central pennsylvania country mess [instrumental]

metachronograph he designed a device he dubbed "the metachronograph," computing how astutely he lived each day to last laughs. it struck up when he stuck to task, furthered goals and honed crafts, and plummeted when he succumbed, sat back half-relaxed. tick, tock, tip-toe forward gingerly. watch and clock, count down bradykinetically. you can't stop to barter for respite or breath, your expensive seconds aren't on that soft credit just yet. so he gathered and he bound the charts, and induced from readings that the running market-value of art said he was cheating, and time spent unproductive yet smart was weak and conceding. twenty-four years late to start, crack intellect and get bleeding. tick, tock, sliding forward reluctantly. step and lock, pinch hourglass sand like pennies. can't stop, or you'll squander potential energy, put grey matter to the mindstone, idle hands just lead to whimsy. with speed and efficiency, he deemed leisure as superfluity, and wrung and squeezed each hour from sleep to sleep through sieve, and allowed no reverie when feats remained unconceived. in damp shirtsleeves he built up memories concrete of completist beliefs accreted clear and free of any doubt that his specialties could be exploited more frugally. the MCG's equationese preached the way of the trapeze: correlated easy and feeling guilty; atlas never would have shrugged, it assured he. years went by, and then on saturday of a faithful week, each day before the sun had risen on bleary-eyed defeat. he rubbed his brow, and cracked his knuckles, and stretched his back to no relief and idly pondered if his machine had a barometer for meaning. with begrudging schedule set to a miser's time, consistent worry left his face in wrinkled lines. extracted from himself the highest product of his mind while other organs suffered tedious decline. and still the graphs spewed forward every day: the art of sadomasochism on display. he cursed the rubric and the discipline he'd made, and glimpsed the light, saw it leading to the grave. he designed a device he dubbed "the metachronograph," whose printouts creased at the fracture that split his brain in half. marked the days he marched, promised by proxy of richest math: posthumous glory to last, the most potent and revered epitaph. tick, tock, desire protesting all the way. small shocks, doling out dolor's days. can't stop, for patience is a frail human trait, the dull pressure behind eyes reminding not to wait, and hissing this: "when did rest ever make a man great?" with speed and efficiency, he doused his machine in gasoline, and made a burn crisp and clean, lit the prints and quit the scene. in fury at a miserable and measured past, threw his clocks down the elevator shaft, heard the sweet tinny crash of last alarum, a ruckus of rising sharps and falling flats. walked outside the laboratory and threw his body on the grass, looked up at stars, promised to make the time left worthwhile and make it last.

snapshot repeating found compound rhythms in my hands and feet; off-kilter time is my kind of backbeat. but I've been told it's socially untoward to communicate by cadence any more; syncopation should be stripped to tribal core -- aphrodisiac substrate on the dance floor. I like my humor without rigidity and believe you have to twist comedy to make it funny. but I've been told there's some things you don't joke about; tragedy's lighter side is right out. yet sexist jokes exist outside of sin; better let the laugh track tell you when to grin. you see it in the test scores; kid who gets a D, not for lack of study or thought capacity; just academic acts of willful ignorance: the pretense of a dunce equals popularity. selling out potential, no more differentials, the average existential hive mind isn't mental. just pandemic acts of willful ignorance. the favor of the hip kids is a rental; you'll never placate the erstwhile prince, so put your faith in your artistic elementals and take a chance on the losing blueprint. I do not mind if I'm described as odd; the solitary member of the time-change dancing squad; indie rock boy who makes acoustic sound strange, nonsmoking nondrinking well past college age. I do not mind, because I'm readily described, and when the snapshots are repeating, keep this forefront in your mind: the lifelong individual will still be feeling pride long after your economy of cool has collapsed and up and died. I have a T-shirt that says I'm a mathlete; always had a passion for number theory. but I've been told it's quite a fashion crime to take delight in calculating primes. arithmetic should only be utilized in age and salary and counting drinks and television times. I've revelled in the meanings of vocabulary; a liberating melting pot dictionary. but I've been told it's frowned upon in frequent use to drop words unfamiliar or abstruse. and if you do, you'll stand smart-guy accused, and command abuse, they'll cut those little curse words loose. you see it in the man who likes looking at art, but he's afraid of rejection, so he's sure to play his part. he'll be the loudest voice to call it a waste of time, and all the while there's self-loathing in his heart. I do not mind if I'm thought of as a jerk for alternating periods of joblessness and work; for loving be nerdy and never feeling shame; for leaving adolesence but bringing the video games. I know I'm on this soapbox a lot, but it's still a valid point; the only strength in numbers are the paper tiger muscles that we absent-mindedly anoint. I cannot trust a judge or lord who wields a sword whose steel is forged and predicated on scales miscalibrated, so outmoded and outdated. This rule of thumbing noses is to blow a kiss with the sincerity of a single-fingered fist and the wistful wisp of a bronx cheer for hypocrisy, the recipocral of mockery, the praise of paradoxocracy. if your disapproving social demons are putting you on the stand, i say shake hands with boogey and stick it to the man. you see it in the schools, you see it in the streets: they try to pit your mind against your self-esteem. the status quo distills the personality; it's only we, the losers, who'll ever feel free.

