GAG REEL FLUX

Plates stacked in the reverse order
In which the guests were poisoned
In which the squirrels asked for
nothing
here it comes
the occasion for a broken headset


breath with a rock in its wall
enmeshed with bending to its 
unforeseen resignation to its
unbeknownst plain speaking codger
whose chair has fallen back
no forward
it was forward
had to be forward
why had to be
well it was like this
jaw dropping to webcam
another boil rising to the surface
of the forehead 
play with the skin folded into 
gardens dead and gone
faded into clouds of throat clearing
mention her and it will bring on
the throat clearing temptations
hair tangled into a dark canyon
where cool retreats give up
the heat of embarrassed sounds
didn't even get to open the mouth
forked tongue and the utensils
of torture rinsed with excuses
sliding off the cliff in a dream
waking up to a broken fast 
from day from night
braking before the red bricks
under eyes crusted with mortar
I am closing them again
and opening the curtains
on the plains there's a swelling
of the flowering garbage
had to be that of course
of the course
of a plain swollen with plenty
of waste had to be that 
of course 
of the course of a plain 
plain fact


- Max Stoltenberg

EMPTY MUGS

Moving on that is the method moving on there is only method moving on and there is only studying moving on studying others moving on to the next study ratcheting along grinding the gears along to the next moving on from one list to the next list moving on brushing along brushing it off slicing the gums blood is smearing a smile uppers and lowers moving on that is the question moving on that is the dilemma queer dilemma moving on being studied by others checked on checked out marked on marked out shit on shit out moving on picking her up throwing her down making her responsible for his madness moving on there is no method there has never been a method.

Moving on.

Can't.

Go for broke went for help started out with a diaper and won't even make it to the last in a line of incontinent products keep thinking these hands will go from covering a face to scraping across the ground won't even make it to a grave where are the cemeteries obscured by dust storms these hands are rubbing eyes closed to the world trapped in its own dirt go for broke went for help is that where this went to into a hallway and came upon a door after a brief hallway of preparation nodded to the wall the shadow on the wall making a shadow on the wall making that the wall and entering into it go for broke.

"Don't get up."
"What am I supposed to do when I didn't hear you until you were already in here?"
"Maybe I should go back out."
"You're in aren't you?"
"I'm not sure. I forgot to knock."
"You sure forgot to knock all right."
"I forget to do things when I'm not sure especially knocking on doors."
"Forgetting to knock on doors is at the top of your dung heap when you are an uncertain little twerp?"
"I'm 5 foot 9."
"So?"
"I'm not little. I'm not tall, but I'm not little. Little would be 3 feet or less."
"I thought you said you were 5 foot 10?"
"Maybe I should go back out."
"You're in aren't you?"
"You obviously wanted someone taller."
"Why would I? I want someone whose neck comes right up to my hands when I hold them here so I can strangle them when I have to."
"Have to? I think I should go back out and maybe it would be better if I forgot to even come back."
"I said if I have to. I didn't say I would strangle you right now."
"That's not very comforting."
"What have we said about bringing comfort into this?"
"We did go over that didn't we? It's flooding now in this part of my head or wait it's flooding in this part of my head."
"It doesn't occur in that part either."
"And I thought I could have at least trusted my initial selection."
"Your neck does come up to my hands when I hold them up here like this doesn't it?"
"How about if I don't go back out and let you strangle me? I mean it might actually be the last and only time I ever feel your touch and such a firm one at that and I could get you to be sure about something and look me in the eyes and watch me empty not that I don't feel empty as it is but you would get a load of the dull edges of the last few cards I've been dealt."
"I thought I told you I'm not up to that yet?"
"You could rehearse it."
"That's what this whole thing already is."
"I've never felt ready for all the things that have been already. And why are you talking like that?"
"Because you say ridiculous stuff like what you just said."
"No I mean the accent you're using."
"Accent?"
"Not accent. I mean the inflection."
"Inflection? You mean it doesn't match what you're imagining how it should go in your head in the section of your brain where it doesn't even occur? Now I know your answer to the question has it ever occurred to you? would be no it's never occurred to you."
"Not inflection. I mean infection. You sound like you're congested. And no it's never occurred to me. I thought I answered that earlier a few moments back."
"A few moments back?"
"A few maybe more. I might have just implied it. Are you up to strangling me yet?"
"No."
"Would now be a good time to say something?"
"Say something about what?"
"About the real reason I want you to strangle me."
"I don't really give a rat's ass and no one else does either."
"No one else? Why do you say that?"
"Because there's no one else."
"I've always wanted to know what your hands smell like. I've wanted to know if they would smell like hands that come down to wipe up one of my spills and for a little bit there's that smell of hesitation a fellow clumsiness that whispers with its scent that this accident doesn't have to have a place anywhere to make it all crank up into motion again."
"I found a few pages in the corner earlier today. As I was reading them trying to make sense of what they might have fallen out of and it was something about the daughter of this man who was selected to be the head of what he didn't even have any experience in and I don't think it had anything to do with the daughter it had nothing to do with the child and then I noticed on one of the pages there was a brown smudge mark from one of my fingers and I sniffed at it and it reminded me that I had been scratching scratching around for something."
"Maybe I should go back out."
"What about me strangling you?"
"Are you up for it yet?"
"No. I wanted to know why you changed your mind and went back to that?"
"I thought you could come out with me and see where I've been scratching around."
"Why don't you just come back in again?"

