Dreams, Memories, Visions Of life as a ‘story of the self-realization of the unconsciousness’ ... p. 17 Digging up bones and a little light in fog ... pp. 104, 107 Walking through a valley to hand a goddess an umbrella ... pp. 155, 161 § Of trees as the embodiments of life’s incomprehensible meaning ... p. 86 The bitterness of Freud and the analogy with God ... pp. 75, 175 A white dove transformed into the ghost of a customs official ...

Opulent Absurdities: The Aristocrat as Pataphysician Lord Ardenforde opens a jewellery box to reveal a platinum brooch, rhodium watch, immortal diamond choker; and on the quiltwork, a tiger-eye necklace pendant. Exclamations clamour as seven yellow balloons ascend to the Taj Mahal painting that hangs from the ceiling beams. Soap-skinned Valentine looks on astonished, an obsequious grin dripping from his amazing hollow face. Plush telephones purr politely.

Deliquescent Bodies (Love Parade) I hope for night; it comes; it is here; it comes with rain & river, & the lights are electric. I am offered a drink & the mercury blue neon over the door catches my eye, tears open the retina, imbuing the optic nerve with cold cathode gas, ionising my nervous system to the limit. Breathing carbon dioxide, I metabolize my own body. I am a pillar of ether by the exit door. But I’m not alone. We all matter less than we did before,

A Story so Untrue You Have to Believe It’s Real A Story so Untrue You Have to Believe It’s Real On foot from Edinburgh to Canterbury for a once-in-a-decade conference on "What It Means to Be a High-Functioning Humanzee in a Mythological World", we are discussing the cultural fallout of "phase-three scholasticism", which has rocked the academic world and the Catholic Church in Ireland, and is responsible for the suicide of at least five university deans and three bishops, as w

Synthesis Save us! A sex-fiend went to the wheel of the train. Is this the way out? Yes, but flies crawl downwards. I have a picture of Saturn. The situation has changed: it is the wrong kind of number. The babies are crying. Well, then, it must be a holiday. It is green. If you like you can say the same. “Diabetes is on the increase.” It is the Americas: they are pushing me. into something almost

Magic Night Blood, tears, a vial of sea salt, dice, cards, a postcard from Venice. Magic is time and space. Magic is the space between things. Honey drops slowly from the spoon into wine but neither honey nor wine are affected.

Beneath Beneath a red lightbulb innumerable doves swim as if in a cold, gold sun. Birth, creation, a ruinous origination. Decomposition settles in. Bibulous boozers scratch at beer, flick the air with brown fingers. Intemperate cuckolds. “Declare your bones,” they say in whispers thick as honey. Time is arrested as the production of long shadows hushes the brown room, but not the annelid which eats the dirt that falls from the shade like black snow.

Observations of Mountjoy Scott, the Earl of Ardenforde Lord Ardenforde opens a jewellery box to reveal a platinum brooch, rhodium watch, immortal diamond choker; and on the quiltwork, a tiger-eye necklace pendant. Exclamations clamour as seven yellow balloons ascend to the Taj Mahal painting that hangs from the ceiling beams. Soap-skinned Valentine looks on astonished, an obsequious grin dripping from his amazing hollow face. Plush telephones purr politely. Butler tuts at dis