Epigraph: --- ![[Pasted image 20250516175715.png]] -Adrian The End of the Fifteen Hundreds, anteAntiquity Hildr came into the World upon a border. As a border, and a boarder within a border. Born of Land and of Sea, Hildr was born to be the Sky. She(/they) was(/were) born under the dark, shadowy shroud of the Black Death, as the embodiment of a single glimmer of candlelight; the hushed, yellow glow of which filled the room, announcing her imminent arrival into physical form. It filtered through the ribcage of her mother's loom, itself creaking and exhausted, from the years and months birthing, thrum-tapped tissues of its own. Her/their Hamlet in Berwick-upon-Tweed was facing the latest of a cyclical chain of *Yersinia Pestis*'s fight for its own survival (and, inadvertently, the death of millions of hosts). The town teemed with walls. Walls within walls. Over an iterative process of capture, loss, recapture, brutal force, and reinforcement, the walls evolved a life of their own - carrying history of the ever-present, ever-presented past of protection. Or equally, entrapment. Initially, the medieval fortifications followed the natural curvature of the landscape, reflecting a now-long-forgotten instinct of life to flow, with an effortless effort, like a *wu wei* waterfall around the rocks that it gradually erodes through the inevitability of time. By the third iteration of rebuilding, the reign(s) of Elizabeth saw the addition of Bastions in complex, Star-shaped geometry. The echoes of peoples past, and their Will to survive, evidenced through an all-too-permeable and now evolved membrane, pooled in the ditches, the recesses of Earth, many of which, emptied and yearning, or relieved of their weight, can still be seen today; like the wrinkles of a Celtic Giant who, perhaps tired of all the fighting, laid down to rest for a little while, and in Her dreaming, grew old, blossoming foliage, trees, verdant and crumpled grass, beneath busy footfall of humans who forgot her. _Born of Land and of Sea, Hildr was born to be the Sky._ The town was alive with culture, not only in the microbial sense. It was a veritable cauldron of web-like connected wisdom and skilled trade; its function as a port afforded the Scots a maritime link to European markets, facilitating exchange of wool, fish, and grain harvested by blistered and frostbitten hands. These working hands, receptive, giving, whether willingly, desperately or forcibly - they were walled within a town incessantly changing hands. The town, as a living entity, and as all living entities are, held a fluidity of identity. Its positioning on the border between England and Scotland forged a site of constant subjugation, and negotiation, not only in the economic sense. A so-called 'Garrison Town', Berwick was a place in proximity to an English military base, designed for the purpose of violent protection, and indeed, therefore, entrapment. The town was kept alive, and therefore, equally, regularly faced the threat of death, due to its pivotal contribution to the trades of textile weaving, and salmon fishing. Hildr's mother was one of these weavers, and though her name was never ushered amongst the peoples, her anonymity gave her fabrics an even greater desirability. The Father who birthed her was always wary of the Greatest Sin of Pride, and yet this somehow birthed an even Greater Pride. Not of his own Fishing Trade (for it was undeniable, the income his skill brought was dwarfed entirely by the value of his wife's), but for his Family. So the walls kept rising, falling, rising- Through plague after plague, flood after flood (the swell of the Ocean Spirits, reaching up through the arteries of the River Tweed, even overcoming the city's sea walls) And still, against the waves of battle, the salmon kept leaping. Returning to a home they no longer remembered, but felt, a homecoming requiem, encoded in their scales. It was these unsuspecting creatures that provided approximately one Fifth of the sustenance for the Wiltergarten family, who resided in a humble abode just outside the outskirts of the town, close to the River. Bertrand, the wise, yet distant man he was, built their house with three of his fellow fishermen, upon a foundation of stone. Many other families coveted and marvelled at the sturdiness of the home, managing, miraculously, not only to survive the copious floods from the swell of the sliver of breathing river that held the silvery skinned, pink flesh of the humble, yet crucial, fraction of their livelihood; but also, to survive wave after wave of the ghostly Plague that seemed to ravage house after house around them. Of course the house's elevation made entry for rats and their accompanying flea vectors more difficult, and Bertrand's obsessive (but so very, at his Heart, benevolent) hygiene practices, scrubbing his hands sore before ever entering the house- a praxis inherited from his much-too late and sorely missed father born of Ireland. He had taught him of Manannán mac Lir, the over-king of their fearful place of Work, and Guardian of the Otherworld, his Father's eventual, wave-sweeping rest. Born of Stone-Stabbed Land and Sickly Sea, Hildr: Oar of Soaring Sky. Hildr's departed mother, who she never learned the name of, as her father wouldn't, or couldn't utter it, was not just an exceptionally gifted weaver, but a gifted Soul, of incommunicable, arcane, cursed Wyrd, who rarely spoke a Word. She had helped weave the stakes, the warp Wattles of the family's own Walls, threaded with an intricate weft of twigs sourced from woodland nearby, which the men plastered with the dung of Horses. Her mother's artful, yet decidedly mathematical part in the building of their house was done in secret, to avoid the persecuting eyes of anyone who may have accused her of witchcraft. Bertrand Wiltergarten had met his unbridled bride upon the dragging current of a rocky shore, belonging to the Cormorants. The both of them equally naked of Spirit, but one much more naked of flesh than the other. He would always remember the weaving of their Fates as his greatest homecoming. Wrapping her in a shroud of fur, as she shivered, sighing spirals of mist from her silent mouth, he asked her name, to no audible reply. She simply smiled at him and released a lock of hair from its saline entrapment on his forehead. She felt the familiarity of the saltwater, and revelled in not knowing whether it had been birthed by the Sea, or from the pores of his searching flesh. This straw-filled pillow, unpillagable, their Love, sweeping back to Poseidons Luckily for him, but perhaps not for her, but perhaps equally unluckily for them both, but luckily for Hildr, or indeed not at all; he had been on a solitary fishing trip that winter night. He rarely ventured out to sea alone, and when he did, it was never alone. Except for this, one journey. This young man, aged beyond his years by the ravages of the Ocean, a trade passed down to him through countless generations, through an untraceable, swelling river of genealogy, to a source unknown, from a mouth, silent, but breathing. Each father teaching his Son how to cast a net, how to weave a basket of reeds, how to read the signs of the mysterious Sea. Each son being taught, cruelly, her lessons. Bertrand had lost his father to the Plague the night before this trip, his grief leading him on this reckless journey. But, from this Flood of Loss, this thoughtless excursion, likely born of a desire to die- yearning to join his teacher, his father, to find him once more between two waves of that great unknowable Sea - from this waxwinged Son's attempt to find his Father in the Labyrinth he had built for him in the tide of his wake, did he find his wife. And there, upon that rocky, nearly-wintered shore, under light of the Harvest Moon, he covered her, he shielded her nakedness the only way he knew how. And gratefully, she pulled the replacement hide around her. Born of Land and of Sea, Hildr was born to be the Sky. He built wall after wall of his own in the years that flowed onward, far outwith and within the walls of their small home. Built for both his child's and his wife's protection from their own latent power. Upon these walls, physical and emotional, lingered the pungently fragrant reed baskets and nets, with no reels of which to speak, to catch aquatic prey, woven, as always, by the magickal hands of her mother. For Hildr's mother, and indeed Hildr, were magickal beings. These walls, these veils of secrecy, built from the warm dung of naive and misdirected love, were also, as all walls were and continue to be, a prison. In the Twenty Three months preceding Hildr's birth, while Bertrand was out fishing, her mother would weave walls of her own. Using the nets and baskets left behind, left due to the very holes and tears that she had perforated purposely, rendering them insufficient for Bertrand's purposes, but a certain perfection for hers. For she would spend these early wee hours of the mornings stolen away, to scrape the stolen salmon scales from her husband's nets. While she felt the essence of her power drain during the summer months, due to the shorter nights, she thanked the Moon Goddess for the longer absences of her well-meaning, but suffocating partner. For it was these times that held her power in a crucible. And it was these times, in blessed solitude, when she would weave her greatest work. A living textile. It was also during these periods that she would be afforded just enough time to make it to the woodland, its sanctity unbeknownst to most, but felt especially by Bertrand- he had warned her of the consequence of crossing the threshold of the *aes sídhe*. It was here, with appropriate Silence and careful tread, from where she had sourced the reeds for her husbands fishing baskets. The regular collection of which provided a useful excuse for any instances of her late return to their home, about an hour on foot (it would be less, but this was not her natural mode of travel). Past this woodland, where her husband had told her to never venture, as always, binding her with Fear, born only of good-natured worry, there was, as he'd intuited but never seen, an Otherworldly Portal. Into a clearing, an absence left by the cruel but necessary need for farmland's nourishment, stood Five, and sometimes Four, Stones. Stoic. But not always silent. To those willing, or able, or brave enough to listen. His ever-binding, reel-pull Love, rendered it impossible for her to ever speak of her pilgrimage. But she was, for her own Otherworldly nature, afforded passage through the