakewalk script that I can apply 2/5 of my talent to, be incredibly awesome in, and just get fucking paid? I don't need Oscar fodder every time. What about that bullshit superhero movie that Charlize Theron was just in? I want something like that." There would be an awkward pause and then one of the agents would say, "I'll call the Coen Brothers."
- Yes, but in a predictable way. The Coen Brothers seem completely obsessed with greed. I'm not the first to notice a consistency in the brothers' stylistic devices, but most Coen Brothers' movies are motivated by greed: Miller's Crossing, Hudsucker Proxy, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, Oh Brother! Where Art Thou?, No Country For Old Men. They seem to think, and perhaps not wrongly, that if everyone stopped wanting more money than they worked for, the world's ills would vaporize. It can be best summarized by Frances MacDormand's famous line from Fargo, speaking to a murderer she has just caught: "There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don'tcha know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well. I just don't understand it." The Coen Brothers, it should be noted, are probably rich as hell. I couldn't find any specific info, but they have more in life than just a little bit of money.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
An Email to a Friend Who Told Me Not to Buy Nike Shoes
Subject Heading: I'm Buying Those Nike Shoes
Dear X,
PLEASE DISREGARD ALL OF THE FOLLOWING IF YOU DO NOT CARE ABOUT SMALL, STARVING, BUT VERY CUTE CHILDREN IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
I've never thought so much about buying a pair of shoes, but you set me to wondering whether buying Nikes is something I'm ethically opposed to.
That being said, I work on document retrieval at the Kresge Business Library, so it's kinda my job to find articles on business practices. So, defying the "chef's family mostly eats take-out" stereotype, I have taken my skills to use for my own purposes. After about fifteen minutes of research (that I'm getting paid for on the clock) I have come up with the following:
This is a paper by an MIT grad student and its probably the best (and most reliable) breakdown of Nike's evolving role as a more responsible business practitioner. It doesn't take long to read but it is SUPER dry and boring. If you have any interest in it, skip to section 4: "Nike's Response: Learning to Become a Global Corporate Citizen."
In early August of this year, Nike found out that a private contractor that they had hired to run a factory in Malaysia was grossly abusing human rights. They immediately shut down the factory and held a press conference to declare that they had no idea this was going on and it was put to a stop immediately. Is it Nike's responsibility to police every single company that it hires run its factories? Not really, but public pressure has MADE it their responsibility.
Most of the people who still criticize Nike are Libertarian xenophobes who don't think that anything should be manufactured outside of the United States, including chopsticks. There are also the hemp-wearing, LSD-addled, One Love people who think that all human beings and some apes should be paid a million dollars an hour to do anything until the day that all currency is replaced with fond memories of childhood. But the rest of everyone else seems to think that Nike is OK. In fact, it's somewhat insulting to Nike if I DON'T buy the shoes seeing how hard they've worked to improve their practices.
My point being this: when corporations respond to public pressure and bad publicity, and attempt to right their wrongs, public opinion needs to ease up a little bit. If everyone is relentlessly critical of Nike, then boycotts and public pressure become meaningless because the public is impossible to please.
I think I've written way too much on this, but I'm sending the email to you anyway.
-Ben
p.s. OBAMA OH EIGHT!
Author's Note: The Obama thing is a reference to an inside joke, but seriously, vote Obama.
Dear X,
PLEASE DISREGARD ALL OF THE FOLLOWING IF YOU DO NOT CARE ABOUT SMALL, STARVING, BUT VERY CUTE CHILDREN IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
I've never thought so much about buying a pair of shoes, but you set me to wondering whether buying Nikes is something I'm ethically opposed to.
That being said, I work on document retrieval at the Kresge Business Library, so it's kinda my job to find articles on business practices. So, defying the "chef's family mostly eats take-out" stereotype, I have taken my skills to use for my own purposes. After about fifteen minutes of research (that I'm getting paid for on the clock) I have come up with the following:
This is a paper by an MIT grad student and its probably the best (and most reliable) breakdown of Nike's evolving role as a more responsible business practitioner. It doesn't take long to read but it is SUPER dry and boring. If you have any interest in it, skip to section 4: "Nike's Response: Learning to Become a Global Corporate Citizen."