green-blue sheet of braille the glacial clouds shift and redesign the macrocosm patchwork quilt above. i strain beyond my simple aesthetic mind to grasp the purposes they're thinking of. the air massaging frost into my skin. alert, i watch those jigsaw pieces spin. the bloodrush static in my ears resounds. i try to sense the earth turning around. and through the looking glass i spy infinity who peers back through the lens reversed to see a victim of a ratio whose dignity is lost amidst a world's attention plea. i wave my arms, a signal to no avail; one dot from billions, a green-blue sheet of braille.

letter to myself on my nineteenth birthday hey dear andy, welcome to the dormitory. it will serve as backdrop to so many stories that when you get to be my age, you'll gaze back upon with less forehead-slapping and a little more glory. still, here to help you pass the test with a minimum of regret and fewer clumsy missteps is a litany of ten reminders to aid you in seeing the blunders beyond your blinders. forget the beholder, beauty is in the eye of the behinder. first, just because you have to swear allegiance to a major doesn't mean you'll have to bear that career choice forever. come to find that college is less about knowledge exact and specific, and more about proving your mind can be elastic, scholastic and prolific -- even straightforward studies produce more than vocational statistics. second, just because your parents aren't barging into your bedroom doesn't mean you should sleep into the afternoon, then stay up all through a disciplineless night: maybe during freshman year, you could eat breakfast more than twice? third, don't let the infinite distraction of the internet and email lead you to surfeit. i know the information and contact is addictive, but trust me, "reply to all" is a button you'd best not hit. fourth, you're not omegaman, and a girlfriend isn't destiny, so don't extend the beggar's hand to fake your way into ceremony. and don't fall in love with the idea of being in love; that reflexive paradox only leads to forgery thereof. an impulsive psuedoconnection giving way to painful grimace, and a hasty apology for what turned out to be a hasty kiss. a relationship to last two days or two weeks just to end up saying: "look, i was just lonely. before we go any further, let's give up the ghost and shoot the pony." trust me, andy, i really don't want to look back and see any more junior-high-style hookups on my two-page resume. fifth, it's true as you pass twenty-one, you still won't become a drinker. but that doesn't mean you have to play the uber-straight-edge narrow-minded thinker. your friendships will become much more relaxed when you let your self-appointed job of judgment go lax and learn to discern the difference between someone having a beer now and then and the unsubtle act of a plastered debauch at the bastard frat. sixth, it was easier to get along in high school because you weren't all sharing the same residence, but it's easier to be friends than dormmates. and dishygenic or disorganized habits might be entered into evidence to issue a whispered caveat that you're either insensitive or spiteful. just be mindful of the guitar noise and the stock you put in the patience of other boys. seventh, i'm aware that you're quite proud of your brain, and your inner nerd would not complain if you sit browsing the dictionary or solve another video game, but don't forget it's healthy to go outside and jump around in the rain. eighth, i know it's hard to overcome an overbearing parent, but it's time to make your life's goals apparent, and though it might be catalyst to argument, it's time to embrace confidence in your freedom; the aftertaste of an obstacle is sweetest and youth is the currency most easily spent. ninth, i remember you as big fish in the small pond of high school. it was easy to take for granted the opportunities handed to you, but this is where your reputation again becomes skeletal. you'll have a choice of elementals to make yourself a medal, or prove yourself lazy or ignoble. consequences are higher, more dire and it's on you to emerge triumphant from a fiercer fire, so don't shrink from work, and get used to the all-nighter. and tenth, and this is most important, you know that what you really want is music. so i'll keep this simple: don't complain about a difficult path or a dayjob, just grit your teeth and do it. so that's about it, younger self. i won't reveal any surprises. but if you can keep these things in mind, you'll be amazed how satisfying your life is. so long, signed, older self.