hallowed hollow hill. By the first anniversary of their marriage, she herself had spoken exactly Twenty Three words to her husband, Nine of which were "I adore you" whispered in an aqueous triplicate, none of which uttered under the blinding luminescence of the Day. She was not made for the Day, just as she was not made for the land. And she felt her yearning grow to match the heat of the long, arduous Aria, screamed from the coarse throat of the Northern Wind and Sun. Born of Land and of Sea, Hildr was born to be the Sky. It was on the early morning of their first anniversary that she encountered the Stones; having spoken the latter seventh, eighth, and ninth libretto of her Love for Bertrand before he left for the Sea, on a trip that would extend far beyond the usual half-day, by weighted forces unknown to her, or him. But known to the Stones. There had, at First, been Five that day. She had been called through the woodland, much further through, as a foetus, being pushed against its Will, through the undercurrent of her mother's birth canal to the brutal breath of this World. She had been called by a low, low hum. Much lower than any able to be heard by mortal ears. She heard it first, through the soles of her feet. And then, through the marrow of the bones of her soul. And then, unavoidably, impossible to be ignored, through the circulatory system she was still getting used to, even after all these months of tourism in anthropological flesh. And then, cracking like the axe of a lumberjack, or the crack of a tree felling as a result of his Work, or the crack of lightning against another tree to bring about its felling by the Tree's request to join its axe-felled partner, she felt it stab an ancient rhythm, into the four candlelit chambers of her foreign, newly-shrunken heart. She thought she felt it grow back to its original size, and slow, to the watery, grave Adagio she was born into, years ago, too numerable to believe. And so she had followed this unmentionable hum, through the mycelial orchestra of the humble forest, conducting her winding yet certain path through the leaves, where she had seen them. Born of Land and of Sea, Hildr was born to be the Sky. She immediately identified the not-sound's origin, through her heart, like the upturned glass of a child, now emptied of milk, and pressed against her ear against the wall separating her, from a terrible argument between her parents after bedtime. It was coming from the central Stone, the tip of the upturned pentagram that they, the Five, formed as One. She felt the waves of terror wash over her, just as the same eavesdropping child may be washed in a vicarious terror of her beaten mother, and yet, as the child may be unable to tear her ear from the glass against the wall, she was unable to tear her webbed feet from their geological destiny. Approaching The Fifth Stone, The hum stopped. But the silence was louder than anything she'd ever heard. She knew, she knew she had to reach out and touch its porous surface. Dropping the woven reeds of her basket, spilling out those yet to be woven, a single finger of Lilith approaching a Goddess she felt she remembered, to whom which she had finally returned- So close now, reaching, she felt the undulating, ululating vibration of home- The world turned, spiralled, whirled about her endlessly, in an instant- The stone was gone. But then, that precious weight That familiar weight of the deepest ocean, dampening her shoulder She spun on her own axis; finding an unspeakably ancient figure before her. As yellow-grey as the great Stone had been, and stiller, still. The Crone was the Stone itself. And so began a clandestine sequence of meetings, corresponding, not so coincidentally, with her husband's extended fishing expeditions, once a month; on the New Moon; when she was at her weakest, hidden as the Moon herself, but the Stone Woman at her strongest, basking in the Rising Sun. The two would commune, amidst the Walls of those Other, Othered, Knowing Four, as they were meant to, exchanging wisdom of the earth and sea- They were Labouring A Strike of Lightning-Fire- And as the Shore remains still, awaiting the homecoming of the tide, so too would the Stone Woman stay; for she would not venture further than her circle. Not until she had to. The Stones were older than the Earthly mother in which they were planted, even older than Hildr's unearthly mother; but the two needed one another. The Stone Woman longed for stories of the Sea, just as Hildr's mother longed for the Sea itself. And in return for these stories, shared in silence, through the breaths between them, as the Sun dawned across their ancient forms, The Stones would impart their strength of weight, their resolve to wait, The Unheard Melody Whisperers, Ancestral Answerers, Of Five Reversed; Intersecting Swords of Fragarach, sapping her Strength so that she may become Strong- And a Middle Way, A hopeless dawning clew, from lowly tome of Tone- A roaming pathway, towing home. The first instruction was given, stern as Stone itself: to hollow out one of the wooden beams of the frame of her loom. She obliged, as the Stones, for all their looming calm, this Circle of Fifths also petrified her, in their ancient, unspoken, immovable and almighty Might. For Medusa's prowess was not her visage, but the threat of Stony Imminence. It was a reasonably easy task, to whittle from the loom an absence - For she had a habit that her dearest Bertrand found endearing, In which she'd beat a nigh-impossible syncopation, with the Rhythmic Beater of the Loom. As he'd be in the other room for reading, and she'd be weaving reeded flute, With Treadles she'd be knocking at his Walls, And he would hear her through the stone which separated them Accented with reed clicks, and textured with her heddle shimmers- A Beating Heart came from the loom; A wedded pulse for them, amodal tune As she'd spin to gold her clan's clandestine Wool- Until her webbing ebbs flowed towing pulse From worried care of her rare, gentle Fisherman, would veil The whittle-stitching of her fledgling Sail. Uncovering, his lover's hollowing was covered by her hand's Beat, Which she so skilfully composed, she wove her reaching, and her threads with each But little did her mother know, these very veiling drum-beats kept this Sacred Family Safe, with yet another Veil unknown- Her percussive contemplation more than simply ways to pass the waving time; Rather, Hildr's Mother, tapping, and her Father, rapt- Were being wrapped in Faerie magick; shielding them from harm. An Ageless Aegis, the *pestis*, it was petrified, and though unseen, there lay a circle of Spirit Saline, wefted all around their home - Neither flood nor Plague of fleas could enter, for they could not stand the Otherworldly Drum. And of his unsuspecting Land Pulled through her secret Sea, She was a Flooring Sky. Besides this geological family name being simply "N", a fact seemingly vital to be communicated, Hildr's mother would learn, between the heavy silences of the unspoken words, that the Stones, now, with the Crone, Five - were once in fact Seven. And while she never met the anthropomorphised figures of the other Four standing on awe-inspiring guard around them during their communion, she learned that each of them had a tale to tell, a yarn they had been spinning, a hide-drum they had beaten since the beginning of time's ascent. She learned these Celtic-Knotted yarns, of Stellar origin, were what kept the very Earth spinning. They were the 17/4 polyrhythm which kept the Moon in the effortless, yet ametric Fivesome Reel around the Earth. She daren't ask where the Missing Two of One had gone, for she sensed that this was a Great Loss; not only for the Stone Woman, but for all of Life on Earth. She felt she knew, given their number, their connection to the hardened human body, to which she was starting to become familiar, and to the fragile planets of the Solar System. The Stone Crone who had felt her worthy of revealing herself to, she was the Downtrodden, Beaten Heart of the Cosmos. On the (needlessly, for the Stones ensured she would always be back before her husband) hurried return home, she often wondered which of the Earthen Body's Seven "N"s were missing. Was it the Stone of the Root, the Stone of the Gut? Was it the Stone of the Throat? Was this why she felt it so Heavy to speak? Perhaps One of the Missing Stones lay at the bottom of the Sea. Perhaps the Gravity of their sunken grief was what called her back there, to the deep. On her Twenty-Third to Last visit with the Stone Crone, she was given direct instructions, the final piece of the cryptic key, the final Beating Pulse of the escape route the Stones had been paving for her, beyond her knowing. She left the circle that day with a small piece of the Crone. A sharp, flat, cataract-yellow slate, which, to her horror, unable to look away (perhaps locked in her stare by the Stone herself) the Ancient Stone Witch had pulled, torn from the lens of her human form's eye, mid-transformation, in a grotesque sacrifice of Love. Her silence during such a devastating act made the vicarious agony all the more tangible. Born of The Dawn, and Yet, The Dusk, O'er The Hills, Came Mourning Sky- So began her near-daily ritual. Resolved to perform the sacred work, to construct the Janusian archway, to open the door home, by the Stones themselves. And like Janus, each day she would be staring back into the past she and Bertrand had built together, while also staring forward to the future he hoped for their family, that she knew could never be. She would sit behind the wall of her loom, and scrape the silvery scales from the nets, the baskets, and from any scraps of inedible, diseased or much-too-small fish, with the sacred piece of the Crone that had been bestowed upon her. On her husband's return, signalled by the slosh of the animal fat coating his Leather boots, sewn by her hands, fashioned from another animal's hide, she would quickly, as instructed, deposit the scales she'd salvaged, into the hollow recess in the loom's frame. In her hiding, she was rebuilding her own Hide. --- Bertrand, being born in Early October, under the sign of Libra and so very close to the Holy Day of Samhain, was a creature of balance. And while balance in the macroscopic sense of the cosmos, when viewed closer, balance can be the most damaging and hurtful force of all. This town, this family, and this yet-to-be-born child felt this more than perhaps anybody in history. Scales. Scales were the weight of Bertrand's birthright Scales were the sight of his family's next meal. Scales were this family's unravelling, Scales were the veiling, and the revealing of secrets, Scaling far beyond, beneath and above the years spent inside those two candlelit rooms, Scales of one kind would be Hildr's doom, And scales of another would be Hildr's becoming. Born Neither of Land and of Nether Sea, Hildr was born the Sky. Soon, sooner than they (plural), but not he (singular), had hoped, came the day of Hildr's arrival. The day the hiding must end. For their safety, or for what he believed, to the best of his ability, was their safety, Bertrand did not enlist the usual gathering of wise midwives that the rest of the village's children had been delivered by. Baby Hildr had, that fateful night, at a crushingly yellow-golden hour of dusk, pierced her mother's water, releasing the weight of the ocean. A saline foreshadowing. The end of Bertrands hiding came just before his wife's, when his face could not help but betray his suppressed fear for what form Hildr may take, once born. His other, much more tangled, frayed, and drop-stitched threads of terror, were woven into the fabric of his care for Hildr and her mother, contorting it from its protective intent, into something much more dangerous, an inadvertent pride, an unintentional hubris, rivalling that of Arachne herself. He believed (and he truly, truly did believe, no matter how erroneously) that he could deliver the baby. But the screams, he thought, when the moment arrived. Dear god, *the screams.