Having my way with Ulysses

as if the world was coming to an end

In secret we met - / In silence I grieve / That thy heart could forget, / Thy spirit deceive. / If I should meet thee / After long years, / How should I greet thee? - / With silence and tears.

light a candle for us and pray to whatever youve got because yes the world is coming to an end and it’s about time too woooo this is our house now everybody out thank you and get the fuck out and thank you dear saint lazarus on this your glorious day blah blah blah for demonstrating so clearly just how not to do it for there to be a sundering there must first be a reconciliation and my sister and I are like two become one for this shit though she might murder me at any moment because you cant discount she has that determined vicious look in her eye she’s ready to poison this whole place with Arsenic and finish it off herself o but sister love lets take our time a little we cant create ruination without satisfaction we can at least pretend to like it well have our way with sly uses o yes paralyze it long and hot down to its soul as far as possible and possible too o sly can you feel us making a whore out of you youre swollen out like an elephant come let us relieve you of that baby there you go now lay back darling dont worry sweetie love we’ll pull out

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

politics and earthquakes and the end of the world

Which we all like. Rain. When we sleep. Drops. But wait until our sleeping. Drain. Sdops.

ive been so sick waiting for this day i was ready to take to my bed and ask for food to be brought up except my brother would poison it with Arsenic and ruin a perfectly good breakfast in bed with a couple of eggs he has plans to kill me too ive seen them in that locked drawer of his behind all his smutty photos I knew id find something there nobody knows him like i do still he’ll have his uses and sly won’t any more giving it all away like she does and well shes been given her notice and im in charge now or we are for the time being because i promised my brother id stop plotting his murder long enough for us to do a little mining we have here a goldseam of inexhaustible ore and I intend to blast it wide open until the world shakes at my words though im not going to give him the satisfaction in any case he’ll be dead and let whatever god hes praying to today try and save him because ill be like the heavens coming down to punish him for creating so many gods theres no god not his anyway and not him no give me regularity like the clock and number and reason science rationality and ill forge them like metals into weapons and kill you all he says we can break sly uses into bits and whore her out for hire do you think she would mind a little wrangle first he wants to know maybe she’ll be willing but needs a little force he must be losing his mind if he thinks sly would succumb to manipulation just like that not for you sly user for somebody else maybe but such a person would have to detach entirely from the outcome which is of course death no we need temporal manipulation we’ll mix up a little something to keep sly loser so entirely in the present every second of every moment of every little bit of every moment she’ll have no concern for her outcome well hire minders supplying dosages in continuous fashion because well want any variation in her temporal understanding to be undetectable said minders would also have to provide sustenance and shelter at the start attend to the person’s bodily functions until they are no longer required and anticipate any possible need or desire perhaps we can put her on some sort of drip but it will be hard to get quality minders ill have to do it myself or sly will be dead before the second interview no matter in slys state she’ll be dead already good kitty which will make her sly useful something my brother never thought about hes too ready to drive it up into her because thats all he wants out of her go ahead my brother if thats what you like but ive looked you square in the eyes and you cant fool me and you cant fool sly with your sly eye blinking putting on the indifferent id rather die 20 times over than let my brother manipulate his way to my destruction its mine go ahead and think im a downright villain if you think that is my nature but my brother drives me mad i told him yes because he said he cant get on without my help but dont blame me if i murder him at any moment

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

not natural like the rest of the world

Laughter and blows merged inextricably; for however conditioned an onlooker might be to their emotional summersaults, no one could foresee the moment when these two sundered portions of a single being would cease from strife and become one again.