In early August of this year, Nike found out that a private contractor that they had hired to run a factory in Malaysia was grossly abusing human rights. They immediately shut down the factory and held a press conference to declare that they had no idea this was going on and it was put to a stop immediately. Is it Nike's responsibility to police every single company that it hires run its factories? Not really, but public pressure has MADE it their responsibility.
Most of the people who still criticize Nike are Libertarian xenophobes who don't think that anything should be manufactured outside of the United States, including chopsticks. There are also the hemp-wearing, LSD-addled, One Love people who think that all human beings and some apes should be paid a million dollars an hour to do anything until the day that all currency is replaced with fond memories of childhood. But the rest of everyone else seems to think that Nike is OK. In fact, it's somewhat insulting to Nike if I DON'T buy the shoes seeing how hard they've worked to improve their practices.
My point being this: when corporations respond to public pressure and bad publicity, and attempt to right their wrongs, public opinion needs to ease up a little bit. If everyone is relentlessly critical of Nike, then boycotts and public pressure become meaningless because the public is impossible to please.
I think I've written way too much on this, but I'm sending the email to you anyway.
-Ben
p.s. OBAMA OH EIGHT!
Author's Note: The Obama thing is a reference to an inside joke, but seriously, vote Obama.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Extended Metaphor #331
Insecurity is vinegar, a repugnant substance that is widely regarded as necessary. And no real kitchen is complete without it. There is always way too much of it around, and it is shockingly cheap and easy to come by. Good for cleaning.
Charm is baking soda. On its own its an empty dry powder, but its a rare recipe that doesn't require it. Well, its not actually required. But if you're making a cake, and you realize you don't have any...let's just say that no one will have be told that you ran out of baking soda. They will just be able to taste it.
Mix baking soda and vinegar together and see what happens. Its an experiment that we all tried in middle school then repeated in high school. Some have not stopped the experiment, which isn't really true of actual baking soda and vinegar; here's where the metaphor starts to unravel. But here's where it picks up again: it sure it fun to watch the two mix and go off.
Charm is baking soda. On its own its an empty dry powder, but its a rare recipe that doesn't require it. Well, its not actually required. But if you're making a cake, and you realize you don't have any...let's just say that no one will have be told that you ran out of baking soda. They will just be able to taste it.
Mix baking soda and vinegar together and see what happens. Its an experiment that we all tried in middle school then repeated in high school. Some have not stopped the experiment, which isn't really true of actual baking soda and vinegar; here's where the metaphor starts to unravel. But here's where it picks up again: it sure it fun to watch the two mix and go off.
Saturday, September 20, 2008
On An Unstoppable Train
I will ride this forever
for there are no stops.
I cannot get off the train
For I am not a passenger on it
But all the passengers
And the train too.
On and on and on anon
anon anon anon anon
an unstoppable train.
for there are no stops.
I cannot get off the train
For I am not a passenger on it
But all the passengers
And the train too.
On and on and on anon
anon anon anon anon
an unstoppable train.
Non-Physical Pains
Over the years, these categories have arisen from the Raw Data. They are modern occurrences, inapplicable to even the very recent past.
1) Fate. Accidental tragedy that comes as a result of coincidence. Unforeseeable, unavoidable by personal intention. Usually is accompanied by feelings of guilt and hopelessness. An attempt to insert one’s will into the causes of tragedy retroactively. As a result, the victim attempts to blame himself or herself for problems that are well beyond his or her control. This leads to two distinct and intermingling depressions: guilt for causing the misfortune, and the underlying knowledge that she is lying to herself and in fact has no control over her own life. (Please excuse all pronouns). This is the second-worst form of tragedy.