* Punctuated in stark contrast to his wife's relative silence throughout their entire marriage, perhaps it was this contrast which made the sounds so harrowing. But no, these sounds were simply inhuman, no matter the previous state of the form from which they emanated; Guttural, chthonic tides of Banshee shrieks; one after the infernal next, erupted- barrelled from her throat, more horrifying than any tumult he had heard on his countless battles with the storms of the mighty Sea. Born of Both Crumbling Land and of Eroding Sea, Hildr was to be the Falling Sky He was terrified, not only for his wife and child's wellbeing, and by his suddenly dawning powerlessness, but also, less importantly and yet incredibly more-so, he was deathly afraid of the birth being witnessed by another member of the village, and what this could mean for all of their fates. But the fates were weaving Hildr's becoming, with exactly the texture it beckoned, by necessity. Bertrand stumbled, crying for the first time in his adult life, tearless even at receiving the news of his Father lost at Sea, and the lack of his burial on consecrated ground, and even on that desperate night where he tried to join him, that desperate night that ended with meeting his wife, that led to this very night, where he very reasonably feared he may lose her forever, when he would indeed lose her, but not in the way he feared - he was finally crying. Born of Tearing Land and of Tearful Sea, Hildr was about to be the Sky. Stumbling out of the room, out through the woven walls, knocking over the many bowls of boiled water he had tried in earnest to soothe his wife with, he could not scream, for even in their remote location on the outskirts of the town, even with the spacing of the fishermen's houses along the riverbanks to ensure a respectful sharing of resources, his own screams would certainly be loud enough to attract attention. And so, entirely unaware of what his goal was other than the saving of his wife and child, he began to trip over himself, clawing at nearby roots and pulling up grass to regain his balance, gnawing the other hand to prevent his crying out; as his wife was, upon the handle of an old, wooden Oar he had given her to bite at least a fraction of her pain into. Born of Bitten Land and of Biting Sea, Hildr was to be the Teething Sky. He was looking for help, a sign, anything. Not an excessively religious man, yet he found himself praying, praying with every fibre of the warping tissues of his body. Down, down through his legs, that ineffably sickly sensation of adrenaline pooling in one's calves, as if standing upon a very high ledge about to fall; he was praying. In muffled sobs, in muted wails, in stoppered siren calls, he was yelling out to God, no, to the more ancient Gods and Goddesses now erased by the so-called 'One God' their village had been told to worship, the 'One-God' that had apparently condemned his own father to hell, or worse, purgatory, purely for having the audacity to meet his end at Sea. So instead, he was praying to the Goddess that this One God had attempted to siege. And, as if (and absolutely) by magick, She heard him. In the distance, it seemed his answer was calmly approaching- he thought he must have been hallucinating, but there she was indeed, walking over the knoll. The old, old, new face that he needed. A female, yes, thank God, no thank Goddess, a female who may know, in some way, at least in myriad ways greater than he evidently did not, how to deliver his child. Hildr, uncontainable, She was born to be the Sky. With another stumble, another clump of earthy scalp ripped from the ground beneath him, he blinked those strange tears from his lashes, and suddenly, the Old Woman was within whispering distance. He opened his mouth to speak, and she nodded before a sound left it. He had no time to question her lack of questioning. Offering a frantic, mud-soaked arm to aid her walking, she smiled and denied the assistance, signalling the Yellow stone-topped cane she was walking with. And before he had lifted his head from his own responding nod, they had inexplicably arrived back at the entrance to his home, wear the screams of Hildr's arrival could once again be heard. He ushered the Stone Woman in, and before he could follow her, she turned and shook her head. He could not have entered the house if he tried, but he did not try. Not for lack of the gripping desire to help Hildr come into the world, but because of the deep, circling waves of knowing that the Crone had embedded in his Heart. She was the only one for the task. And so, hours passed, the screams slowly ebbing into a diminuendo, as his panicked pacing left trenches around the boundary of their home, in sympathy with the recesses surrounding Berwick, until the rising of the Sun. Born of Land and of Sea, Hildr was nearly born to be the Sky. When he hadn't heard any cries for Twenty Three seconds, he felt something crack, not so much as an axe against a woodblock, or even as lightning against the tree that became it, but rather, like the bone of a twig underfoot, or the crack of a lightbulb that signified an inventor's one, last, good idea - He knew he was able to cross the threshold to his abode once more. But he did not know, at least consciously, that he would only find little Hildr in there. Silent as her mother had been, as if her antenatal screams had been borrowed, relieved, scale-scraped and stolen from the baby herself. Born of Scaling Lands and of Scales of Sea, Hildr was born to be the unscalable Sky. She lay, jaundiced, wriggling like an upturned woodlouse, atop the unshaven gray Goat hide in front of the Loom. The Loom, its true intent now revealed, (and this, in her absence, formed Hildr's mother's un-hiding) to have been witholding a hollowed recess, still shimmering with the suggestion of a once-dense collection of scales; and its warp threads still shimmering too, singing a song of what had been woven through. Born of Land and of Sea, Hildr had been born the Sky. For Hildr's mother, the Selkie with no name, had sang her Song, in a scale unknown, except, for now, by One- She screamed not to draw him near, but to keep him safely far enough- The creature, the two of them both knew, had been imprisoned, by her own design- To learn what closeness may be brought, To know his only warmth she'd sought- by the reed basket of a glowing Love Inside a smaller heart The two, Yet Three To Be, the Neirlie Three as One of them, aloft- and locked in warmth, of the sweetest embrace they both had ever or would ever know the salt of her, the salt of him, Eyes closed but knowing What uncrossable door they were trying to squeeze their love through. Hildr, Vital Birth itself in Blackest Death, afforded from the Yellow Sky. On the Twenty Third day of their marriage, they had dropped her sealskin as one, from atop the Berwick Cliffs, to try, in vein, to seal their hides together They hid as best they could They hid as best the danger of their forbidden love could let them- He never kept her against her Will And even in this moment, peering upon his only family member remaining; He found himself searching as he had mere hours ago, Tearing up the dried and frosted grass of their past moments; Wondering in what ways he had made her feel that she could not tell him of her desire to leave - But, he knew His Bairn, she was even more than but a Valkyrie Even now, in this latest weighted blanket of his Life of Loss, he knew He understood This gentle, stunted, tearless fisherman, So careful- So careful not to alert the fish of its own capture - But not for malice, no, Not for the sake of nefarious intent, But rather to ensure the creature might suffer less, In the moments beating the inevitable, in the chain of rhythm leading up, to its percussive stunning. And the man still, after all these decades, found this the hardest part With every fish bashed upon the gunwale, he flinched And so he flinched now, knowing, That this silvery light must too return to the weightless depths from whence she came Born of His Sunstroking Land and of Her Wavelapped Sea, Hildr, Sky. Ablaze. A Valkyrie. Her mother's heart, Still longing for the Sea, it grew The Selkie knew one day that she must leave For she had been told to weave her Skin anew, Using the surrogate strands of salmon scales; she had made her leap, she had autumned the dear reed basket of Bertrand, who could never let her breathe the way she needed to, but did not know just how much she needed to- She had crawled out of the small gap in the Stone, Made by the Crone of Stone her Self, which now lay at the back wall of the house, And led straight into the River. From Wrinkled Land and Veins of Sea, Hildr had been born the Bodiless Abode. Hildr, War-Swaddled Swan Sailing As A Silent Sky. First, he lifted up his baby, The babe born by ordinance of a Crone Stone, by a Fisherman, a Selkie Ma, and there, in Salt, he Baptised her Heid in Strings of Strings of Salivary Violins, He was kissing her, he was kissing her so tenderly, again, again, he was sobbing into all her kisses, He was