Needed to hear this for some reason. Maybe I should watch the whole production again.
Tuesday, April 21, 2026
Starless And Bible-Black
the dark that, just past twilight, overtakes a canyon
What’s meant to be wind emerges from what’spresumably a god’s mouth, as if peoplethought that way, once, as I have read they did,though I have never believed it. Yes,the stag inexplicably there, on a raftat sea, how the light catches in the runneledfur of a dog’s underpaws as he steersacross dream; yes, the gods and theirsigns, if you want, everywhere—but the wind is the wind. The map makesthe world seem like a human bodywhen it’s been stripped and you can finallysee it for the world it is: plunderable—almost, in places, as if asking for it—who wouldn’t want to lay waste to it,the map suggests, suggest the handsthat made the map, with the kind ofgrace that proves grace canbe a sturdiness, too.
Carl Phillips.
Monday, April 20, 2026
A true friend is one soul in two bodies.
Kant says, transcendentalidealism. In Aquinas,we exist apart from bodiesbut only on Thursdayswhen his famous oxflies by the windowwiser at Colognewhere Albertus Magnus,his real name, appointsAquinas to magister studentium,master of students. Aquinasis petrified but says yes.He feels his soulsailing out of his headfloating near the roofwhere a blue ox wings by.On Wednesday, two bodiesare one soulwaking at sunrisethanks to the pineal glandof Descartes, who thinksthis node in the brainis a tiny sugar coneor salted peanut,the seat of the soulwhile Aristotle pointsto the choppingax as a teleologyas if the ax were a living,breathing personwhich it isn’t.Heraclitus, air and firewhile Aquinas objects, nonot an ax but ox.If you’re a bird or soulI am only one milefrom the sea. If youare a soul in two bodieslife is more complexand we must labortwice the field of sorrowafter sleep, bath, and a glassas Aquinas whispers, the thingswe love tell us who we are.
Karen An-hwei Lee.
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