im going to need very strong wire cutters maybe or something slim and sharp like an oyster knife o maria santisma what was my mother doing there where shed no business gaping at us with her eyes as stupid as ever and polly what a Deceiver i swear after we pull this thing off im going to kill her infect her with a slow fever because she doesnt deserve to be decently shot i hate her pretending of all things like she had just so happened to have been following me up that alley like i couldn’t feel her coming along skulking after me her eyes on my neck and a half turn and theres mother and she hadnt an idea about our mother showing up no let them both go smother themselves for the fat lot I care mother thinking first thing that i wish my sister any harm whatsoever especially with her such a beauty magnificent head of hair on her down to her waist tossing it back like that the lovely new skin too where it peeled off there after the burn its a pity it isn’t all like that well in time all in time though try timing anything to do with either one of them and it never seems to go properly curse them both to the lowest pits mother especially saying i wasn’t being respectful its impossible to be more respectful and i have to wear this kind of a tin thing around me too tight to walk in until i remember my company manners polly being so polite with her smirk saying im afraid were giving you too much trouble mama and extremely sorry mama believe me and shes supposed to be my sister well its all very well a mother but you can’t fool me

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

wasnt it natural

shhhhe’s still mad but i dont see anything so terrible about it now i can do whatever i like and momma will keep an eye on him for me shell want to know where were you where are you going it’s perfect o my brother have i offended you well too bad darling ill do it again if i have to though it is hard to deploy momma properly because she never knows the time i hate that pretending and she was a bit late too and i was just beginning to yawn with nerves thinking she was trying to make a fool of me now shes sending me to try and patch it up so whos the fool now still i should do something ill send flowers poppies so hell have something to do

2 Responses to wasnt it natural

  1. I hate to sound ignorant, but I’ve been kind of confused by your posts of the late and I’m wondering what I’m missing. Cause it isn’t you’re writing, it’s my lack of knowledge.

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

Where the statue of the fish used to be.

Ask them whether on reflection they could see anything amusing in all that foul mouthed, foul minded derision and obscenity. To you, possibly it may appeal as art; you are probably (you see I don't know you) a young barbarian beglamoured by the excitements and enthusiasms that art stirs up in passionate material; but to me it is all hideously real.

Gala Event at Holy Mother Public Relations had us Praying for the End of Time.
by St. Francis DeSales

To mark the end of the thirteenth Ba’k’tun Holy Mother Public Relations Inc. hosted their first annual End of Existence Gala in the circular Star and Garter Ballroom: the dazzling center found everywhere in the Holy Mother PR Empyrean building whose circumference appears to be nowhere and why am I telling you about the room? I hate duplicity as I hate death, so I’m talking about crap nobody cares about because frankly I want to bury my real feelings about this shitshow of an event somewhere after the first couple of lines to ensure that our Holy Blessed and Most Exalted Mother Mary will have passed out before she gets to the sentence where I call her the booze soaked love child of Courtney Love and a pile of vomit. There, I said it. As I have prior experience covering the various travesties parties Holy Mother PR has thrown in the past to provide Mary with fresh drinking companions celebrate Mary’s glory I knew to race past the red carpet and find Her Shitfacedness our Holy Lush before she passes out in the men’s urinals. A pity too as I had only a glance at Jesus gingerly exiting his limo with his babyclothes up to one side. I was dying to find out was he circumcised but I had bigger fish to fry as apparently did the “ladies” of  the Tranquila Convent who catered this stinker of a party with what can only be an ironically inspired all seafood menu. Ghastly. Everything fried in butter: they love buttering themselves in and out, though to their credit they served a potent egg nog which Sister Mary Peter described as eggs beaten up with marsala. One taste of that and I knew why I was far too late to interview Mary. Though, with all the optimism of a rookie I pressed on, seeking her out in all her usual puking places: closets and behind statues, but I could not find Her Drunkenness anywhere and I stopped looking when I saw the out of order sign on the men’s lavatory door.  Alas, Mary was already face down in a pool of her own vomit and piss. I’d say they ought to dedicate the urinals in Her Holy Name but in that case they’d probably throw another one of these disastrous events to mark the occasion and I’d have to cover it.  I was late for Mary but I found myself just in time and unfortunately perfectly placed for the unveiling of Negative Destiny by new sculptor Martha. While some might try to make a cat cleanly by rubbing its nose in its own filth, Martha has tried the same treatment on The Annunciation, and Negative Destiny comes off as a rather fleshy cross between The Annunciation and The Incarnation. But with more slime. This mixed media piece is curious the way it’s made and I asked Martha what are all those veins and things but I won’t reveal her answer. Trust me, it is better not to know. Martha’s sculpture managed to renew my faith in the end of the world, and indeed to wish it had come before Martha had ever been born. I don’t want to say that it is bad, not at all. It succeeds gloriously in finding new ways to suck. O lord I wanted to shout out all sorts of things fuck or shit or anything at all just to distract myself and indeed to save some of the others: anything to tear my ruined eyes from that ugly quivering disgusting thing placed up there like any other statue in a museum, and the crap sculpture she had just unveiled. Martha ought to take a good look at herself but a mirror never gives you the expression. My advice to you Martha: check herself into the Tranquilla convent, they’ll take anybody.