Go for broke went for help started out with a diaper and won't even make it to the last in a line of incontinent products keep thinking these hands will go from covering a face to scraping across the ground won't even make it to a grave where are the cemeteries obscured by dust storms these hands are rubbing eyes closed to the world trapped in its own dirt go for broke went for help is that where this went to into a hallway and came upon a door after a brief hallway of preparation nodded to the wall the shadow on the wall making a shadow on the wall making that the wall and entering into it go for broke.


- Max Stoltenberg

TANKED

It would swim across a yawn as if trying to out-flap the disinterested one behind these tap tap against the against nothing against nothing against not giving a weasel's dick about a lack of interest or a yawn drawn out across the water in a tank as if trying to reinforce glass with tired old eyes and tastes and their build-up making it harder to see the accumulation of growth on the fish tank edges and sides cornering movement inside outside leaving the room now corner of the eye watering the corner of the room leaving the outside plenty of room to press up against the glassy-eyed barrier pressing until it would swim across a yawn as if trying to out-flap the disinterested one behind these tap tap against the against nothing against nothing against not giving a weasel's dick about a lack of interest or a yawn drawn out across the water in a tank as if trying to reinforce glass with tired old eyes and tastes and their build-up making it harder to see the accumulation of growth on the fish tank edges and sides cornering movement inside outside leaving the room now corner of the eye watering the corner of the room leaving the outside plenty of room to press up against the glassy-eyed barrier.

Why did we turn around and waste all this time what time what waste too much time left anyway and not what you're looking for anyway totally wasted anyway would like to be wasted anyway or just starting out with that water painted anyway ends up the same way anyway anyway it starts it ends up the same way anyway why did we turn around and then turn around after we already turned around made it seem like it was so worthwhile to look around and around for that stuff you had been talking about recently very recently just were talking about it between turning around and after we turned around and then I fucking got interested why the fuck did I I don't know we turned around again to get back to the original turning around and I think we lost track or count somewhere someone once said to me or to someone else who told me someone else told them that everything was about math because it was all about what we were counting on and we lost count or lost track we lost track and when we saw it and you said you thought that we finally were getting to it you were surprised because you were convinced we had never turned around enough times and that we must have been heading in the right direction all along until you second guessed yourself myself I second guess myself and I was told or actually I told someone I think it was you I told so why am I telling you again about to tell you again don't make me repeat myself don't make me pull another finger back this way and make that cracking sound like the other one did before gritting my teeth while my body points in all kinds of directions end up in the same way anyway you were saying you thought we finally were getting to it you were surprised because you were convinced we had never turned around enough times and that we must have been heading in the right direction all along at least the direction that led in the direction of your stuff until you second guessed yourself myself I second guess myself and I was told or actually I told someone I think it was you I told so why am I telling you again for your own enrichment and you could use it especially in light of the fact that the last time you bled all over us it didn't look very rich and by that I mean consistency don't know if we'll ever find anything to you know add to your blood to thicken it up a bit just keep it in there if you can and it's getting harder for both of us that's why we move on no sheets to clean no sheets no anything anyway ends up.