2) Unforced Error. A true mistake in the classic sense. A tragedy caused by one’s own inability to prevent it despite knowledge of its likelihood. Initial lamentation and regret, but these feelings quickly subside. Immature “victims” (subjects) repress their own role in the misfortune: creating a fictional exterior cause, or elucidating a personal flaw beyond their own control. Mature subject almost immediately move past lamentation and gain a sense of comfort from the tragedy. “I have learned a very valuable lesson that will lead to a more successful and error-free life in the future.” Except this. Unless subject is young, it is very unlikely that he or she will be able to avoid the same misfortune in the future. The power of habit prevails over negative reinforcement. This is the most common form of tragedy and preferable to all other forms. Least emotional harm. A quick flash of depression leads to conversation with friends and the building of community. The possibility exist that this is the best form of tragedy because it is the most common and most practiced for. The possibility exists.
3) Intentional or semi-intentional harm. Willful creation of pain through normal social interaction. Emotional distress caused by the indifference or intention of another human being. Extremely high levels of emotional damage. Some victims recover. They successfully become convinced of the inadequacy of the person or persons causing them harm. This is rare. Abuse over time can lead to severe instability. Constant questioning of the self and self-worth. The entire psyche becomes contaminated. Inability to convince herself that she is being unreasonable. Extreme cases lead to victims telling themselves over and over. There is nothing wrong. There is nothing wrong. There is nothing wrong. While wholly possessed by a perfectly complete depression. Remember. All connections are unequal. The inferior member is forced to face the worst non-physical pain: the difference between needing and wanting. Horror sets in as day by day there a dawning realization that he needs something that he does not even want. Recovery is long, difficult, and unlikely. It is important to remember that everything is ok. There is nothing wrong but it does not seem to be true.
In the future all these tragedies will be obsolete.
1) Fate. Accidental tragedy that comes as a result of coincidence. Unforeseeable, unavoidable by personal intention. Usually is accompanied by feelings of guilt and hopelessness. An attempt to insert one’s will into the causes of tragedy retroactively. As a result, the victim attempts to blame himself or herself for problems that are well beyond his or her control. This leads to two distinct and intermingling depressions: guilt for causing the misfortune, and the underlying knowledge that she is lying to herself and in fact has no control over her own life. (Please excuse all pronouns). This is the second-worst form of tragedy.
2) Unforced Error. A true mistake in the classic sense. A tragedy caused by one’s own inability to prevent it despite knowledge of its likelihood. Initial lamentation and regret, but these feelings quickly subside. Immature “victims” (subjects) repress their own role in the misfortune: creating a fictional exterior cause, or elucidating a personal flaw beyond their own control. Mature subject almost immediately move past lamentation and gain a sense of comfort from the tragedy. “I have learned a very valuable lesson that will lead to a more successful and error-free life in the future.” Except this. Unless subject is young, it is very unlikely that he or she will be able to avoid the same misfortune in the future. The power of habit prevails over negative reinforcement. This is the most common form of tragedy and preferable to all other forms. Least emotional harm. A quick flash of depression leads to conversation with friends and the building of community. The possibility exist that this is the best form of tragedy because it is the most common and most practiced for. The possibility exists.
3) Intentional or semi-intentional harm. Willful creation of pain through normal social interaction. Emotional distress caused by the indifference or intention of another human being. Extremely high levels of emotional damage. Some victims recover. They successfully become convinced of the inadequacy of the person or persons causing them harm. This is rare. Abuse over time can lead to severe instability. Constant questioning of the self and self-worth. The entire psyche becomes contaminated. Inability to convince herself that she is being unreasonable. Extreme cases lead to victims telling themselves over and over. There is nothing wrong. There is nothing wrong. There is nothing wrong. While wholly possessed by a perfectly complete depression. Remember. All connections are unequal. The inferior member is forced to face the worst non-physical pain: the difference between needing and wanting. Horror sets in as day by day there a dawning realization that he needs something that he does not even want. Recovery is long, difficult, and unlikely. It is important to remember that everything is ok. There is nothing wrong but it does not seem to be true.
In the future all these tragedies will be obsolete.