underwriter's knot coming soon...

atlas mathematics i booked a month of shows, polygon from coast to coast. and while touring all alone, i harbored a secret hope to run into you on the road. learning layouts of the land, atlases burning in hand. tried to get a radar lock on the ghosts of your exhaust without further getting lost. and it might, it might have worked except my compass needle went berzerk thanks to acceleration, jerk, and the curvature of the earth. and i tried, oh how i tried to get our shows to coincide. now i'm playing an empty basement after a sixteen hour drive. time zones give me the bends. brakes and tires like fairweather friends. but the plans extend to where the headlights' vectors end; beyond that, no who, what, where or when. used the mapquest website: directions to your show tonight. i scribbled down the way to a place i'd never played, but was sure that i'd locate. inevitable to fail, i hadn't drawn it quite to scale. and with standard indie guile and more error than trial, i overshot it by a hundred miles. i'm calling I-, I-55. my interstate bingo card lied; the diagonal I survived were some potholes roadside. and my ride has circumscribed a shape with a hundred wrong sides. i'd triangulate your trail, but i'm a lousy tour guide. i couldn't find you on the bill. because you're playing greensboro, i'm rocking greenville. but the plans extend to where the headlights' vectors end; beyond that, no who, what, where or when. i once believed in cartography, but you keep eluding me in the shifting scenery. second-guessing intersections and cloverleafs; engine whines on winding contours, but i'm feeling no relief. i saw you in the atlas, but you drove right off the map. and then disappeared in details, navigating secret paths. i scanned for you in legends, but you were not inside the tables. turns out you were hiding in the pages, somewhere underneath a staple. sitting in the breakdown lane. outwitted by the simplest weathervane. but the plans extend to where the headlights' vectors end; beyond that, no who, what, where or when. if getting there is half the fun, then i'm only a quarter-way done. but the plans extend to where the headlights' vectors end; beyond that, no who, what, where or when.

fifteen years with skeletons when we were young boys, my party met to slaughter ghouls and ghosts over pizza and oreos. one of us manned the maps, another kept tabs on the obtuse passwords and secret codes. in my hands, the controls quadrilateral and not so ergonomic, but my thumbs knew positions mnemonic. like savants helpless in the real world becoming experts so linguistic with two buttons and a joystick. and none of us ever wanted for much more than a saturday sleepover with the nintendo in tow. time and mortality meaningless technicalities; you die a hundred times, blink your eyes and rematerialize. no thought was given to one's image of one's self, anyone could channel a chubby plumber or a courageous elf. and we'd ignore our bedtimes once again to keep the world safe from another hundred skeletons. cutscene reveals a few years have passed; graphics sharper, the processors received a much-needed blast. in the new philosophy, we swing our swords in 3-d, a strategy of targets, one less abstraction from reality. but in parallel, our own world became more engaging, greater choice and responsibilities were changing. we piloted real cars and socialized without a screen and even spoke with modern girls unfiltered by a digital sheen. i still figured fantasy to be a fine currency, i knew it wasn't just me who'd pledged allegiance to some dragon's family. and periodically we'd fill the microwave, quaff caffeine, and use the glowing medium of tv to keep these realms skeleton-free. my space hunter, implement-collecting in alien depths; someday-hero schoolchild watches mother take her last breath. the scourge of vampires cracks his whip, rapelling to the ledge. growing older wouldn't mean outgrowing these legendary friends. present-day, when the image parlayed less resembles a game than a full motion cinema verite, slots and ports two through four go unwarmed by the furious pulses of my swift-digited cohorts. the last device by which they get excited is an exercise in hand-eye coordination after a stressful day of corporations. it's a drink and a smoke to unwind them, not a virtual quest to save the princess or collect coins or diamonds. and the allure of a twenty-hour quest seems less a captivating escapism and more a tedious test. it's not so much a challenge as an unrewarding hassle when they tell you the real princess is in another goddamned castle. and my own schedule has censured most chances for adventure; day jobs and band practice fill the hours of my adult tenure but i admit when everyone is asleep, I have to save the helpless victims; I power up disc and system; and say to the skeletons, 'I'm ready, bastards, whenever you want it.'

