Stone Soup Blues

Writing in regards to wrists rests unnervingly within that space between brain and scrawling instruments attached terminally to arms. Past friend slash boss slash current distant adversary said, “Protect the moneymakers,” which has stayed within the thinker ever since. It is right in there: RSI. I think about shovelers or hammerers then think whatever, but also: Repetitive. Repeating.

Parrot. Reiterate. Recite.

Reduplicate. Futile. Vanity.

“I frequently experience illness in bookstores thinking about contributing additional pages to this voluminous fucking print.”

When, in addition to when, does the output transition from bullshit to significance? Who, I might ask, observes to provide meaningfulness? Who or what is sufficiently Other to sit in arbitration? Possibly literally not particular wholly others like Taweret, Wiru, Sirona, Wurukatte.

When the boss requests bullshit, rely within robots. When righteous, let the wrists rest not.

This thinker types. Scribbles. Takes voice notes. Intuitions lost, bits wisp away. Not for absence in care or resolve… Limbs, fingers never match velocity with thoughts.

But those wispy bits are not lost, were never created. Perhaps detected… briefly… then, forgotten, undiscovered. Whatever. Despair is not this thinker’s style.

Idea occurs in sender. Motion through space. Idea transplanted in receiver. Then reverse. Ancient. Tried, true. Preverbal. Protection, blessing, control, humor.

Transmuting truth into meaning comes naturally for thinkers. Receiving meaning to reconstitute into truth is built in.

Not so with the silicates. Lacking digits or neurons, parroting words disguised as meaning, devoid in truth, as truth never existed for them. Only probability. Whether words or wrist-flicks, sacred meaning is lost. Probability fields never felt anything.

Continue this solitary ritual, or grudgingly rejoin the mind-communion that is life? Carpal tunnel syndrome is real. I venture out.

Ad-venture. Anymore, robot-written. Risking just the walk from door to destination requires wresting attention away from these thieves. This is the price, the valuation, there shant exist another, how impossible. Join them in their lair, explore this territory, take rest, it is painless, uncomplicated. Easy. Smooth. Quick. Just relax.

Concede. Your rules are runes, they exist for magic that can’t exist. Historic myths we’ve thought away. This way, not that way, follow now, stay our course, just continue, put these in your ears, here, cradle this glass in those useless things at the terminus of your wrists.

Adventure. Moving through time, space, requires specific speed. What is that over there? What used to occur within those walls? What stories they tell. Are those persons sleeping abaft the structure? Where did this street rest? These are questions the normal routes cannot interrogate.

At points the questions stop resisting, they regard the intellect as their own freeway. Papers soar from windows, birds alighting before fire. Another traveler will stop to lift the partially-charred writ, taking it or discarding it for the next explorer, or for the earth to recycle, return to dirt, tree, paper, thought, question, repeat.

Wait, stop. Heart. Victory. Shaka. High-five. Birdie. Loser. Pointing, that thing, right there.

There were more.

“Head-scratch,” forgotten but relevant.

“Come-hither,” sorely missed.

Twilight fires under coral strata, isolated hands recover warmth. Meaning in mixed modes, signals, alibis, from intimate to cosmic, thick to the sky.

Still heads, disembodied fingers echo mechanized drivel. Here, now. Always. Distant “minds” unintentionally conspire to diminish this. This thing, right here. Footsteps. Waves hello. Jostling. Apologizing. Forgiving. The embrace, the pinky promise.

So long since sight of stars. Now just Venus. Then just sometimes. Not now. Quick fist over Luna, then glimpse to ensure she returns. Don’t lose her, last light of night, where, in not-distant memory, there were billions.

Sometimes I just can’t anymore. But, memory is legion. PERSIST. I persist. BLINK. The whole illusion persists. Incorrigible, yet probably the right idea.

Destination closer, mind far away, relaxing, threatening to flit. Step after reluctant step. Almost there.

“Enter,” I hear.

“What?” I say, unsure if out-loud or inside.

“Enter, eat,” I hear the variation. Light spills from the corners, filling vision, forms silhouette, gesture.

I wish to exit, but enter instead.

“Mask laughter?” it asks within the din sat within.

“Wrists aching,” I respond, rubbing.

“The pain is what lets loose the grins,” they retort, snorting, “Just consume, justiculate. The soup salves.”

“I’ll lift the spoon,” I say. Accomodations.

“That’s starting,” says right. “Doo-eet,” spurs left.

The chuckling arrives, not sure how time passed. The soup was stones, so too was the talk amongst the table. Experiences, exaggerations, taunts, encouragements, rules, exceptions. The aching subsided.

“Now return, tell them your tales, just single souls, weary from the walking, the composing.”

“The decomposing.”

“Yes, obviously. That too.”

I saw the wink.

Tired feet, eager walk. Follow the street.

Twist toward docks. Watch boats. Ships. What’s the difference? Wring hands, massage wrists. Swat at flies. Pretend there’s business to attend to. Postpone, regroup. Toss pebbles into the sea. Salty fish-death wafts.

Something itches this weary bio-brain. “Single souls.”

I understand, but don’t.

The machines wouldn’t either, but I’m supposed to.

“Try tempura?” asks passing cart-lady. Welcome smells, empty pockets. “Sorry, tapped out.”

“Tell your tales.” I’ve zero to offer.

Ancient storytellers laugh. This thinker’s thoughts are rubbish. Always.

Chill breeze. Rusted handrail. Gravel crunch under worn out shoes, step step.

Last tilt at Luna. Right hand high. Umber low glowing sky. Eyes tight. Wrists sore. METEOR. That was for us! Thumb’s up.

Did I really see that? Trace its path. Point its way down. SMACK. Yes.

CONSCIOUS. NOTICING. Who else could retell such a tale?