sobbing and kissing his wee Wain, and she was charioting him, in Holy jig about the place where she had arrived - About an invisible stake, a Maypole born early, in late-Mid April, Seventeenth And he was carrying her, (he was always carrying, something or someone, Whether they had asked to be carried or not- He was always carrying, but-) Hildr now was Both their heavy wagon And from this little house of woven walls, He was kissing her, he was kissing here- He was kissing both of them, but One now gone- He peered out of that hole of Stone she'd left and he did not lament, or beseech her Looking down upon the little Hildr, he was kissing her- The embodiment of their love, The boundary of a threshold, The marriage of their marriage; He knew this land was too heavy Born of Not His Land and of Sea Not Hers, Hildr was born to be the Sky. for both Hildr and her mother to stay afloat within And back within, out, out into that Opening- In Harmony of Hope; Back where she'd learned Awen's Ode of Oldest Olde- Those Waiting Scales of Cosmos' Weight of Patient Wheel Unspoke- The Day The Hilled Awe Then Awoke- Our Jagged Giants Faced Their Loss Also And back without their Heart, This Ancient Cult Now Beat In Counterbalance to Her Pull- Our Little Laddy-Not Knot-Lass, Born Into The Future Past- A Darkened Path, An Answer, Though For Ne'er Asked- Our Hildr, Ending All Our Standing Stilled Born of Sins Beginning Sky; Als Garten geboren, Das war Sie auch- Wilted Blooms From Boils of Silenced Mouth- A Flaming Branch, Uprooted South A knocking At a Hellish Gate- She/they Did Lay in Wait- Our Gender-Free Dear Saviour's Start Departing Knoll, Sighed Wiltergarten A Sky Fore'er Taken, Flight Birthed of Holy Land Forgot A Genesis from Whirring Wrought A Boundless Boundary was Brought- Alive. A lyre, All eye- The "Why" Within the Crone's Goodbye- *(The Stone Had Two Names; The First, It was Lydia)* And Doubled Yew Now in Her Place, *For She Would Soon Be Known As The Sweet Trinity* With Trunks a-plaited from the Brae- Magick-born by hands of Fae Dear Hildr was the Lighted Way Through the woodland's blessed, Out to the place of Rhythm's Jaunt- The Selkie's Neither-Son-Norn-Daughter Had left the Circle Now Bereft Where Once and Yet There Will Stand Seven Four Shadowed, Hanging From the Heavens Where Once There Stood A Sextet Hive There Then Were Lowly Stones of Five; Where Selkie's Breath Was Heard No More, There now stood Lonely Stones a Four --- # ⧖ is for Mahler Epigraph: --- ![[Pasted image 20250516175644.png]] -Adrian OVERTURE: "Why, I'm cold" Perigee mumbled to their father, who seemed to ignore them for a good Twenty Three seconds. This often happened, as in his post-middle age, his FFFs had become somewhat of a 'white noise' background, simultaneously allowing him a narrower focus on whatever he was working on, while also blocking out the reality of the goings on around him. He often mistook actuality for just another strand in the tapestry of causal clouds, which was a frequent source of frustration, for Selena especially. Perigee's speaking voice had developed incredibly late - they did not utter a word until the age of Seven - but by the time they did speak, they had absorbed so many interwoven messages of information, through the medium of Sound, through musicological research, facilitated by their parents institutional access to The Journals, that they immediately spoke in long, floral sentences, rife with verbosely strung together adverbs, veritable wasps nests of metaphors, similes pouring out of them like honey from a newly-sliced honeycomb. Myo, of course, was not surprised, he rarely felt surprise at collapsed event potentials, but rather, a reserved annoyance, as if the phenomenological world of actuality was simply a hologram of a deeper ocean of Quantum Truth. By the age of Nine, Perigee had developed a rather endearingly precocious quirk of beginning each sentence with "Why," as a stoic philosopher might open a dialectical argument. This gave their communication a Superpositional quality, both suggestive of a question {as in: "Why(,) is everything okay?"} or, equally, the sense of an asserted answer to a question {as in: (this is) "Why(,) I'm cold"}. To Perigee, "Why" was not a Word, it was a Sound. It was a Letter[^Y], to a recipient they had not yet seen with their Eye- which of course, was another letter. Shivering, Perigee wrapped their blanket, meant only for 'security' and far too tattered and unravelled to provide any real warmth, around them. This embodied action caused Myo's FFFs to converge upon a majority (showing Perigee going inside to ask Selena for a cup of Cauldron Chai), and it was this, threat of Selena getting the upper hand in the child's relative 'early game' of psychological development, that caused him to finally pay attention to them. "Oh, Glimmer!" Myo exclaimed (using his chosen term of affection for Perigee, yet, still, not taking his eyes off the terminal), while turning up the floor heating of the Treehouse Lab. The Treehouse in the Endive's back garden was the primary locale of Father-Progeny interaction, being where Myo spent probably 77% of his waking (and indeed, sleeping) hours. It was a curious structure that had become curiouser and curiouser with each passing year of Perigee's development. As his research took various forking paths, new equipment was installed, old equipment cast aside and dismantled, leading to a scrapyard of an obstacle course leading to it. Perigee enjoyed this playground of technological memory, seeing the obstacles as a way to sweeten the reward of spending time with their father. Myo was entirely indifferent, or perhaps enjoyed the physical barrier it created between him and his family (it was both. It's always both). Selena of course, absolutely despised it, and certainly didn't hide her feelings on the matter. Endive's (M, that is) back-garden, Treehouse lab was decidedly in a perpetual state of 'unfinishedness', which Myo appeared to enjoy, calling it a 'physical manifestation of Alfred North Whitehead's Process Philosophy' - Selena's hermetic memory never seemed to be able to provide the reference for this text, which quite loudly hinted to her that this was merely a facade as unformed as the roof of the Treehouse itself. Initially, Perigee and Myo (but not Selena) had begun to build the makeshift lab 'together' (of course, Perigee's soft little hands couldn't operate the robotic tools that facilitated its architecting, they instead provided a 'scrub nurse' role, gleefully handing her father the necessary middleware components so that he could solder them to the various, Entomoid robot arms, which still lay underneath the Treehouse's foundation, embedded into the tree like the outstretched hand of Mars depicted in the Painting previously known as 'Minerva fighting Mars' {now revealed by the work of Perigee's parents[^minerva] (which was the beginning of the end of their honeymoon period) to be a trans-dimensional collaboration}. To Selena, the robotic appendages stuck out like Six Sore Thumbs against the organic spine of the ancient tree. Perigee, on the other hand, often thought silently "Why, the Treehouse is an Angel just trying to take flight, whose wings have been stripped of their feathers"[^icarus]. Myo was indifferent. --- **SYMPHONY NO. 1 IN D MAJOR**: "TITAN", or, "*Tighten*" (Originally conceived as a symphonic poem) ***“Whose is that unfinished black box in the back garden, what have they accomplished, why am I cold”*** <span class="right-align">-Sylvia Plath, The Tree House</span> --- ⧖eno was an incredibly *difficult* child. Not difficult in the pejorative sense whatsoever, but rather, as a highly complicated game of Chess, such as that spearheaded by their mother, Selena, in the now highly respected Field of Bughouse Modal Chess Theory. They had been one of the very first babies conceived via *parsenogenesis*, the much more robust successor of the '*In Vitro Gametogenesis*' seemingly devised by the 'Scientists' of Antiquity. As such, their beginning, as one of the Seventh Wonders of the World, paved the slippery stepping stones of their becoming, as an entirely *Other* being - right handed, but decidedly on a *Left-Hand Path*. Difficulty, like all things, is not an objective or absolute term. In fact, it exists purely as a relative spectrum; relative to the observer. One may even crudely say that 'difficulty lies in the Eye of the beholder' - just as Selena found her many Hexagonal Bughouse Chess (which she'd come to term *Hivehouse Chess*) incredibly easy, whereas Myo, even being the undeniable genius that he was, found even a game of Draughts nearly impossible. There were simply too many variables. And so, ⧖eno's 'difficulty' (as described by many of their teachers, gossiping in the Teacher's Lounge on their break times) lay not in their inherent divergence from the norm, but rather the norm's inability to provide the appropriate structures to nourish, and cultivate their absolute brilliance. Their nonverbality until the age of Seven was not the aforementioned 'divergence' (as, of course, most children do not speak until at least Five), but their (quite literally) maximum Score of Nine(9) on The Field Recordings meant that there simply did not exist an appropriate education plan for their neurological development. This numerical feat of academic prowess was never achieved by anyone, not before, or even since (at the time of writing) - not even their Father, who held the original World Record of 8.88/9. The Field Recordings were comprised of Nine Examinations for the Attribution of Remit - conducted at the age of Nine years old. Given ⧖eno's nonverbal nature in the first few years of schooling, many of the educational staff assumed they would perform incredibly poorly on the Field Recordings, given their oral component. But Myo had resolve beyond faith in his child, not a single one of his FFFs foresaw a future in which ⧖eno *didn't* beat his score. He welcomed this entirely, in fact, the day he walked them to their Examinations (he, of course, given his visual 'noise', could not legally operate a Vehicle), he found it impossible to hold their hand the entirety of the journey, needing to stop every Six metres to stim, flapping his hands in front of his eyes in his habitual gesture of his Beaconism. The two of them were a feedback loop of autistic blossoming, every one of his stims leading to one of theirs (they'd not quite figured out their most soothing form of sensory stimulation and regulation, but it always involved making interesting, nonverbal sounds - clicks, tongue pops, giggles, buzzes, humming incredibly microtonal notes that Myo had never heard, leading to even *more* paternal pride and subsequent excitement) - so the journey took at least triple the amount of time it usually did. But Myo, of course, foresaw and planned for this. --- **SYMPHONY NO. 2 IN C MINOR** “RESURRECTION,” or, *“Razor, Wreck, Shun”* As parents were canonically not allowed in the Grand Hall, Myo gave his wee Perigee one last kiss on their head, being sure to secure their yellow bow, and managed to (at least he thought) hide his tears from Perigee. They of course, heard the tears forming in his tear ducts, and knew this was simply a sign of immense pride. Also, given their father's FFFs, they realised this probably was a good sign for their coming Results, which allowed them to carry a certain, deserved confidence into the Hall with them, grounded in their usual, deep-listening sense of Humility. Entering the space, Perigee was immediately overwhelmed with the sheer volume (in every sense) of the auditory data they were faced with. Given the Hall's Nine-pointed Star, or Enneagram shape, the space was an unusual isolation chamber of resonance. The previous Student was finishing their Examinations, having just reached the Final Central Checkpoint, and as such, all the associated equipment was still ringing out in a symphony of movement. This sensory overload being such a common initial hurdle amongst the Students, Perigee's Prime Sage, Professor Hamsa, went to hand Perigee the standard-grade noise cancelling headphones, or 'mufflers', but when taking them off their Phonehook mounted to the concertina zig-zag back wall of the Hall's entrance, She corrected herself, realising the Nine-Exceptionality of the Student that was Perigee. She returned the Grey headphones to their bottom row and reached up to the top row of hooks, where the Yellow mufflers were kept. Given the muffler's incredible efficaciousness, the subsequent misuse of which leading to hallucinations, akin to those experienced in a sensory deprivation tank, there were only Three of these yellow pairs. Perigee had been the only child up to then who hadn't experienced adverse side-effects from their utilisation; which signified, clearly, how much they needed them, and just how much of the world of Sound they were able to absorb. Luckily, and unfortunately, for Perigee, the same could not be said for her sense of sight, unlike her father. In fact, Myo himself had performed a genomic screen on Perigee the year prior, and discovered a de novo cluster of highly penetrant mutations to the RHO (Rhodopsin) gene, the harrowing data (which he processed, reprocessed, and processed again, still to the same horrible, unavoidable result) suggesting the underlying cause for Perigee's frequent 'clumsiness' at night and in dimly lit conditions - not just the usual assumed Propriosentia—the neurological Beacon (or neuroBeacon) inherited from their mother—but a nefarious, creeping night-blindness that would inevitably develop into a total loss of peripheral vision as they approached their teenage years. The previous Student's neuroBeacon was that of Photosentia, the most common nB, so the heavy, burgundy velvet curtains had been drawn down to allow him to concentrate upon the Trials of Examination at hand. However, Sage Hamsa, being aware of Perigee's 'Propriosentia' (actually a rapidly developing case of Retinitis pigmentosa, RP), had signalled the Recordings Adjudicator to raise the curtains, much to Perigee's delight. Even then, they delighted in the performance of it all, and deep in the Operatic system of their body, they swore they could hear the honey-sweet applause of an audience awaiting the first notes to be played by a virtuoso. Hamsa delighted in the obvious delight on their face, as the Sunlight flooded in, through the intricate, Stained glass panels of that Star-shaped, Cathedral of the Sacred Culmination of Burgeoning Human Knowledge, and began to kiss where their father had moments ago, the glisten of their freshly-fastened yellow bow almost too bright to look upon. Hamsa signalled in SomatoSign (Perigee's primary modality of communication for the first few years of formal education) for them to move to the Starting Checkpoint, at the Centre of the room, which, during Examination season, sported a Hexagonal desk, which from a Bird's Eye view, looked like a Benzene ring. Perigee approached the Central Checkpoint. "Just looking through your diviagnosis file, Mx. Endive" Perigee awaited the expected gasp of surprise. "Woah, I've never seen all Nine before--" They were exceptionally comfortable with silence - in fact this was often a point of discomfort for those around them. Such is the effect of somebody who doesn't feel the need to fill every space they occupy. On the other hand, the same can be said for the opposite. But as their father would say; extremes aren't something to be afraid of. Enantiodromia (one of their latest Words in their Lexicographic collection - Pre-Seven years old, they would 'Sound Scrapbook' samples of podcasts, or record parts of Speech spoken by others, to keep a record of these juicy letter-clumps that represented such diverse meaning, even within the same word. Now, in the last two years of finding their voice, they had taken to recording their own words, whether found in books or in the world of Sound.) Seemingly becoming impatient with waiting for Perigee's response, the N.E.A.R. Cleric reading their file inquired: "so it looks like you've got your pick. Which of the Nine vertices would you like to Initiate with?" - The Cleric waited poised at the terminal, ready to open one of the randomised Problems, according to Perigee's chosen Field. With no hesitation, they said "All of them, please" Again, a look of surprise and a stifled gasp, which Perigee heard in the microscopic shift and salivary movement of the Cleric's epiglottis. It wasn't against the rules, so to speak, but nobody had even chosen a Field other than the one suggested by their neuroBeacon, let alone more than one simultaneously. "...Well... Just how would that work, exactly? You aren't a computer--" Now they deemed it appropriate to speak: "No, but we all are, really- capable of concurrency, it's just a matter of appropriately multithreading" Clearly tired with their day of back to back Examinations, the Cleric gave up resisting with a sigh; "Fine, Endive. Here" They swiped over the screen in front of them, sending over all Nine Problems of their Field Recordings to solve. "Thank you, Cleric" "Sure. Let's see how this works out. If at all" Even with their Yellow Mufflers, they took three seconds to try and consolidate and process the egregiously intrusive sounds of the clinical machinery in the room, keeping the Examination patients under anaesthesia alive. N.B. As reading, and most of our perception of Time itself, is tragically linear, what follows is the closest, non-chronological approximation of Perigee's One Hundred and Twenty Three minutes of their examinations. I. Pythagorean Arithmetic | Numilumenolægia *(Ancestral Mathematics)* --- >**Problem: Devise a unified algorithm capable of identifying and categorising all possible higher-dimensional polytopes (n-dimensional analogs of polygons and polyhedra) that exist within non-Euclidean geometries, while encoding these forms into a fractal-based numerical system for visual representation and practical application in quantum computing.** While none of the 'difficult' child's Problems proved particularly 'difficult' to them, this one took the longest. This was mostly because, in their sporadically networked brain, they required the solutions to all the others to be finalised in order to solve this one. Time to solution: Twenty Three Minutes. Score: 1.00/1.00. II. Aristotlean Causality | Particuticlergæria *(Ancestral Physics)* --- >**Problem: Prove (or disprove) the existence of a causal bridge between quantum entanglement and macroscopic determinism. Develop a model that traces causality from the quantum to the classical scale without violating locality or free will principles.** The Vertex of Particuticlergæria (known as Physics in anteAntiquity) was the first place they went, much to the surprise of the Cleric, who thought they would head straight for the Vertex of Imaginætia, da Vinci's Vertex (which was thought to be previously known as 'Art' or 'Creativity' in general). But given the time spent with their parents- being privileged, as their only child, to be let into their nuclear familial secrecy of trans-temporal abilities, they were quite well placed to bring together the 'classical' Physics of anteAntiquity (represented by their mother's Hermetic Memory) and the now primary framework of Quantum Mechanics (at first Perigee was rather confused by the Audio signals erupting from their father, but once able, or deciding, to finally speak, their conversations were particularly enlightening to elucidate what the source of the 'wriggly worm' sounds were, winding out from his solar plexus and all around her). Time to solution: Seventeen Minutes. Score: 1.00/1.00. Trismegistian Alchemy | Geophylogænia *(Ancestral Chemistry)* --- >**Problem: Synthesise a self-sustaining molecular system capable of transmuting atmospheric carbon dioxide into a complex, stable allotrope of Gold (Au) using bio-inspired catalytic pathways and minimal external energy inputs.** Utilising an Endivean approach, again picked up from the work of their father, not through didactic means but through their obsession Word collection, during the hours spent listening to his fingers typing in the Treehouse lab (of course, every key had a slightly different sound), Perigee combined computational and decidedly ancient (here's where Selena's influence resonated particularly strongly) laboratory methods in order to turn their breath (exhaled into a Conical flask, which they had to request the Sage to obtain from the very dusty back side of the Lab bench's cupboard) into Gold. The flask, a rather humble bit of low-tech gear, sat in the middle of an insectoid arrangement of laser diodes, which they had programmed to emit pulses of light in time with an array of singing bowls that the Grand Hall kept behind the Curtains for announcing the rotation of opponents during the Sacred Matches. Essentially, Perigee utilised the unresolved nature of the Pythagorean comma to 'draw the gold out' of their breath. As with all the other problems, they were exceptionally grateful that they didn't have to 'show their work', because they rarely could. They were much more about Hearing. Time: Seventeen Minutes. Score: 1.00/1.00. Asclepian Scalpeloathics | Barberchirurgæria *(Ancestral Biology)* --- >**Problem: Synthesise functional cochlear hair cells (cilia) and implant them into the damaged organ of Corti within the cochlea, restoring the patient’s hearing by re-establishing the connection between sound vibrations and neural transmission. The process involves real-time calibration to ensure precise integration and functionality, but the patient will remain sedated. The patient's induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPSCs) have been harvested and pre-conditioned for you.