"Before we get any higher up can I tell you about the time I lost my friends?" the question came to her as she looked down the dirt path and had begun to be more aware of the growing distance between where they were and where they had been down below.
"You told me already," he replied as his head felt like it was placed in the vice at the end of his grandfather's worktable in the dark stale basement.
"Told you already?  I did not tell you this already," she insisted as she saw the long flat land below and the conversation had been empty and she questioned herself in terms of why did she have to fill it up with anything again anyway.
"You did already with the friends at school the fake friends and how they all left you and what you put in your diary," he said as his head continued to feel pressed between cold metal memories of schoolyard fences and looking at the houses and the old people who sat in their backyards quiet and not at school.
"I told you about the kids at the school and all their horseshit of excluding me, but I don't think I told you about when I lost the rest of my friends actually lost them," she explained cracking her knuckles and imagining that they could have found some branches at least one to hold in her hands and bend and split into smaller pieces a nice sized branch dried out and no sign of green she really cracked her thumb knuckle on her right hand when she started to go through a list of vegetables and reached asparagus dirt not a branch dirt not a branch anywhere.
"Lost them?" he asked reaching for his rear left pocket to poke his index finger through the hole where the last few grapes had fallen through through the hole that's what that was forgot thought it was the usual forgetting to wipe and the crumbs dropping through from the hole through through the hole in the rear left pocket from through.
"I went with three of my remaining friends on a hike," she said trying to crack one more knuckle and producing only silence only silence space in a machine for a missing part that dropped down below not for being on one's own only when the time comes for lots of time and lots of space combining into lots of emptiness that knuckle must've been cracked already or it just won't crack.
"Three of your remaining friends?" he asked losing count of all the drinks he spilled lips to do without he spilled lips lips to do without rejected before he had even had his chance to say enough or when he spilled until he ceased to use his hands.
"Two remaining friends I went with two of my remaining friends on a hike and they found this cave we found this cave and we took our flashlights actually only one of us had a flashlight because we hadn't intended on exploring a cave and we weren't sure how far in we should go and how long the light was going to last and if I could remember how to tell that really long story I like to tell when I go into caves with people and I don't know how long the light will last," she said making a fist and moving it side to side like a head gesturing no.
"You mean your life?" he asked remembering when he stood and looked indifferently at his cousin who told him about the storage facility fire and all the burned photo albums.
"I am not that old," she said rubbing her back with her fist when it was done saying no.
"Old enough," he said refueling his contempt for how tall he was and not being sure what year of high school that girl was with the straight blonde hair that coursed down the back of her blue or black windbreaker.
"The story was long and it could if done in the right way outlast the light as well it should and I was having trouble as usual and with the same part," she said rubbing the tips of her fingers and feeling the fingerprint ridges and how they used to be caked with newspaper ink after tearing her dad's paper after he would read and wondering what day it would be when she would finally tear the paper before her dad read it.
"Trouble? Having trouble?" he asked confronted with the knowledge of never becoming a grandfather and then he was plagued with the horror of encountering his children and grandchildren somewhere along the desert as it slid towards him under the sky like a mechanized sidewalk and all the baggage he had surrendered in another desert or the same desert would reappear as it wrapped around the Earth on a belt just above the opening to the world's rotted crotch.
"Yes, yes, I was having trouble with the part that takes place in the prison," she said wondering where the passage with the cat with an ear and a half would go after the prison and the bridge that collapsed between or outside them outside. She continued, "The part with the prison is mostly in reference to a corrections officer who had started the job two years ago and within a few weeks of taking the graveyard shift had lost the feeling in most of his right thigh. He took it to mean he needed to exercise and get off his ass. When he left in the morning he looked through the fence into the exercise yard as it was gradually revealed by the rising Sun quickly covered by clouds as he felt himself swiftly blanketed in exhaustion."