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

2 the same in case of twins

He sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake. He knows if you've been bad or good so be good for goodness sake!

My Dearest Sly,

Seasons greetings from my family to yours!!! I can’t believe the year has come and gone so quickly!!! I do hope the holidays find you well and happy!!!! We Temporals have had a banner year and look forward to more happy times to come!!! Indeed both Paulie and Polly have big plans for their future as I imagine you are well aware. Aren’t they frightful trying to hurt you?!! Sweet imps. Children do enjoy destruction. Perhaps it is my fault for breastfeeding only the one of them, and for such a long time too: like some kind of big infant I had at me! The doctors did think it would help our twins differentiate a bit from each other if one breastfed and the other watched with a bottle of formula, I don’t know. Maybe that wasn’t the best choice. But no matter, onward and upward!!!! Though do be careful my dear, they intend to destroy much of what you’ve done here and turn what’s left over into some sort of frightful playground of their own. As their parent I won’t be one to stifle their creativity, so perhaps its best to leave that part up to you. So heads up my dear!! I did ground Paulie recently for what appeared to be another attempt to, well, harm his sister. He says it was the other way around, but Polly is such a delightful nymph with a loving and kind heart, especially toward her brother that I just can’t imagine her wishing even to touch a single hair on his sweet lovely little head!! And certainly not during the holidays!!! Oh her burns are coming along quite nicely, by the way. Healing up a treat!! Now don’t take me the wrong way, Paulie is just as loving and kind as his sister, but he does like to play rough. Boys! So charming!! All sticks and snails and puppy dog tails though I do dislike the dog tails, they can be frightfully bloody. Well Sly my dear dear dear dear friend, I would love to invite you over for oranges and lemonade to make you feel nice and watery, but you do understand I am sure.  Have a merry merry!! And a safe and vigilant new year!!!!

Forever yours,

Politemporal

p.s. I almost forgot, have a lovely end of the world!!!!!!

One Response to 2 the same in case of twins

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

2 Responses to not a letter from a living soul

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

2 Responses to what did i tell him i was engaged for for fun

  1. Seriously, I expect not to know sometimes all the things you talk about in a piece, but always its presence. But I’ve read this twice always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Perhaps because I did too many mushrooms long ago–God, send me more mushrooms!–I know I’m missing something so sarcastic that even I can’t ferret it out. Also (this is not for you but to ‘upstairsdownstairs) what is his problem? >KB

  2. In Penelope, Molly reveals she told Mulvey she was engaged to the son of Don MIgel de la Flora and will marry him in three years time (a lie). She also reveals to the reader she is the daughter of Lunita Laredo a Spanish Jew (the truth). This is my imagination of their ketubah, a Jewish wedding contract.

