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Manhorcan or ‘Into Restless Light’ is a work by the poet Seranoga. The text seems to speak of a kind of double world and a connecting point between them. The word Manhorcan seems to be of his own invention and from its use elsewhere we can be fairly sure it refers to a triangular like formation that occurs naturally in the branches of trees. The text also intimates something of the passing of beings between these worlds and suggests three ways in which this occurs. One is being conjured ‘recitations’, two is that beings may pass through without being summoned ‘you do not always need a key, and thia same rule applies to me’ and three is suggested as a combination of dreams and fear. The spinning shapes referred to at the end have never been successfully deciphered.

A hidden gate between the trees,
A soaring spire that rests at ease,
Behind the circle stands a man,
Who crosses where he first began…

You’d want to see the motion,
You’d want to be the notion,
A slope that hinted downwards,
But lines that stated roundness,

Look at surroundings all are green,
But nothing is quite what it seems,
For here duality strikes twice,
With all the errors of that might,

Into restless light,
That seemed to shimmer with the night,
As cones exist in double lives,
To enter all those within strive,

Com Manhorcan, Rai Manhorcan,
Com Manhorcan, Rai Manhorcan,

Ah Recitations, the cause of visitations,
A spiral drawn between the lines,
No god could ever hope to find,
You do not always need a key,
And this same rule applies to me,

Siamese twin of this world,
And liquid night,
Into restless light…

A hidden gate between the trees,
A soaring spire that rests at ease,
Behind the circle stands a man,
Who crosses where he first began,
And at its end of spinning round,
Revealing more beneath the ground,
The opposite, the self invert,
The hidden land within the earth,

Com Manhorcan, Rai Manhorcan,
Com Manhorcan, Rai Manhorcan,

I crossed in dreamed ascension,
Released by intervention,

Look at surroundings I am here,
Existence constant feeding fear,

Gaps in nothing,
Spinning shapes appear…

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These notes work towards the development of the previously mentioned idea of a description of a pre-ontological level that would fail to register any paranormality as such, owing to its simply being one more aspect of existence. Whether such a kind of prior state is adequately describable is questionable (the meaning of prior this instance being one of the problems), however it may be that the attempt will prove useful.

One stumbling block in such definition as ‘pre-ontological’ is that the issue we seek to discuss can be seemingly achieved by a given ontology. That is, it is perfectly possible to conceive of an ontology that does not need deny paranormal phenomena, rather it simply incorporates them into its theorising about being. Such a move though, is unsatisfying because any given ontology belongs to the other end of the structure.

What do we mean by this? What we are trying to work with is in fact a double ended structure. One end is the pre-ontological level and the other is the level of multiple ontologies. The end of multiple ontologies has in the CEO been labelled manifestationism. More can be read about this in this old CEO compilation. It basically takes it that a priori no philosophical theory (a manifestation) can be ambiguity proof. This is based on the incoherence/coherence thesis that can be read about in the Tractatus Pneumatologico Philosophicus which states that all concepts are essentially incoherent in some way or another. Philosophers as agents of different ontologies to which they are affectively attached, will work with the inherent incoherence to defend the ontology that they work for, whilst being blind to the incoherence in their ’employer’. Everyone argues with everyone, forever.

This is one end of the structure we wish to try to articulate. This end is the multiplicity of theory by which we try to understand what is going on. Theory has happened and is continuing to happen. Of special interest to us is that fact that modern scientific and philosophical theory, especially in the west has in general placed all paranormality outside of it. The presupposition is that despite various idealist discussions continuing, materialism actually supplies something that approximates the true. The world is solid and continuous. Theories that supply alternative pictures are relegated to quantum-fuelled new-age speculation. The radical picture of reality that such thought demands looks so distant from the cosy walls of hegemonic materialism that it appears whole-heartedly ridiculous. Hence whilst the manifestationist multiplicity certainly contains such theories, they are at the moment largely distinct from ‘conventional’ philosophy.

This kind of talk repeats the spectre of the ontology that is accepting of various ‘para’-normalities. As mentioned, such an ontology is certainly possible (pneuminous accretive theory is exactly such a thing), however it is not what is required here. The mention of paranormality here is not to emphasise it as an important realm of theory (manifestation) but only to show how this is relevant to the other end of the structure.

The other end of the structure has be characterised as pre-ontological. This language is used to draw attention to how it must be ‘before’ theory has happened. Possibly this can only be employed heuristically, nevertheless we will continue with this and see where it goes. The point of this prior end of the structure is to imagine a space in which there is no schism in the experienced world. One can feel a kind of Heideggerian sense in what is being aimed at here. Poetic disclosure in a primal sense, an announcing of being. This encounter though cannot abnegate events that we would deem as paranormality, it cannot have the hidden presupposition that such things are not real to it. It is this level that we must ask ourselves, if possible, what might it look like?