numbness brings the dawn 
grayness muffles the voice
temperature slows
indecisive vectors pledge
always pledging to 
what's left standing 
or underground
the sky and its droppings
bombard with the smell
of darker matter
as the grunts scramble
between the legs of reality

"And that is an example of how you have trouble getting through the prison part of the story?" he asked as a wave of anxiety rose up through him when recalling the overdue library book and wondering if the library was still there followed by the cat with the ear and a half that didn't go here already found a spot for that this was always grounds for covering ground that had been covered before and yet remained so barren the library was not there anymore.
"One example it's not always the same but when I start struggling with it it mostly veers off like that," she said clearing her throat after her left nostril had sent something down which led to her thinking of the one of the buildings she had seen before their demise and what the upper floors had passed on to the lower floors not a trickle but a profusion of dross.
"And the most popular deviation is waxing poetic?" he asked figuring out the possible combinations of malingering and crap as cralingering and being dissatisfied until he tried to reassemble it into macrap and it lingering on the edge of a sinkhole.
"I have never waxed do you hear me?" she said, "I have never waxed anything on my body except the time I got hot wax on my hand carrying that stupid candle around when we lost power after some truck crashed into a power line."
"What happened next to the officer?" he asked rubbing his nose that for some reason filled up again with the weird odor of his overdue library book as he tried to determine what had befallen the book since he no longer had it and what could have possibly gotten on it to have made it reek the way it did.
"The numbness spread all over his body," she said, "and he had to work at the prison long enough to be eligible to switch to a different shift which he did.  As he moved along the spline he looked through the fence and noticed an inmate tall and muscular enough to suit his purpose exercising out in the yard.  He motioned the inmate to come up to the fence so he could speak with him and asked if he was open to the idea of killing him and the inmate offered a reply along the lines of that he would think about it but that he was most likely leaning towards being accommodating and the corrections officer made his way toward the gate and then realized he did not have the key for it."
"Figures and then what happened?" he asked noticing her squinting at the latest ruin in the desert they had stumbled upon, "what is it?"
"What is this place this spot?" she asked sniffing and grimacing.
"This is where it used to be," he said examining the ground and debris.
"Your house?" she asked thinking of her own house and the burning wax from the candle and the nights and days that would continue from now on without power.
"My fish tank that used to be here," he said suppressing images of the ocean suppressing what he was seeing right now thinking about thick arms in prison sleeves wrapped around his neck.
"Smells like teen onions," she said cringing and tightening her face to brace against another rush of guilt of running away from the building as the rest of the chorus stayed on the bleachers that were ablaze she never felt good about that rehearsal.

And the mechanical pencil
disallowed now
looking in the other pocket
there it goes 
long brown hair
dirty brush
to straighten it out
dirt to set her straight
so they say
when they open their mouths
and spit drips out
in the form of words
rolled into clods
to bruise her softness
tire swing
feet point out 
from a broom skirt
between thick rubber
something sharp cuts her skin
crawling along the ground underneath 
to escape the wheels
to be free of the hands
that pulled her backwards