nocturne and figure three thirty this morning, wind as instrument; low whistle with the whispering hum of hibernation. fifth-floor view: streetsweeper takes a scheduled cue. his blinking light, an ounce of light amongst the quiet automation. taciturn capacitor punctuates slow miles: a code of shadows strobed upon the eyes of taxis' charges. a drowsy catnap caught while ferried home to domicile; carousing leads to easy sleep, dilated pupil accepts defeat, slips out of sight, enlarges. and i'm still awake. no school or work or occupying interests to tie me to time and date. this is the picture of the opposite of discipline. this is what happens when your nihilism gets to win. this is the sun ignored, when darker blinds are broken in; and daylight can't remove the bedspread wedded to your skin. on the wrong side of sheets, a day job's wage paid in dreams, hours nine to five open for sleeping. soundtrack of commerce, traffic, progress slowly muted; the circadians disputed by a cycle i've no hope of breaking. what's left of squandered savings is still pathetic cusion enough to keep me from necessary waking. on occasion, i'll rouse to hear a neighbor blaring soap operas or gospel music one or two apartments over. ashamed to call them peers; no company of grumpy wives or stay-home telemarketers lead any more enriching lives. no more romantic at twenty-four than it could be at forty-five -- to quit the working colony, just to bunker in the beehive. this is the picture of the opposite of conversation. this is what happens when you fail to question misdirection. regretful naps to map the gap that's left by lack of application; and daylight can't remove the dust on your imagination. on the wrong side of sheets, a day job's wage paid in dreams, hours nine to five open for sleeping. soundtrack of industry, society occuring without you registers as little more than a subtle change in light and hue, deadened by moist eyelids. corneas like deserted islands, there's no message getting through. but by the starlight, i'll be ready to be entertained. except my friends will all be winding down from busy days. so i get dressed to take a lonely walk, no destination, and tune into the subtle rise and falling of the population. and in the distance i locate horizon under moon; that twilight line between familiar time and alien afternoons. this night, another country's day meet there, lateral kissing; such little insight gained by seeing what you are all missing. and i'm still awake. lay down for an uneasy nighttime hour just to sit up straight; it never seems to take, it never seems it's too late. and three thirty this morning, the katydids and i keep silent vigil over an aggregated snoring, i could watch ten thousand sheep leap over skyline, and it would never become boring. it's only the waning night, the morning light that gives an early warning that i'll soon succumb to slumberous exploring. on the wrong side of sheets, a day job's wage paid in dreams, hours nine to five open for sleeping. world outside the window penetrates vapid like an old mistake, brain writes awkward plays on the strange stage of inner gaze, but nothing quite so sideways as a schedule of waking nights and sleeping days.

strategies for throwing boomerangs in low gravity [instrumental]

this record is skipping the station promised a continuous music block; can't tell where one song started and where the other stopped. programmers and dj's assert that they know best and then bookend the hour twice with same request. curtail creative freedom, labels proselytize inoffensive chords and monosyllablic lines. then instigate litigation and say you plagarized 'cause your song's 5-4-1 and theirs is 1-4-5. a bullet-smash that's readymade, advertised at every play. cause, effect in rondelay. floats to surface on the chart, investment masquerades as art, and expendable hopefuls play their parts. this is not what i thought it would be. delivered singles stress the choicest markets. scratch the back that's cash-strapped with weighted A&R kits. coerce the youngsters to sign up for the street team. milk adolescent labor for vicarious royalty-free dreams. video transmits a chic production feed of whatever hormone posture they're trying to unload this week. dictate the chanteuse by demographic score. this year she plays the sweetheart, next year she plays the whore. promotion drones so hell-bent on pushing crap 'til you relent, then tracking every dollar spent. the hit parade a ready gauge of who gets billing on the stage and whose toothy picture stares and glares from the back page. this is not what i thought it would be. we like your image, kids, and your sound's quite mature. we just might need to give your compositions a little manicure. and give you ideas on how to dress, and tell you with whom you'll tour. we have faith in you, but don't worry; if you fail, you're fucked and we're insured. in product-named arenas, you weather cheap-seat hassles to catch a glimpse of tone-deaf guitar-smashing assholes. learn a pavlov dance-step to hula and lambada. anchor catchy hooks in your medulla oblongata. and i swear that if i hear just one more guy ask me to take him higher and teach him how to fly, i'll get a crate of earplugs and unplug my hi-fi. beethoven never heard this; what a lucky guy. this is not what i thought it would be.