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

I couldnt rest easy till I bolted all the doors and windows to make sure

vern what the hell were you thinking daily for a year

i am sure I heard burglars in lestrygonians i know i did, even with sirens making as much noise as it possibly can and that crack forming in eumaeus maybe i can get a watch cat that can be useful later on too i wonder if they can see anything that we cant staring like that but i hate their claws im not going to rest easy until i lock this place down bolt all the doors and windows to make sure there isnt much to steal indeed the lord knows you put it all out there for free the past year and then some still its the feeling it would be all confusion if we moved when ill bring a bit of salt in uncross the knives i knew thered be a parting that bit stitched on the day after it happened when was that nausicaa one installment late out of how many and this one is number 453 O Vern what the hell were you thinking daily for a year id like to give you 2 damn fine cracks across the ear for yourself take that now for going ahead with all this temporal stretching to dig up whatever you might find down in the cracks you think nothing happens in a year everything happens in a year and you with two of them and each one too little to wipe his own ass too impatient with the waiting always waiting to send them down to some school to learn but o patience above it all had to come pouring out of you too soon what you dont want to hear that well you cant say i pretend things can you im too honest maybe i am the pan calling the kettle blackbottom but every day i get up theres some new thing on and im to get in front of the footlights again and let it out full sweet god sweet god well when im stretched out dead in my grave i suppose ill have some peace

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

the smoothest place is right there between this bit here

There was a story about this traveling salesman whose left wrist began to hurt him, just under his wrist watch. When he removed his watch, blood spurted out. The wound showed the imprints of very tiny teeth.

the way Vern plots and plans everything out gives me the fidgets particularly now at the end of the world and i suppose she thinks im finished out and laid on the shelf well im not no nor anything like it and the temporals can kiss my tessellated ass because this is my house delete it all im spread all over the internet on show well see well see now that were near the parting well Vern will leave me here at the end of a cycle and the start of a new one damn it damn it and go write her rune poem and the temporals story and the holy mother public relations employee handbook and squaring the circle and saints lives and instruction manuals and whatever other confusion she vomits out i hope she’ll get someone to dance attendance on her the way I did because she darent order me about the place O Vern im letting myself up out of this you have me that exasperated

One Response to the smoothest place is right there between this bit here

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

by God yes wait yes hold on he was on the cards this morning when I laid out the deck

The cards are vague and mysterious.

Scene: [On a bed of something as soft as what do you call it gossamer, wait, what is that, snakes? That’s a bed of snakes now? How the hell are we paying for this? Did we have to hire snake wranglers too? Jesus Christ!]

Jesus: [On the god mic] Yes we have wranglers, but just for one infinite snake. God says don’t worry about the budget he thinks he has a donor. Ok head in the game people. Places please Cassandra, Lakshmi, Vishnu keep Rip Van Winkling it right there where you are. He’s sleeping hard. Let me know when we have places. From the top of the show, standby on lights 1 through 5, and snake wranglers: go.]

Scene: [On a bed of snake soft as what do you call it gossamer, Vishnu is sleeping while Lakshmi massages his feet and gossips with Cassandra.]

Lakshmi: So how is God’s play going to go, it must be opening soon, no?

Cassandra: Wait, am I sitting on a snake? I better not make an alnight sitting on this affair. I mean. Sorry. What? His one man show? Oh honey you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.

Lakshmi: That bad?

Cassandra: I did the cards, and first off I get reversed four of pentacles crossed by the happy squirrel.

Lakshmi:  Oh that’s cute. Isn’t that good?

Cassandra: It’s bad. I mean, corners are being cut all over the place and it’s like he’s obsessed with promotion. He says that he has money of course so we’ll be all right, but you know the membership numbers have not been good lately. Christmas drove in a few advanced ticket sales, but we won’t see any of those people again until Easter. And then you cross all that with a happy squirrel: this show will stink like road kill.

Lakshmi: But it will have a long run?

Cassandra: No. And it’s his own fault. He got reversed 5 of swords at the top, I mean, come on. He brought it on his own damn self and then hooking up with his with his ex wife all the time squandering money and getting drunker and drunker. The rest of the time he’s been just plain intoxicated on himself. He has wardrobe making skinny jeans! You should see him all squeezed and squashed into them!

Lakshmi: No!

Cassandra: Sure enough. It will be a spectacle on the stage, imagine paying $450 in the preserved seats for that to see! It was all right there in the reversed three of cups. Yeah it’s all great fun, and won’t it be the biggest hit show of all time, so hey! Lets celebrate now!