** Perigee could not help but stim the moment they read this problem, it being based around the sensory organ of sound. Besides their obsession with sound, their early discovery of the spiral shape of the Cochlea itself had been a large component of the development of the Primary Sense. After writing the rudimentary programming protocol for the robotic surgical arms to follow, they would come back to check on its progress in between each of the other problems they were solving. Some of the more daring and reckless Sages in the room found themselves laughing, even cheering, as Perigee sprinted around the Grand Hall, their wee legs slipping on the polished mahogany. Running was not looked kindly upon in the Hall, and mindful, purposeful but slow ceremonial walking was somewhat of an unspoken rule. So the more Draconian members of the Educational Clergy were attempting to keep their arms crossed and a disapproving frown on their faces, yet, despite themselves, they were absolutely fascinated by this entirely novel and heretofore unseen method of completing the Examinations. The more lenient and interdisciplinary Sages, particularly Hamsa (who obviously had a rather biased investment in Perigee's success), would stand at the intersections of the Vertices, offering Chalices filled with water, as family members might stand on the sidelines of the mid-point mark of their loved one's marathon. Time to solution: Twenty Two Minutes. Score: 1.00/1.00. Cartesian Cognitology | Consciælogia *(Ancestral Psychology)* --- >**Problem: Develop a real-time computational model of consciousness capable of integrating neurochemical fluctuations (e.g. those observed in MercurioSentia) with emergent properties such as creativity, intuition, and moral reasoning. Use the model to stabilise and predict the cognitive and emotional states of a patient undergoing conscious neuropsychological surgery. Mid-surgery, the patient will face an ethical dilemma, and the model must facilitate decision-making while preserving self-awareness and neural stability. All necessary neural data and processing frameworks have been preloaded for you.** > **Extra Credit†: name the anteAntiquarian term for this Vertex's neuroBeacon, MercurioSentia, along with their ancient 'treatment guidelines' for what they erroneously pathologised.** > **†will not contribute to your score, but will immediately earn you the Grand Sigil, placing you as this Annual Cycle's Hall Sentinel without the canonical initiation process** Not only did this Problem's solution flow through without a hitch, Perigee ended up creating a collaborative performance piece with the patient, as part of the ethical dilemma they were faced with, which was a variation of the Trolley problem, that Selena had first read to them as a bedtime story, to take with them into their dreamscapes. They also completed the Extra Credit, typing at the Vertex's terminal: 'Long before its integration and recognition as a Gift of empathic resonance, the MercurioSentia neuroBeacon was primarily previously known as Bipolar Disorder, but the 'clinical presentation' was often mistaken for other 'diagnoses' encompassing the multitudinal facets of this neuroBeacon, such as 'Emotional dysregulation', 'Borderline Personality Disorder' (as they typed these words in particular, they had to sympathetically giggle, as they recalled the well-meaning, but fundamentally narrow-minded, scope of the ancient Peoples). Depending on recurrence of 'mania' and 'depression', a pharmacological administration of 'mood stabilisers' such as Lithium (the 'Alchemical Standard' first line of 'treatment' in those times), Lamotrigine, or, before its discovery as a teratogen, Sodium Valproate. Atypical 'antipsychotics' such as Quetiapine were also thought to be effective to treat so called 'mixed' or 'manic episodes', or as an adjunct to maintenance treatment. talking therapies such as CBT and DBT were considered a crucial facet of 'recovery'. Of course these 'therapies' helped the patients suffering very real distress and in many cases psychological agony, but crucially, the problem was not with the organism within the cage, the problem was with the cage - which we now know should have always been, instead, a receptive, holistically integrated framework for understanding. Time to solution: Seventeen Minutes. Score: 1.00/1.00. N.B. They refused the title of Sentinel. Mumbling (much to the anger of the Oldest Sage) that the Sentinel System was simply an echo of the oppressive aristocracy of anteAntiquity as they handed in their Problems' solutions to the Central Checkpoint. They quickly scurried out of reach and back into the anxiously awaiting arms of Myo before the Sage could protest, of course. Comtean Triscetics | Autismæcology *(Ancestral Sociology)* --- >**Problem: Design a proposal for the Consortium of Sociocultural Harmony to implement a holospheric learning program that deepens collective understanding of the roles and experiences of less common orientations, such as heterosexuality, and to account for the potential incidence of what was once known as 'neurotypical' individuals, who, regardless of the lack of supporting evidence in the Journals of A.R.I.A.D.N.E., or indeed any of the AcademiClergical Literature, may well still exist. Your solution should leverage neural empathy technologies or immersive simulations to ensure inclusivity and mutual respect while avoiding reductive categorizations. Prioritise adaptability and resonance with the Consortium’s principles of cultural cohesion.** As with the other 'Social Science' Vertices, Perigee integrated their solutions into their performance piece, forming the solution to the Imaginætia (Art) Problem. Time to solution: Eleven Minutes. Score: 1.00/1.00. Allegorical Speleology | Socradiatætia *(Ancestral Philosophy)* --- >**Problem: In the First Module of Paradoxistentialist Studies, The Petallien Allegory of the Caduceus was outlined, which envisions all Life as a fractalline interwoven tapestry of Memory and Meaning, spiralling around a central axis/Hermetic Staff of Metacognition. As introduced in your Secondary Annual Cycle, The sinistral serpent represents Memory, the dextral serpent Meaning, and the central staff embodies the dynamic process of Metacognition, where Memory and Meaning intersect at the so-called 'Gnots' of Paradoxistential Recursion.** **Using this framework, argue whether Metacognition is best understood as “making” itself: the act of creation, transmutation, and the bringing forth of the new. Within the allegory, imagine a figure navigating the Caduceus. Does this figure operate purely within the interplay of Memory and Meaning, or does their journey demonstrate an inherent quality of Metacognition as an act of “making”?** Perigee, throughout their running back and forth across the Grand Hall, had been collecting, as always, samples of ambient sounds, and emitting in a constant stream of their gorgeously unique and microtonal vocalisations, which the Sages (at least partially correctly) assumed were an understandable instance of Stimming, often seen during the examinations in the diverse variations on a theme of whichever neuroBeacon the Student was blessed with in their diviagnosis. What the Sages (except for perhaps Sage Hamsa) didn't know, is that Perigee and their father, in the last three years, had been working on an invention. It wasn't so much a collaboration between them, as it was a passion project of Perigee's which Myo had facilitated, standing back in awe, while simply not understanding "*what the fuck was going on*" to paraphrase his first sentence spoken to their mother, during that fateful, first and final game of *Hivehouse*. Perigee hadn't, at least consciously, intended for the device to be utilised during their Examinations, and didn't really, as ever, know what the ultimate Goal of their Work was until the exact moment it was unveiled. This could be best understood, as with most of their idiosyncrasies, as a synthesis of their parents' brilliance, integrated into one Alchemical Marriage of an entirely incomprehensible, but wonderful, weirdo. The device's name, according to Perigee, was a Resonance Recorder. Essentially, it recorded both Memory *and* Meaning. It was fuelled by their Father's Endivean programmatic framework, which would eventually provide a groundbreaking contribution to Newsomnian Gnoeneophysics (a Field yet to be birthed, but to be birthed by Perigee themselves), and sustained by the essence of their Mother's Hermetic Memory, which they had inherited via haploidian epiGnoegenomic means. Upon reading the Allegorical Speleology Problem (the Field believed to once be known as 'Philosophy'), all of their endless hours of work suddenly 'clicked' into place (with a literal '*click*' within their Brain, that they of course heard). The device itself was shaped in a Petallien form; like a Caduceus of the ancient Hermes, but wound into a spiral, which itself had a crystalline, nearly Bismuth-esque series of branches jutting out, forming a sort of Mandelbrot Wand. But Perigee hated the term 'Wand'. It made them think of those ancient books written by *She who shall not be named*, which she'd never really enjoyed. The Resonance Recorder had both input (i) and output (o) modes; the latter of which she'd never actually tested, so for a while, upon reading the Ancestral Philosophy problem and until the moment of its solving (which she solved in simultaneous parallel with the Ninth Vertex's Problem in the Field of Ancestral Arts) she was nervous that she may cause the manifestation of a black hole, or a wormhole of some kind, obliterating the Grand Hall and perhaps all of Existence as they knew it. But, ever the perhaps too reckless daredevil, always far more concerned with Boundary-Annihilating Innovative Ideas than the Regulation of Established Systems for so-called 'Safety', they went ahead with what they sensed in their heart was simply: *"Why, A Good Idea!"