faithful atheist coming soon...


palmetto acres southern exposures: a grey negative of neon spires over boarded-up arcades, quarters for erotic high scores. twenty-four hour electricity pumping cheaper porn through wires, lighting misspelled marquees selling slightly less bored. at the border pedro stands guard over his flea market concrete and spilled bottles of flat champale on the cocaine mirror tables. executive room at blue collar cost, but don't bother with the receipt; pinching pennies leaves no impression on those in this Sissyphean fable. interstates wallpapered in red and yellow bubble fonts beckoning with indian river fruits and brick firecrackers. one hundred billboards tower over flags and parking lots, proscenium to dollar commerce starring uninspired actors. credit cards as useless as stone wheels at the greasy spoon. you wash your browned fives and tens in the buttered grits, but keep some wallet green and warm for the souvenir heirlooms. “wish you were here” like the punchline, stale postcard, stale wit. the swamp foxes trundle under shoddy shade from withered trees. the forest's permissive canopy letting sunburn through to flattened land. palmetto climate like a palm held closed to gentle blowing breeze; strips of land and water mingle, recipe for humid hand. the tourists leaving dusty vectors bombing down the gravel paths. designer towels, bikini fashions: like scarlet letters, a clear exhibit. learning rudimentary civil war histories like arcane math. adventure golf a clear reminder of where they live, not where they visit.

divide by zero i am a mathematician, not by choice, but by the nature of the way i am wired. i see figures and graphs easier than hope and desire. a schematic for an anathemathematic unhappy lifestyle. everything weighed in relation to everything else, appreciation of one gained only by disproof of the other, making neat little slide rules and i'm slowly subtracting myself. i wish i could unfetter myself and just laugh, but i'm a slave to my logic, a whore to my math, and i have trouble thinking in non-numeric terms, my desuetude tear ducts burn dry and unconcerned. why can't i unlearn? 10 divide by zero, 20 goto 10. the program i can't stomach, my heart can not rend, and my once so-many-times-knotted brain can not bend itself around an idea that doesn't compute a root, imagination now a trivial pursuit, zero-and-one machination. and my heart can not calculate beauty, or love, or art, just a losing blueprint of labyrinthine charts. where in this technology would i find belief when belief does not come with degrees of precision? what's the prerequisite for relaxed and comfortable while worrying the infinite just might be fictional? it would all be palatable if i could prove my faith. but all i can prove is my math.

selling the action figure history continues to wipe the pigeon shit off of statues erected in the name of people who thought their lives less valuable than an indispensable idea, a catchphrase like "optimist" or "jingoist patriotist" backed by a stone-gone marble-carved list of those who spent their last chance on the peer pressure of an iron fist and a plaster-cast of a motionless hand in a ditch. but i'm just fine to sit behind the shelf of the store and sell the action figure, it's best left in hands more willing, better and bigger. don't make me a bitter beggar, a one-medaled one-armed one-legger, all we cowards just prattle on in argument, battle with words for swords, weak still speaking, and i'd rather live on my knees than die to play the late worm for an early bird.

pianissimo trumpets discordant at arm's length. and my major and minor keyring has lost its skeleton status at all of your entrances. an amalgam of rhythms, the tempo wasn't quite so soothing in retrospect. ever since i fell out of tune, you've been turning this down. my pianissimo whispers turning this down. your pianissimo whispers turning this down. melting candles so as to build up wax. and coat these now cacophonous lyrics in coffins of paraffin. broken strings and sundry picks, the lattice of the bedsprings. this brokedick song gone on too long.

All songs copyright 2003 by Andrew Wagner.

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