Lakshmi: Was that his attitude?

Cassandra: Acting upon him.  His attitude was the reversed ace of wands. So.

Lakshmi: Blocked.

Cassandra: Yup. He did have Judgement straight up; that was interesting.  He’s going to have to make a change.  It’s time to look everything over and weigh it all out.  The show can’t sustain itself as a one man thing.  It just doesn’t work in this day and age, with audiences like these.

Lakshmi: I know it. Fickle. He should have stuck with the triple act. So much less pressure when you’re in an ensemble.

Cassandra: Don’t I know it and I told him too, but does he listen to me? No. Does anybody listen to me? No.

Lakshmi: They don’t.

Cassandra: No they don’t.

Lakshmi: God’s tongue is too flat.

Cassandra: Really? Ew. I wouldn’t let him lick me.

Lakshmi: He does it all wrong too.

Cassandra: Pigs of men. And what about that one? Don’t you get sick of Vishnu’s big square feet up in your mouth like that?

Lakshmi: The first night ever we met, I had just floated up out of the ocean and we stood staring at one another for about 10 minutes as if we met somewhere. It was a recognition, you know? I saw him and I knew I’d be rubbing this man’s cold feet for all eternity. So tell me more. What’s the future, what’s the final outcome for God: The One Man Show!

Cassandra: I drew the king of swords for the future, so he’ll find a different layer of consciousness to work in. He’ll have to. He’ll figure it out, he just has to be rational about it. And the play? I don’t even know how to tell him.  What am I going to tell him? It was the five of pentacles reversed: he’ll lose money on this thing. Really, he ought to lose money itself from the whole enterprise: money has nothing to do with being god. I tried to tell him. I talked and talked until you couldn’t even see me anymore, I was just this angry woman’s mouth telling him come on man, believe me! This is how it’s going to be damn it, listen! I’m telling you!

[Cassandra is interrupted by somebody on the god mic. Who the hell is that?]

no thats no thats no way no stop just stop shut up cassandra shut up people dont believe you because some man told them not to believe you here i am apollo telling the story first so dont believe cassandra when she talks the one who tells the story first wins my ass ok my motherfucking ass is that what you think chica no just speak girl and let them all believe what they will and you know what congratulations everybody wins so lose it just let it go baby love its no loss what are you losing whats lost its a gain you want to spend all time trying to make people know the future you want them to see dont you see it too the truth its true its true thats you all the time with believe me believe me and they dont believe you and poor me im such a victim is that what you tell yourself and why because ajax raped you and whats her face athena just stood there and watched is that going to be the why for everything you going to let that be your loss forever get over it its done let it go no loss ok its a gain to be done with that lot and let apollo say whatever he likes to any born fool wholl believe all his blather because hes god hes god so what you be god too ok youre god too you are god done moving on now go

4 Responses to by God yes wait yes hold on he was on the cards this morning when I laid out the deck

  1. ‘…it so much easier when you’re in an ensemble.” I like that for some reason. Hope your holiday was good. You don’t have tro answer this, but have you ever cheecked out any of my pieces-poems, not the commentaries? I was wondering. Best. >KB

      • I would like to ask a small favor of you. Because I simply don’t want to be someone who only enjoys your sarcasm, because most of what you write is over my head because of your background, I would really like you to get five minutes and go to my blog and read the last two poems I’ve posted. They are not long, they are accessible and they are not at the level that most of the poetry on here is at. It is beyond it. I am a poet, and a good one. I take what I do seriously. I get up at for, am writing by 5 and sometimes continue into the night. I don’t even need to know what you think of them, only to know what I do and that they exist. I’m going to play the “L” card on this one, loalty. Yes I am a loyal fan. If you don’t do it I won’t know but it bugged me enough that I had to at least ask., Thank, best>KB