News Flash From Someone Else's Brain
GARY INDIANA -- In a freak instance of cannibalism, an employee of the Wendy's fast food restaurant, Jeremy McGarrens, 22, jumped across the counter while working and bit into the shoulder of a customer that was simply attempting to order a Junior Bacon Cheeseburger. As McGarrens was being hauled away by police on assault charges, he was asked about the motivation behind his erratic outburst. He replied that he was simply a firm believer in the Wendy's mantra and it was "What tasted right at the time."
Congratulations! You bought an iPhone.
Congratulations! You have just purchased Apple's latest new product in interface technology, the Apple iPhone. The Apple iPhone is a completely unique mp3 player and communication device. In order to get started please review this list of features available only with the new Apple iPhone:
1) Adjusting the appropriate setting on your new iPhone will insert a laugh track into your telephone conversations making you feel like Sienfeld/Elaine.
2) Telling the police that you have your new iPhone but not your license will get you out of a ticket.
3) Your new iPhone emits a wireless signal that interacts with the brainwaves of certain physiologies making it OK for you to say the n-word in front of black people.
4) If you type 'wtf' into your iPhone a pop-up screen will outline exactly 'wtfiu'.
5) Your new iPhone both knows and has hung out with Tom Brady. Now you can tell all your friends 'my iPhone knows Tom Brady!'
Note: Please do not ask your iPhone to introduce you. Be cool.
6) Your new iPhone is the internet.
7) All foreign language calls are translated when spoken through the iPhone.
8) Rubbing the iPhone on you dick will make it bigger.
9)Your new iPhone will imitate your voice pattern on the phone to your Nana. Download a plug-in off iTunes to enable the option of your iPhone automatically ordering delivery flowers upon her passing.
10) Um...it's a fucking iPhone.
11) When you go into a public restroom your new iPhone will utilize non-GPS tracking to pinpoint your location. As you step up to a urinal (or preferred receptacle) the sound of a gentle mountain stream will play behind your current music selection to assist your restroom experience.
12) Buying an iPhone for your son will cure him of homosexuality.
14) Enabling the Conundrum Feature will put a red button on the corner of your new iPhone screen. Touching the button will instantly kill one random person on Earth, maybe someone you know, maybe someone you don't, and put $700 in your checking account.
COMING SOON: Apple is working on a new iPhone product in conjunction with Google! The new software on each individual iPhone will compose an original new Radiohead song each day to play as your ringer.
1) Adjusting the appropriate setting on your new iPhone will insert a laugh track into your telephone conversations making you feel like Sienfeld/Elaine.
2) Telling the police that you have your new iPhone but not your license will get you out of a ticket.
3) Your new iPhone emits a wireless signal that interacts with the brainwaves of certain physiologies making it OK for you to say the n-word in front of black people.
4) If you type 'wtf' into your iPhone a pop-up screen will outline exactly 'wtfiu'.
5) Your new iPhone both knows and has hung out with Tom Brady. Now you can tell all your friends 'my iPhone knows Tom Brady!'
Note: Please do not ask your iPhone to introduce you. Be cool.
6) Your new iPhone is the internet.
7) All foreign language calls are translated when spoken through the iPhone.
8) Rubbing the iPhone on you dick will make it bigger.
9)Your new iPhone will imitate your voice pattern on the phone to your Nana. Download a plug-in off iTunes to enable the option of your iPhone automatically ordering delivery flowers upon her passing.
10) Um...it's a fucking iPhone.
11) When you go into a public restroom your new iPhone will utilize non-GPS tracking to pinpoint your location. As you step up to a urinal (or preferred receptacle) the sound of a gentle mountain stream will play behind your current music selection to assist your restroom experience.
12) Buying an iPhone for your son will cure him of homosexuality.
14) Enabling the Conundrum Feature will put a red button on the corner of your new iPhone screen. Touching the button will instantly kill one random person on Earth, maybe someone you know, maybe someone you don't, and put $700 in your checking account.
COMING SOON: Apple is working on a new iPhone product in conjunction with Google! The new software on each individual iPhone will compose an original new Radiohead song each day to play as your ringer.
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