Look close

Those funny looking rocks are not rocks at all. They are tear gas grenades, a regular feature of the landscape—along with sundry other spent munitions, burnt earth, and squirmy, giant millipedes—in the parts I've just passed through. No comment on that for now, but watch this space for further updates. In the meantime, this from Dambudzo Marechera:

"Austerity. Austerity. Austerity. These drab rimless streets, the tainted asphalt of means that have no end. But austerity. Screwing the shit out of the cowering air. Here and there, eyes glaze over in wideawake stupor. Up down. Crunch the feet of soldiers. Austerely. Striding. The microphone deeper and deeper pushes into the dark lips. Speechifying. The ugly fact. Suddenly oozes. Flanked by Ministers. Licking. The blunt and abrupt cheer. Fucked into astonished silence. Down there in the towering sky, a bright disc blazes. Nerves. Moods. A palpable gloom. Blacker polished night. Revealing dentures. The dazzling sharkgrin words."

—Black Sunlight, 1980

Dear friends,

Forgive me this brief absence. I will be away from the Homeland for a few short weeks, searching out facts, truths, other rare reptilian critters. So this spectral space will likely go unmodified until, say, late July. I will continue to post, of course—I am always but always updating and uploading—only not on the internet. Look for my reports in storm drains, potholes, dirty thoughts, embarrassing odors, clouds, the sticky dust that collects on window sills. We are grateful for your every click!

Trouble down the road, or not

Milky Way on the right (us), Andromeda on the left, getting closer every day. NASA says maybe they'll collide, soon, right quick, in a few billion years, or maybe they'll just "dance around and eventually merge to become one large elliptical galaxy." Like the Tupamaros used to say, O bailan todos o no baila nadie. There is also this possibility, which is, I'll admit, a relief.

all writing

"All writing is forbidden us save that which we recognize to be inadequate."

—William Carlos Williams, The Great American Novel

Gotta go

“La única salvación de todo andar es no llegar.”

—Roberto Juarroz