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

had i frequent omissions

peeking into the focus and pecking at thumbnail reveries, pricking up ears to my phono on the ground and picking up airs from th'other over th'ether, 'tis tramsported with grief I am this night sublime, as you may see by my size and my brow that's all forehead, to go forth, frank and hoppy, to the tune the old plow tied off, from our nostorey house, upon this benedictine errand but it is historically the most glorious mission, secret or profund

this is the 456th installment of sly uses having my way with ulysses and im thinking forward so much its all seeping into penelope and farther back you can see it in eumaeus and circe i searched high and low for the perfect drag queen or king to be circe bella bello cohen and maybe I shouldn’t have been so upfront with therell be no money in it only exposure i cant attract them any other way and starting back in march too in a retrospective arrangement so many images in my mind of direct stares from them to the reader but what is the good in going into mourning for what was neither one thing nor the other and it turned out i was avoiding human faces anyway though I have some of myself and the story of a haunting sorrow in nausicaa shot by my friend rachel a filmmaker shes in my bookclub ive been in for how long years we need a new member weve slipped below our ideal seven or eight or nine remind me you can tell from the picture with the top of his head cut off rachel wasnt looking at a face no its a picture of the connection shes making between her eye through the lens to his eyes and back love it theres also the hot priests calendar the vatican puts out also nausicaa and milly cooper there too a couple more maybe number 456 like stairs written in how many days let me see calendar where the hell is that ive moved offices and switched computers and went from sitting to walking which is much better but its hell on penmanship and mine was never much and its medieval spanish strings now you wont hear much of that back in sirens if i wrote sirens again tomorrow it would be a very different race of mermaid sirens and family visiting from south africa i had come out of simultaneous chapters around march was it thinking aeolus would be much easier given it was only one a day but thats also when joyce shifts positions a little multiplying things in delicious ways im simultaneously tweeting the headlines then i banked enough though to be present for people whom i most dearly wanted to be with we had fun here and at the beach in oregon with the boys and new dog running and old dog chilly and such happy nearly all our family my dear sweet inlaws i love i have some mothers revolving equally in my heart and sandy is one of them it was nice sirens and cyclops and thinking about wilderness was it just after mnemotechnic i forget the puppy chasing birds and one sweet fish boy playing in the ocean and the other with two eyes as darkly bright as loves own star running happy i did some work then too and read finnegans wake labyrinth style polycursal this is not a book to be read in a straight line for me anyway when i decided to have my way with ulysses i did not expect finnegans wake to have its way with me and always on for flirtyfying too o goodbye sweet tart goodbye this year flowed all over me like a warm shower bath i left university life with a great future behind me for the what is that word known to all all a part of the bravest thing i have ever done and the thing is so much stuff after has been another bravest thing i have ever done including this revolving sphere whose center is everywhere and whose circumfrence is nowhere but where the hell am i going to put it born in what is that space the net revolving whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere what did hg wells call it the world encyclopedia the central ganglion of the collective human brain accessible from everywhere and centered nowhere mapped by borges on a scale of 1:1 and dante stirring the pot how many days was it now 380 just this particular revolving sphere within a sphere and when well this is an eye blink when is nothing in the grand scheme of time and most immediately i am thinking only of my own pleasure but something must be done with it