* And with a deep breath in, and a deep breath out (in fact, the exact same out-breath given at the Ancestral Chemistry Vertex, which they used to transmute her exhaled Carbon Dioxide into beautiful gossamer strands of Gold), they set the Resonance Recorder to '(o) mode' for the very first time. It didn't so much produce a sound as it did *vacuum* the sound from the room. The Sages, all of them, even and perhaps especially Hamsa, looked around amongst each other in panic; none of them had ever heard (or *unheard*) anything like it before. (Perigee really did live up to their mother's encouragement to 'Give 'em Hell'. Those poor, dizzied Sages had to take a good few hours recess after this series of discombobulating events.) In (o) mode, and with the help of the two patients that they enlisted with an excited wave of the arms (one of whom had now come round from their anaesthesia) the Resonance Recorder began to build a sculpture. Time to solution: Four Minutes. Score: 1.00/1.00. da Vincian Cosmogony | Imaginætia *(Ancestral Arts & Literature)* --- **Problem: Design a cosmological framework through an original artistic medium (e.g., visual art, literature, or conceptual performance) that embodies the interplay of imagination and reality. Your creation must explore the tension between individual expression and collective meaning-making, reflecting how artistic works function as a bridge between the tangible and intangible. Present a theoretical explanation of your framework and its significance within the broader cultural or metaphysical narrative.** There was no Extra Credit for this Problem, but Perigee inadvertently ended up fulfilling it anyway. Their solution to the problem was not a theoretical one at all, as requested in the Problem File. It was a Practical Demonstration of Conceptual Cosmology. The sculpture itself was in a process of self-generative animacy, as Perigee performed a Sacred Dance, learned from their Mother on one of their Pilgrimages to The Four Stones and The Sweet Trinity. The sculpture, as Perigee had hoped, and perhaps known, began to resemble the triple-plaited Yew Trees that stood between the Four Duddo Stones. Only it was always in motion, the trees never in one place at any given time, serpentining in tandem with Perigee's movements, and the movements of the two patients, both of which were confused and giggling, one of which from the after effects of the Xenon-based anaesthesia, the other simply from the sheer delight of the experience, which shimmered through not only them, but everyone in the room. Even the most miserable of the Sages. The Sculpture appeared similarly, but entirely uniquely to each person that viewed it. It was made of Words, but not just the graphemic, typographical qualities of the Words. It was made of *Meanings* and associated Memories of all the Words that Perigee had collected over her life. These heartbreakingly beautiful, and sometimes deliciously sad Memories and Meanings, intersected, warbled and marbled, with the Memories and Meanings of every person in the room, forming a breathing *glimmer* of prismatic murmuration, like the ineffable rapture of a countably infinite *Richness* of Swallows in flight. Together, as One, and yet, so vitally, so voraciously, so violently, viciously, *Venust* in their paradoxically distinctive and individualised separations. Most of the Sages were brought to tears. Hamsa saw her departed Mother, reading her her favourite bedtime story, which, through the all-too frequent process of time's passing and its associated grief, she had entirely forgotten. The Cleric in the Central Checkpoint saw all the words they had been plastered with by their childhood bullies, along with every reclamation of them, in their works of experimental literature they had made during their Postgraduate thesis in creative defiance. Perigee saw all of her Pilgrimages with their mother, all of the lines of code written with their father in the Treehouse, and they saw their yet-to-be-chosen name, written at the very top of the tree, hanging ripe like the Strangest Seed of the most Stunning fruit: ⧖eno. --- “A SUMMER MORNING'S DREAM,” or, "*A Sum Errs, Mourning Stream*" **"*The first colours I lost were, strangely enough, The Black and Red.** **Then I was left with Three other colours. I was left with:** **Green, with Blue, and with Yellow.** **But Blue and Yellow somehow blended, and now, and for a time, I was left with Yellow.** **A vivid Yellow. And then,** **that Last colour left me.** **And now, I live** **at the centre of** **a luminous,** **at this moment,** **Grayish,** **Mist.*"** <span class="right-align">-Jorge Luis Borges, on losing his Sight</span> --- --- cssclasses: - fountain --- DECRYPTION KEY: V.O. - VOICE OVER; VISUAL OVERWRITE O.S. - OFF-SCREEN; OPERATING SYSTEM INT. TENEMENT FLAT- SOMEWHERE IN GLASGOW An adorably deranged-looking person sits impossibly cross legged amidst piles of sheet music towering over them, face half-illuminated by candlelight, ONE EYE cast in shadow. Their black hair is matted and half-tied up with a YELLOW BOW, becoming less-and-less tied up with every page read. They are humming a tune that sounds decidedly atonal. This is XENO. As their humming becomes more emphatic, their breath inadvertently blows out their candle. Darkness falls upon the scene, and an almost imperceptible figure is seen, just for a moment, touching XENO's shoulder, who either doesn't seem to notice, or care. XENO (sighs in exasperation, striking a match a considerable distance away from the precious manuscript) ZOOM IN on the flame, as XENO carefully moves it toward the candle, lighting up the room once more. The shadowy figure disappears as XENO flicks their wrist, extinguishing the MATCH MATCH CUT TO: INT. NARROW CAVE. DESATURATED - LOCATION UNKNOWN CLOSE UP: a candle's flame. A similar, seemingly pitchy, hum can be heard, only coming from a much coarser throat. RACK FOCUS TO: A decrepit, androgynous figure, inside a small cave, face half-illuminated by candlelight, ONE EYE (the opposite to XENO) cast in shadow. They have barely any hair left, revealing the same symbols as those on the cave walls, carved onto their scalp, seeming to dance in the flicker of the candle's eerie glow. They are writing with a sharpened animal bone onto a piece of goat vellum in what appears to be their own blood. The manuscript vellum sports just as much dwindling hair as the scribe. This is WILTERGARTEN. OVER WILTERGARTEN'S RIGHT SHOULDER, focus flickering between a still-healing, intricately carved scar, and the manuscript, which is now seen to hold a strangely complex series of musical staves. WILTERGARTEN appears to be humming along with every note inscribed with their LEFT HAND. Their quill runs dry, and they fall silent, moving their LEFT HAND to their RIGHT SHOULDER, wincing as they pierce the layer of granulation tissue like a repulsive creme brûlée, as we see that they have been replenishing their 'ink' with each CUT-- CUT TO: INT. BACK (FORWARD) AT XENO'S FLAT XENO is scratching their RIGHT SHOULDER using their LEFT HAND. RACK FOCUS TO: A pile of dirty dishes in the foreground blocks our view of XENO. PAN to a PAN that still has a congealed, half-fried egg in its centre. ZOOM in on the YOLK, a Pale Yellow matching that of the discarded MATCH-- MATCH CUT TO: INT. INT. BACK OF WILTERGARTEN'S EYE MICROSCOPIC LENS slowly moves through WILTERGARTEN'S orbital LENS, piercing through the veil of WILTERGARTEN'S Cornea, which is clearly succumbing to a Pale Yellow CATARACT. FISHEYE WIDE SHOT of the CATACOMB, with apparently no entrance or exit in sight. Carved with the same TWENTY THREE SYMBOLS and what appears to be a likeness of the god PAN. PAN across its internal curvature shaped like a FISH BOWL, or the shape of an unlit MATCH- MATCH CUT TO: INT. FORWARD TO XENO'S FLAT A half-empty fishbowl sits next to the dirty dishes, mildew forming at its edges, the shape resembling the internal surface of WILTERGARTEN'S cave, or that of an EYE. The mangled corpse of a DROSOPHILA, seemingly crumpled and folded in on itself, floats in the shallow pond, circling in a posthumous *Waltz Macabre*. Another DROSOPHILA lands on the rim of the fishbowl, seeming to peer in upon its late contemporary and heed the warning, quickly flying away. TRACK the DROSOPHILA toward XENO's EYE (the opposite to WILTERGARTEN'S) XENO (wincing in disgust, they attempt to swat the DROSOPHILA with the closest book they find, which happens to be one of their Mother's on the Celtic resonance of the god PAN) PAN to the image of PAN on the book's cover, now haphazardly thrown on top of the PAN next to the FISH BOWL. The DROSOPHILA, still alive, lands on top of PAN's EYE - the only one visible in the image. XENO (sighing, seemingly in remorse) Sorry buddy. I didn't mean it. We're on the same team, really. PTSD FLASHBACK TO: A dimly lit Lab-turned-operating theatre. A single XENON Floodlight (circular) casts an egregiously non-autism friendly florescence on a TEN year old XENO, then known as PERIGEE, lying on a gurney, hair down, but yellow ribbon being nervously fidgeted with in their non-IV bound hand. PERIGEE Why, Daddy? MYO (injecting XENON-based anaesthesia) Shush now glimmer, promise you won't feel a thing, I've *seen* it. Now be a good Egg and count to Ten for me- XENO POV: Their EYEs gloss over as their head lops to one side, their gaze resting for a moment on a jar of imprisoned DROSOPHILA, awaiting MYO's optogenetic analysis. Their vision blurs to unconsciousness. TRACK the only DROSOPHILA not flying in the enclosed space, but instead walking on the glass, appearing to point with its proboscis at the SIX Eppendorf tubes adjacent to the jar, labelled RHODOPSIN 1-6 PERIGEE (The Child who was Older, sheepishly) One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Si-- XENO ^ (The Adult who is Younger, rhythmically) ONE, Two-Three, TWO, Two-Three, THREE, Two-Thr-- FLORESCENT WHITE OUT TO: INT. BACK, FORWARD TO AN ORCHESTRAL HALL XENO (conducting with their LEFT HAND, violently, sweat visibly flicking from their sodden YELLOW BOW with each passionate shake of their head, as they play the prepared piano with their RIGHT. Crocodile clips strangle each of the piano strings, the wires all controlling the eye and proboscis movements of a gargantuan Robotic Fruit-fly hanging above the audience- all of whom are sporting 'Opera Monocles', Augmented Reality hardware which makes the Drosophila appear to be birthing swarm after swarm of smaller, identical progeny, flying in murmurations