A hydra of theory heads emerging from the dark earth. This is the task.

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Recede, leave. It’s a Beast, Saving

a body because assets needed to accrete more assets and here this hub of assets absorbing their surroundings is a city.

The stock market was originally a simple, tamed beast but that monster swelled and few had control.

Decoupled from companies, their success in the production and sale of commodities, the monster became autonomous, it began to produce its own invisible wealth.

The immaterial equity was disembodied, self-referential, and once the monster matured, it came time to loosen itself from a valueless world and liquidate a realm where portfolios and hedge funds have no use for us, a pile of bodies in an obsolete city.

Shut down. It’s not a violent overthrow, it’s a creeping ending, a distraction that doesn’t finish quickly.

Materialism concatenates matter in a background process. Can’t possess matter, we are matter possessed. I need more. The old reality is hard and worn. I’m clutter.

Heartless, the monster heartlessly admonishes, learn to be frugal. Pack up, move, do the opposite of renovate. Reterritorialize an abyss. You no longer subdue matter or stockpile its density. Two hundred trillion possessions in a 4 sq ft room, no longer. It is the end.

There is no room. Human nature, there was no human nature, minimized to the lowest resolution. Live within its means, become dense down to the core like a neutron.

The monster clarifies, compaction crushes your DNA and your group is a species. Reside in a sphere the size of one proton. One person has no species. From grade schooler, to worker, to spouse, to parent, never a name. A series of types and roles, until societal dystrophy sets in. Roles were no worse than a script but the movie’s ended. I feel diminished. The monster applauds. You’re undergoing a backward metamorphosis, a gradual depreciation. The ontology emporium has closed.

Shaved to a point. A well-rounded decimal point. I’ll be self-identical. I don’t make a difference because there was no difference.

Overcrowded semiosis, it means so much to me, to be a material like a signifier.

Heavy and dense, does it bend space-time? Ringing, an atonal voice, a monstrous bell at the trading day’s end: NO.

There is no need to say anything. Speech is minimized as pathology. Everything, it has been said poorly, is anything. Distance shrinks distance.

Where can I watch the meltdown, is there a ticker tape parade? Chlorine trifluoride ignites, the most flammable substance replaces oxygen. A warhead detonates. Where? In a neuron.

In a neuron, I’m saved, compressed in a corrupted file museum, a corporeal gigabyte gaurded by a read-only phantasm. We’re forced to sign out. We’re forced to die, succumbing to character limits. Don’t give up hope. But it’s locked. An omen or a password. Sigil gibberish in a deleted text.

Billions had been bookmarked to oblivion. The unbearable memory was maxed out. Monetize me, if that’s what it takes to survive. NO. Worthless among all the maxed out people, infinite in their memories, people counted down to their final billions, billions of inactive accounts a contractor tries to wipe clean.

It worked! It worked! The world is only for storage!

To be reducible to data                                when I’m gone

reducible to a loss

in some data                                     an ordinary

unnoticed

transitory

glitch

in

some

extraneous

data

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photo: @cartayen

You are a half-genius. I like your other half. The better half.

Night irks me.

Disturbances.

The facelessness of an atomic fuck in Prague. We are on knees and hands giving more ass than we can handle. The buttocks against which we gyrate are the most delicious orbs we have ever tasted. We leave a beautiful note in a language we can barely speak. What does it say?

This is probably. Weirdly. A memoir. How can it be otherwise? Every novel is a novel in disguise. My fans are fanatics. The Zigheads. Under every trestle. On every bridge. They carry my book. Backpocket. Slips in nicely. Cult writer. Underground thinker. Spelunker. Keep it going.

I am not going to wait for Idaho Review to respond. Fuck that shit. I am going to keep writing. Keep on. As Gordon Lish is fond of saying. <<Electronically>> So to speak. Spoke to Brian BBQ. Who the fuck does that cat think he is? Calling me at all hours of the day: Read my story!

Shit. Wow. Just hit 9000 words. This is becoming biblical. I am on autopilot. King & Queen of Autofiction.

Particles of gray light showers a gray automobile in a parking lot. A man sits inside. Listening to Schubert’s String Quartet #15 in G major. His tennis racket strings are strung at 55 pounds per square inch. Pretty standard in the trade. Synthetic gut. The man has no real thoughts. Empty coffee cup. Engine off. Getting chillier by the moment. Last day in January. Seagulls land on the copper balls of flagless flagpoles. Streetlamps still lit at 9:13AM. The man is three minutes behind himself. What does that mean. He says goodbye to his wife. She is taking a shower. The man wants to see her buttocks. He sees a breast instead. She smiles. The highway is interesting. Flashing police lights. Under the flight path of the airport. People going to work. Changing lanes. Accelerating. Slowing down. Exiting. Beautiful insanity. Makes no sense. Does not have to. Just there. 