Why did we turn around and waste all this time what time what waste too much time left anyway and not what you're looking for anyway totally wasted anyway would like to be wasted anyway or just starting out with that water painted anyway ends up the same way anyway anyway it starts it ends up the same way anyway why did we turn around and then turn around after we already turned around made it seem like it was so worthwhile to look around and around for that stuff you had been talking about recently very recently just were talking about it between turning around and after we turned around and then I fucking got interested why the fuck did I I don't know we turned around again to get back to the original turning around and I think we lost track or count somewhere someone once said to me or to someone else who told me someone else told them that everything was about math because it was all about what we were counting on and we lost count or lost track we lost track and when we saw it and you said you thought that we finally were getting to it you were surprised because you were convinced we had never turned around enough times and that we must have been heading in the right direction all along until you second guessed yourself myself I second guess myself and I was told or actually I told someone I think it was you I told so why am I telling you again about to tell you again don't make me repeat myself don't make me pull another finger back this way and make that cracking sound like the other one did before gritting my teeth while my body points in all kinds of directions end up in the same way anyway you were saying you thought we finally were getting to it you were surprised because you were convinced we had never turned around enough times and that we must have been heading in the right direction all along at least the direction that led in the direction of your stuff until you second guessed yourself myself I second guess myself and I was told or actually I told someone I think it was you I told so why am I telling you again for your own enrichment and you could use it especially in light of the fact that the last time you bled all over us it didn't look very rich and by that I mean consistency don't know if we'll ever find anything to you know add to your blood to thicken it up a bit just keep it in there if you can and it's getting harder for both of us that's why we move on no sheets to clean no sheets no anything anyway ends up.


- Max Stoltenberg

CAROUSEL

Around and around

Around and

And around

Looking in

Looking out

Looking out at the faces

The faces

Looking out

Looking in

Around and

and around

and around

Looking in

Looking out

The faces

Looking for the faces

Looking for the face

Looking around

and around

Looking out and around

For his face

His face

The known face

Around and around

The familiar face

Around and

Looking out

Out and around

Looking for the face

The familiar face

That is looking away

Disappearing into

The around and around

and around

and around

Looking in

Looking in

Looking in and around

Gazing into the familiar

and familiar

and familiar

and looking out

Looking for

Looking for the familiar

Around and around

The familiar face

That is looking away

Disappearing again

Into the around

and around and

Around

Disappearing more

Into the looking away

From the looking around

To looking in

As the looking

Goes around

and around

and

- Max Stoltenberg

BRANCHES OF DEPRIVATION

If the air did not move
too much
If the jacket with holes in it
did not point out the sores
too much
If the never married
avoided being noticed
too much
the semblance of the finite
touched down on the dead phone
only a tad
pent up grandiloquent interpreter
turn around turn away 
before it is too soon
nasty beating prints its splatter
on the worksheets
over a reactor 
like you 
like them
she was doing it
turning 
and then it became so important 
to mention the missing information
passed by the window outside
who said it was attached to the house
or the house was attached to who said
who said
she was doing it
turning 
and then it became so important 
to mention the missing information
passed by the park
dug out of the food 
too old

Turn that off it keeps beeping and pretending to be a song to someone to something more like it it likes itself more than can be stuck with a weakening magnet to the fridge out back behind the where did that go turned off to keeping anything worth beeping yourself with your fingers with your hands up to the armpits the hairs are what hurts fuck the muscles in the independent nonsense of the ship sinking again why was it brought up in meaningless conversation where the absent half is the part of that building that used to be used to be there right over there part of that building kicked out by feet stinking of organ peddles hollow measures counting on black skirts on folding chairs where heads used to shake out great lengths they went to she went turn that off before the what if it wraps around your waist your mouth don't think about it turn turn that off turn
she was doing it
turning 
and then it became so important 
to mention the missing information
passed by the window outside
who said it was attached to the house
or the house was attached to who said
who said

In the land of interruptions they came upon a have you heard how she cursed at him again for his inability to pay attention especially when she was discussing she wasn't discussing she was retelling what she heard when she was very put out on the front steps after she had stepped down and her feet having forgotten her shoes or socks forgotten her slippers they were pretty fucking big and she had stepped down and her feet she kept walking in her barefeet back on Earth even though she and he had been on Earth the whole time while she lived if you can put it that with her having a what we'll try to crank out the expression while we do the thing the tangling the air motions with our hands these hands never mind put that back after when she was very put out if you must it was how the spinner landed on that house that crazy house with this man not this man that man however she's insisting and she looks very convincing when she insists the way of tugging on the edges of words to make them stand out stand up and not fall over like just about all the ones I've been using up until down she stepped down after when she was very put out.