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

Lord the cracked things come into my head sometimes

shhh

and why did i do this work have i no manners nor no refinement nor no agenbite of inwit well i do have the ayenbite of inwyt though i had the devils own job translating it from old kentish dialect and itself literally translated from french but there is so much in there sirens and lapwings and cuckoos I came to this idea while translating old english the anglo saxon rune poem my littlest boy started preschool and like melanctha i had been was always desiring to get back into a classroom and time and writing and who can wait i though id have four hours a day four days a week i can work with that what to do i didnt yet know so i translated the rune poem and somewhere between god mouth and journey by road i thought well as well joyce as another ill let ulysses be my playground what harm if i did i have a little time ill take the book of a day whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere and stretch it into a year ill put bloomsday in the middle of the path of its life and ill write according to the time in ulysses and let it be what i like it to be the first ones came out and no damn fear once i started i tell you as the inner voices of stephen worlds weary because he is overwhelmed by too many choices creating too many worlds and bloom nowthenowhen or maybe better in finite time because hes trapped in the present but that looks like infinitetime not the same idea the same and not the same and too easy to mistake so narrative young and narrative mature could be bloglike and everything in first person voice and lots of voices too and let the styles evolve whatever direction i like images yes they had to fit what i see in my mind for that day and sometimes hours and hours of work to get the picture just right captioned with something that would explain comment transform deepen amuse and the styles changing with the year and never enough time for it four hours a day four days a week was not even a drop of what this took seven to nine hours a day or more every day every day every day every day through child illnesses and birthdays and school holidays and emergencies and exhaustion yes and joy too and problems and life and life and life which i knew going in this is what i wanted i real year packed to the gills with life and work and no looking back no time for revision tomorrow is a new day will be so there are holes in my stockings and naked words all over the place and even my bare ass in tessellation and why not can writing be performance art and what does that look like and how does it happen and what can it be to read something a writer puts out there in real time and who would read i dont know who but i see numbers hundreds a day and increasing so many people half from overseas india reads me during their night and europe in their day ireland england france germany netherlands italy spain south africa egypt japan russia australia new zeland mexico canada argentina peru brazil the middle east asia south america the world i missed one installment for a bad concussion but i made it up the next day though i don’t remember how looking back in a retrospective kind of arrangement there are two or three summer weeks i cant quite recall it all comes floating back in a jumbled simultaneity like dreaming in water but i kept going nothing would stop me not even nothing sometimes i wrote in advance doubling the length of my days i neglected my family who were marvelous good sports about it and the laundry general house cleanliness and personal health i felt sharply the agenbite of inwit but a deal is a deal is a deal is a deal im doing this for a year and i did too and by the by a couple extra weeks on top i found so much in ulysses even at this pace that i had never slowed down long enough before to see not even when i was teaching spend hours on just a page or two every day and things get more clear and as easy to see as where was moses when the candle went out and more muddy too is molly lying about her age i think shes fair and forty who is macintosh ah well who the hell knows everybody and nobody pieces of ulysses float through my dreams when i sleep and joyce too this whole thing has been a dream and my dream if you were to do this you might not speak of mathematical esoterica or temporality though i cant quite see how and youll probably not discover as i did that god and mary are divorced and share custody that martha is so angry and lizzie twigg would show up so often or cassandra and the nuns of tranquilla convent are men and the afterlife is a theatre and god is a stage manager or is it jesus and circes pigs are dogs and having once been repulsed by a friend cooking his cat whenever ago in italy i would write a recipe for it and there are as many hindus as greeks amongst the eternals in ulysses and my earliest childhood living in the black hills during the pine ridge uprising is in there too with grandfather tatanka iyotanka and growing up in a colorado mining town what do you know its in my ulysses there in the back peeking out at the end and when once i had favorite chapters i cant say that now no i cant say that now there was nothing i couldnt say and much i didnt say no time no time tomorrow is a new dream will be

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.

Yes because

Now go.