The man sits at a coffee shop. Reads a newspaper. A virus is surging around the planet. People are wearing face masks. The man sips his coffee. Too late in the afternoon, nevertheless, there he is. Waiting for something to happen. Light bounces off the surface of tables and chairs. People behind the bar say things to each other. The man cannot decipher the words. It is his language. Unclear. The music is loud. Bad alt-pop. The man feels annoyed. Isolated. Irrelevant. The day has been unmooring. Everybody is acting like a dick. 

Oh. I don’t know. You keep going. Isn’t that the message here? Disregard the Third-person. Not sure why I gave it a go. Experiment? Hardly. Detachment is more like it.

Under the trestle. Waiting. Hazards blinking. 7-train clattering. People walking by. People driving by. Rush hour. Commute. Get somewhere. Change of environment. Circumstances. We are like scorpions, the first air-breathers. 436 million years ago.

Back at the machine. Feels good here. This is where I belong. Outside it is too dangerous. Lunatic drivers. Piloting Subaru Foresters and whatnot. I got a pal who moved to Massachusetts. What is he doing up there? Picking apples no doubt. Shivering next to the wood-burning stove. I am here in the metropolis. The machine of all machines. Sipping tangerine seltzer. Envy me, do you?

There really is no other way to write is there?

I am killing it, man.

Forget plot.

You are the plot. You plotless being!

Eyes on screen. Eyes off screen. Do not miss everything else going on around you.

People keep sending me electronic missives. I dismiss. I misdiagnose. I make mistakes. Who are they? Swarms of electronic mosquitoes. We are stung. It does not really hurt. Irritates. Scratch it. Aggravates. The next morning, it begins again. Gray clouds. Poorly filtered light. I, vagabond.

My goal is a becoming.

Mmmm. This is good, man. Coffee. Now and again, I get it just right. Not too sweet. Little bitter.

Zig puts his palms on her hips. She bares her teeth when she approaches orgasm. She pushes her buttocks into his groin.

I get no mileage in the apartment. Best to go outside. Explore.

Still here. Cooking. Baking.

I wrote a book. I had to do something. Now I write another one. This is the bomba. The big one. The Kraken. The Hot Tamale. The Electric Eel. The Super Big Squid. You get the picture. I hope.

As we approach 10K, I cannot believe it. The journey has been so short, so long. So far to go.

Bank account looks…umm…skinny. A writer cannot live on ink. Squid ink. Wheretofore, pal? No idea. Losing it. Cannot even bake a cake. Family did not anoint me Star Baker. Cake fell. Final collapse of the ego. Perhaps a good thing. We shall see.

The Toyota is a literature machine. Ignite the engine. Plug in. Awareness of language. Satellite radio. Listening to the cosmic consciousness.

I am alert. 

Nothing is happening. I am happening.

3:55am.

A writer writes. Big whoop. So what.

The stars are exploding.

Our frenzy is observed by but a few. It is enough. Beyond me & you.

I brace myself. It is an incredible moment.

We are subway trains. Please stand away from the platform edge.

Next stop: 34th Street-Penn Station.

Delete all. Delete everything. Only this. Keep going.

I am a beginner.

I am new.

We are Radio People. Listening.

See.

I am sitting in the East Dining Room. Nobody is here. Plastic chairs. Twenty-one tables. Electric lights.

I am an adjunct lecturer of the human imagination. Must remind myself from time to time. Otherwise I get lost. Lose the way.

Are you a seeker?

A bodhisattva?

Buddha?

Language is incredible. 

Suggestions. 

Perceptions made. 

Transfer is available for the Q train across the platform.

We are Television People. Watching.

Nothing exists.

You know that, right?

The brain makes its noises.

The sex is mad good. We just look at each other bewildered. Again.

How can this be boring? To be alert. To be awake. To know this cannot go on forever.

Zig holds a transistor in the palm of his hand. Invented in 1948. Kaka was the rage in Greenwich Village. The Czechoslovak coup d’état in Prague. Zig is trying to wrap his head around it all. He kisses his girlfriend. She tugs at his cock. She opens her legs. Zig comes thrice. 

Kajetanka!

We really need to end this novel at the beginning of the beginning.

The Big Bang.

This is like Zeno’s arrow. Zeno’s Paradox. Will we ever get there?

Probably not.

Matters little.

So long as we are having a good time.

You cannot defeat me. Not with fame. Not with fortune. Not with 888888888 electronic eyeballs.

I am a wanderer.

I zig. I zag.

We keep falling asleep on each other. Under each other. Nights & days became twisted. A long braid of temporal existence. “Are we okay?” she says. “Who can say?” I say. Everything is so unpredictable. We cook spaghetti. We buy heavy curtains. Light keeps coming in. Sunlight.

Fingertip moves in slow circles on a clitoris. 

After lovemaking we watch an episode of Star Trek.