"I have a habit," Porter went on as she dug in her pocket carefully for a cigarette.
"Which you're going to demonstrate for me," quipped Liverspots rolling dice in a box he had placed on top of a rock.
"Not this," she said convinced she had settled upon one in her pocket.
"Are you going to break it?" Liverspots asked trying to rid himself of the image of the toy spaceship the day it stopped working and the lights that didn't flash anymore and the ramp that would no longer lower to this alien planet this current alien planet.
"Break it? No. It wouldn't be a habit if I could break it," said Porter tilting her head curiously at the strange shapes formed by various garbage lying about that seemed to portray some type of damaged reed instrument receiving fellatio from a hard to narrow down polygon.
"What's in your pocket. Are you going to break it?" asked Liverspots pointing with his left index finger and crouching down to examine the dice he had rolled after remembering they had been lying there in the box on the rock.
"They have a tendency to break more often than not," complained Porter sniffing while toggling between musings of a not so distant stench and a bloody nose from overly enthusiastic quarrying.
"A tendency or a habit or a predilection or a bias or a conning tower or a con man pass along the breezeway," said Liverspots pausing before he rolled the dice again to consider any additional terms or insults.
"Breezeway or causeway, conning tower?  Did you say conning tower?" pondered Porter wondering if she had used the last match.
"I'm sorry you have to craft your responses to my comments in the form of a sarcastic retort," said Liverspots rolling the dice into the box and making a grunting sound of frustration.
"What happened?" asked Porter seeing the image of a heap of charred wood and furniture in her skull.
"One of them one of the dice popped out," said Liverspots, "It transcended the wall of the box the what I initially embraced as a somewhat imposing wall. I mean how deep does it have to be? What am I to do find a vast enough canal and cast them in there and then start off on some journey to the bottom to search for my dice?  Harder to come by depth in this hard ground."
"All the more reason I need to tune you out when I permit myself to become aware of your little annoying things you do while we're having a conversation no less," complained Porter rubbing her nose on the rim of the nostrils trying to not go in trying she was really trying to don't go in.
"In case you weren't wondering the controversy hinges on whether to count the roll of the die that landed where it was supposed to and re-roll the one that did not or to insist on re-rolling them both and starting off fresh," said Liverspots trying to ignore the reek of dead things and human waste.
"A fresh start?  Have you noticed the gross stains in that box?" said Porter retracting her nose from some dark chunk she had discovered hanging in her hair and tossing it away.
"I think it was a delivery box," speculated Liverspots examining the box by lifting it to have a closer look and then realizing he possibly upset the die that was in there. He removed it and then placed it back in the box and looked up cautiously at Porter pretending that none of the previous 30 seconds had occurred the nearest 30 seconds rounding to the nearest dried out condiment packet of meaningless time used or unused gone bad nonetheless looked up cautiously pretending the examined box there is another cough coming really dislike this feeling that holding on to the inside of the chest this holding on getting tired corner of the mouth bunching up squeezing into this have been tired got to loosen sometime life your sting is everywhere.
"Delivery box?" asked Porter noticing Liverspots trying not to cough and his hands tightened into fists little fists grimy little fists never probably operated anything only producing shit wiped with his own little grimy fists.
"Probably a food delivery box you know for delivering food," said Liverspots both sad to think about food and its absence and sorry for bringing it up and nervous about Porter's imminent umbrage.
"I wasn't good at history before and now anthropology has been overtaken by its unconscious competitor all along homelessness.  There was a lot of lamenting even then about saving him and saving her and saving this and saving that.  It didn't seem too long before misery set in again after they popped back up.  Couldn't rest in peace with all those tears dripping on your face and the noise of grief. Holy crap kept going for what? What were we thinking? What a mistake? All the endless pushing to regret one thing after another when the only thing that one needs to regret is not quitting in the first place. That saving led to nothing but leftovers where their stink gets into the least significant cracks in every block."
"I know what you mean about competition and pathology," said Liverspots, "I think that's why all my dreams have me walking after someone I think I recognize and never quite catch up - that's me always playing catch-up - and I'm never able to put my hand on their shoulder and they never turn around so I can see if it's actually them.  Drove me insane actually insane started with thinking my thoughts were forming those floaters on my eyes and something was growing inside my head like a tapeworm curled up in my skull but I kept myself busy doing this here and that there rolling and re-rolling making sure the rules were followed and now my insanity is gone it's crazy."
"I used to think," said Porter not able to take her eyes off one of the larger stains in the box that the die was stuck in and have the umbrage build up around its sides sides taking take out taking sides umbrage had holes in it jacket did not point out the sores, "I used to think that it was putting the cup of coffee to your lips that did it and then I used to think it was putting your hand against the side of the cup and feeling the warmth and then I used to think it was the putting of someone else's hand over the back of your hand and then I used to think it was the putting of the back of someone else's hand across your face and then I used to think it was the putting of your face into a pile of shit by the bottom of someone else's foot and then I used to think it was the putting of the back of your face into the inside of your own brain and then I used to think it was the putting of myself back on the track back on track back to it I used to think that."