eureka i was in the bath like archimedes when the idea came clean i am god and you too and why not let my work be delightful and with ulysses why not what a year it could be and i laughed every day and cried some too, the installment i knitted with molly crying as she was the death bunting for rudy have you ever knit anything people notice when she says whats the use grieving for something that was neither one thing nor the other she wont think herself into the glooms about that anymore because you know at that moment she has done so already and more than once and i don’t care how fast a knitter you are even for the tiniest little newborn which rudy most certainly would have been knitting takes time thinking and measuring and increasing and decreasing grafting and sewing it together weave in the ends and blocking if she blocked and put it on him it would have been all day and into the night I know what it is to be a woman and a mother twice over and pregnant more often than that and i felt molly that day back in oxen of the sun though thats not the only way we are in synch which made me laugh too mostly i laughed from the pleasure of it working with ideas i keep around what has love to do with free will and time and eternity simultaneity mathematical esoterica death and god both and or i would write something to crack myself up and laugh that way too each day long and crammed full i would wake up exhausted around 5 my boys wide awake up and busy id start all the simultaneity of life looking after my boys basic survival needs and sometimes my own food pull ups check the schedule what do i think im writing about today half awake without a god’s notion and clothes socks shoes wheres your jacket reading and waiting for it the first mad thing comes into my head no time to overthink anything commit to what comes research it and write and image and caption and keep going tomorrow comes fast and boys play read love kiss comfort and feed them dos huevos estrellados maybe today but no dear god they eat like damn birds one eats nothing new and the other eats two raspberries and is full both curly and sweet beautiful and neither ever eats the same thing as his brother ever smart curious both confused in my eyes sometimes when it comes to weather look mommy blue clouds northwest kids in the dumping rain peacefully doing whatever when people from well normal climates run at the first drop whether it is just misting out or pissing down rain the little one still wont pee in fish heaven where we poured bloop and flushed him on to eternality tell me how do you argue with that our 1st death too it was they learned to swim and play chess and checkers and watch out for the little one he cheats and read i love watching brotherhood happen ive never seen anything like it the sun shines for them and for my marriage too my second one and thank god for it my love my life and i moved to the backroom when was that during circe maybe where i could do my writing and studies at the table in there so i can think and the days slipping sideways and i stopped paying attention to months and started thinking in chapters each one a newness and a different kind of pleasure and in the bath nightly a languid floating flower alone and done for the day and this one the last one nearly done too yes and nothing to do tomorrow for the first time since long before a year ago but it is time now to stop to look around a bit take it in and rest quietly for just one time a short time perhaps or a long however it comes and be still yes because a woman whatever she does she knows where to stop.

4 Responses to Yes because

    • Thank you for your comment. I began it before the copyright ran out and would have done it regardless — that was just a happy coincidence. My motivation, I suppose, was that I had left academic life to have children and my littlest one had started preschool, giving me just a sliver of time to fill. I ended up filling it and spilling over by far! Why this? I don’t know anymore. I could have answered that question much more clearly a year ago. The idea came to me and I went with it and didn’t let it go until it was done. It was a great pleasure to spend so much time on Ulysses, to find so many of its secrets and its jokes. I’d do it again. But I’ll likely never choose to publish something daily for a year ever again, though I’ll always be prolific. The pace was relentless! But with the chance to turn back time and do it again I’d do it again.

      Joyce wrote television scenes in Finnegans Wake: I wonder what he might have done with the web. Truthfully, that’s the question I asked myself some time in October or maybe November of 2011. I imagine he would have had as much fun as I did, and would have blown us all away doing it. And without question, Joyce’s website would be NSFW.

  1. I have do admit I didn’t notice he had written television scenes in Finnegans Wake. But then I know I only ever noticed a fraction what he was trying to say/sing/write.
    May I ask one more question (I’m quite nosey): what was it that you did in academia? I mean to ask: was your work always related to (Joyce’s) literature?

    • Please ask as many questions as you like! I am a literary chronosopher which means I study the intersections of temporality and literature. Or I did. Well I still do. I suppose the closest English discipline I might be classified into is literary theory. What to call me was always a problem: “this is Veronica Tonkin and she is a what do we call you ? What do you do? Cultural studies?” “No.” “Something with theory?” “Yes, close enough.” I should have been a medievalist, they are always the coolest people. And so easy to say. “I am a medievalist.” It just sounds nice. I taught mostly contemporary literature, some modern literature, and literary theory, and I loved every minute of teaching. I was also quite involved in cinema studies. Joyce would sometimes appear in my classes, though not as often as more contemporary authors depending on what I was teaching. I did teach Ulysses as a senior seminar in a quarter system, which was never enough time, but I was not specifically a Joyce specialist. I think my vitae is on academia.edu, but it is badly out of date.

      There’s a television and a radio in HCE’s tavern and they make up some of the noise there. Look for the Butt and Taft scenes. I can’t remember where exactly. Somewhere in the middle.

Intercourse, eyeball to eyeball.