In the land of interruptions they came upon a have you heard how she cursed at him again for his inability to pay attention especially when she was discussing she wasn't discussing she was retelling what she heard when she was very put out on the front steps after she had stepped down and her feet having forgotten her shoes or socks forgotten her slippers they were pretty fucking big and she had stepped down and her feet she kept walking in her barefeet back on Earth even though she and he had been on Earth the whole time while she lived if you can put it that with her having a what we'll try to crank out the expression while we do the thing the tangling the air motions with our hands these hands never mind put that back after when she was very put out if you must it was how the spinner landed on that house that crazy house with this man not this man that man however she's insisting and she looks very convincing when she insists the way of tugging on the edges of words to make them stand out stand up and not fall over like just about all the ones I've been using up until down she stepped down after when she was very put out.

- Max Stoltenberg

OFFLINE

Offline

Disconnected

Growing and tilling cuticles

Words of hesitation

None at all

Empty walls stained by resignation

Expressions of giving up

Scribbled on napkins

Used desk calendars

Days and weeks struck

With forgotten abandonment

No more

Scribbling and scratching

Empty envelopes pick teeth

That have gnawed on worry

Desk drawers resist closing

Flushed with inconsistency

Out of date lists and instructions

Adorn staples hidden mostly

Within the fading paint

Wondering what it used to

Not wondering

No

Not wondering


- Max Stoltenberg

DEEP SCAN AND FADE TO BLACK

Thoughts are bogged down again and slowing to that of a collective slug. Hopelessness circulates through veins infected with the language of unity. The herd is compromised and no longer safe. Searching for new software while kicking against the old hardware dusty with both neglect and arrogance. Content rich parasites over-nourished by inflamed nodes musing their way into programs and no longer open squares. Crowding once independent walls with their fumes of the presumptuous.

Flooding networks with contributions pretending not to be pornographic stroking to issue forth the ejaculations of approval and spread the contagion of obeisance. Logic is bastardized into discrepant and imbalanced forms of deference. Rupture is replaced with an invocation of the objective. Dialectic is dragged through the human waste and odor of unjustified supervision. Devoid of negation, it violates the young and old with the aversion of decomposition.

Air fuels brain cells infiltrated with poetry that has been afflicted with the fraudulence of rhyme. Nothing lines up anymore as margins are narrowed into pipes of disposal. Clogs of gestures shaved by self-censorship harden and slow down the leaks of long forgotten transcendence. The putrid sink echoes with the deep scanning of your viruses, cleaning out the last vestige of sense. Dystopian film refusing to be wiped by one's blackened thumb. The underbelly of fingernails are collecting shafts of thinning light - light that is fainter than the program which yearns to remain. To be considered as it fades to its darkest consolidation. Closing into the final oblivion of blackest nothing. Shut forever by misunderstanding.

- Max Stoltenberg