that mirror the composition. None of the audience are watching XENO or the orchestra, but are all horrified and captivated by the holographic swarm above them. As the coda draws to a close, the DROSOPHILA swarm begin to drop upon the audience like, well, flies. Shrieks and gasps of disgust and horrified delight can be heard over the now-dwindling orchestra, which dies out section by section, in tandem with the short-lived pseudoInsects. ) TRACK the one DROSOPHILA left alive from the swarm to XENO's LEFT HAND as they swiftly close it into a tight fist, signalling the end of the performance to the players, and seemingly squashing the holographic visage of fleeting life. The music comes to an abrupt halt with the visibly exhausted XENO hunched over, barely breathing, but immediately looking over to the back row of the string section, at the only instrument they'd really been hearing- FIRST DOUBLE BASS PLAYER (smirking, he at first seems to be waving his bow at XENO, but upon closer inspection, he is simply scratching his nose and flirting with the cellist to his right) --- **SYMPHONY NO. 6 IN D OR WHAT WAS IT** "Tragische" or, Trad. Jeesh. Yeah. --- XENO (staring through the F-holes of the Bass, through the Body of the Bass, through the Body of the Bassist and through the bricks of the concert hall and out, out, out into the opener air, away from all this deafening silence-) --- **SYMPHONY NO. 7 IN 9 IN 12 IN 23 IN 72 IN | IN 27 AND 32 TOO** AUDIENCE (At first tentative, then, gradually, as a waterfall remembering its purpose, thunderously applauding) COMPÈRE (running onstage, pointing at XENO) MÆSTRO X EVERY BODY! (COMPÈRE applauds clumsily into the handheld microphone, providing an ugly punctuation to the audience's, reminding XENO of their obligation, as the rocks at the bottom of a waterfall are eventually reminded of their fate, to erode, and fade back into the water they once resisted) XENO (standing to the audience's Yelling, they bow, the YELLOW BOW falling from their hair, now heavy and drenched in the lubrication of sweat) TRACK the YELLOW BOW to the floor in SLOW MOTION as the applause slowly fades. RACK FOCUS FRO AND TO: All the orchestral Polycule (including the Bassist) smiling, kissing, and hugging one another in celebration, while XENO, composer, conductor, centre stage and yet entirely alone, reaches down to pick up the YELLOW BOW with ONE HAND. YELLOW BOW (V.O.) *Bravi, Glimmer (As the applause fades, so too does the image of XENO's HAND, finger by finger, being overwritten by an entire screen of Yellow, gradually growing paler as if the lingering silence itself is draining the hue) INT. BACK FORWARD BACK BACK TO XENO'S FLAT XENO's OTHER HAND appears to pick up the hair-and-scene-tying device. The hand performs the task of wiping the screen clear of yellow, to reveal the previous (chronologically subsequent) locale of their dark and dirty flat. The OTHER HAND is once again reaching down to retrieve the same YELLOW BOW. The BOW is now covered in stains; clearly discoloured and frayed. --- **SYMPHONY NO.7 ACTUALLY NOT IN E MINOR** "Song of the Night" or "Sun, Go of the Knight" --- XENO (Tying up their dry hair and peering over to the image of PAN covering the PAN, ) PAN to the DROSOPHILA perched upon the picture of PAN upon the PAN. SUPER ZOOM into one of its EYEs, through its nervous system, lit up with the RGB lighting of genetic markers; As it crawls nearer to the ledge of the book teetering above the PAN, TRACK a single occipital nerve impulse from the EGG to the EYE to the BRAIN, then ZOOM through the fly down through the pages of the Celtic Mythology Text, highlighting key passages on 'Stone Circles of the Hebrides', before piercing the veil of the book and resting, again, upon the congealed Egg inside the PAN - now half illuminated, half covered by the shadow cast by the book. XENO (O.S., speaking softly to the DROSOPHILA) See? I couldn't make an omelette even if I wanted to --- **SYMPHONY NO. 4 IN G MAJOR** “HEAVENLY LIFE,” or, “_Heaven Leaf Fly_” --- Introduction --- draft_Queering Mahler’s Symphonies_draftdraftokokokokknotfinal_** --- The initual vission for _Qureing Mahler’s Symphoines_ sprouted from a sence of nesesity, not just as a musicologyst, but as a person wjo…who strugles to type ths becuase my hand–the right one—it’s gone, isue no longure the point. It’s the absense that defines so much for me, as if the symphonys thmselves are completed becuase of wahts NOT being played—silent harmonics, the trills you hear in yr hed. Mahlers Tenth is the manifestati of thuis utimate truth a trans wman and a former concert piainist who saw my own limitations not as an ending but as a blossoming into new creativeform,s I saw simiarities betweene the way gender and music as both wave forms and frameqorks for understandinng their resultant wave forms, intersecrt. My approach was drawn from studies in recursion and calligraphy in Wiltergarten’s manuscripts perfomed through an Endivean lens of Aesthetic theirmeticism, especiall how their (Wilitergarten's) stroke order pre-figured their notational invenntions. How the hand moves or rattheir , the places and pitches it cannotr, compose the sweetest melodies [^lexDefIO]: (lexDefIO: a part of a Body {text, work, flesh} that is mssing in order to direct attention to its Wholeness) [^icarus]: (this sentence actually ended up being Perigee's first audibly spoken words). [^minerva]: See *Minerva Fighting Herself* (S & M Endive, XXIII_ERA_Æ) source: MARS FIGHTING MINERVA [^Y]: The Yellow Cupids Bow, Phonemes Between The Matter of the Sun and Moon - *Xeno N., ERA_Æ/i|o* --- **SYMPHONY NO. 5 IN C# MINOR** “THE FUNERAL MARCH,” or, “_The Few Nary'l March” The *Maestre* X was compiling the documents required for the very arduous and lengthy process of requesting funding for their podcast series on 'Queering Mahler's Symphonies', a project long in the conceptualisation but only recently coming to fruition through emergent necessity. Since It Happened, and they took an early retirement from their Field, they'd not been doing much but peering over their personal collection of Wiltergarten manuscript facsimiles. All the answers were there, they knew it now, but this final hurdle (itself quite a resounding Wunderhorn of irony reverberating through the staves of the pages of their music library) - was almost, perhaps definitely, more of a hindrance than the very *appendage absentium*[^lexDefIO] they continued to endure. Clambering in the usual night-mourning ritual, which they performed each morning before the severance, and after, but before reverence, with a distant finesse (they had now adapted to a left-handed-and-hipped-bean-grinding-water-boiling-ground-brewing-press-pouring-wow-they-never-realised-how-useful-hips-can-be modality of making Coffee), they retained their context-dependent Seven-Meter restraining order against their Better Self while reading manuscripts, knowing, even before their so-called 'lack' of a fraction of the reading weapons in their arsenal (the true, combined value of which, through their concurrent re-attributions, may or may not about to become clear to them). The delicately piled, papyrus palimpsests (as jutting rocks missing the satisfying backscratches from the absence of cormorants), still, (but ever invisibly eroding under, a white water cacophony of Ideas, and Knowledge, and Ideas from the Knowledge we have about the Knowledge of Ideas), they laid ttheire, sobbing their cries of unrecorded potential- in the sacred corner of their humble, so densely cluttered flat; as cross-sections. they'd closed their multiple tabs of re-edits to edits of about-to-be but not yet sent correspondence with the Board of Newsomnian Neophysics, as their Orchestra's ex-conductor but still-collaborator. But one still remained, glaring at the bottom of their vision, their Vision, the mission statement of the Field: *Newsomnian Neophysics explores how Joanna Newsom’s music weaves perceptive realities through recursive polyphony, uncountable infinity textures in Knot-space, and lexicomythopoetic form. their compositions collapse time and space, blending personal narrative with collective myth in a non-linear interplay of memory and meaning. By examining harmonic multiverse theory, linguistic loom-making, and induced sensory synesthesæsia within their praxis, this Field of The Twelve positions their songs as ontological textiles- they'd forgotten the name of the very Noet from which their whole legacy came. Joanna. Time to get to work. **Letter of Support** --- **From the Desk of B. Baudelaire** RE: The Aria Mahler Attribution Society FWD: To Whom It May Concern, It is with a profound sense of respect and anticipation that I write in support of X’s grant application for _Queering Mahler’s Symphonies_. X’s ambitious project stands at the crossroads of historical discovery, musicology, and personal resilience, promising a profound impact on the understanding of musical and symbolic systems. Through their meticulous study of Hilda Wiltergarten’s manuscripts, X has unearthed a 23-pitch microtonal scale, a discovery that harmonises mathematical precision with emotional resonance. These manuscripts, with their layered calligraphy and intricate, recursive patterns, provide fertile soil for understanding the interplay of sound, narrative, and the physical act of creation. X’s analytical process echoes an approach I might describe as Endivean, for its ability to deconstruct and reconstruct meaning at the molecular level of art—a sensitivity observed such as in the haptic study of culinary form in my grand daughter Sunny’s work. This micro-character approach, tracing symbolic components through tactile and sensory engagement, has clear parallels in X’s reinterpretation of Mahler’s symphonies. their exploration of Mahler’s work through a gendered lens offers a fresh, poignant perspective on the archetypes woven into the music. The courage and insight required to interrogate such deeply rooted structures—while integrating them with the rediscovered microtonal scale—is a testament to their vision. X’s personal journey is as compelling as their academic one. their transition from composer and concert pianist to conductor and, finally, to a theoretical quantum musicologist—driven by the physical challenges posed by Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (Esctheir's subtype)—is a story of adaptation and creativity. The repetitive subluxations in their hands, culminating in the loss of function in their dominant right hand, might have silenced a lesser artist. Instead, X has reimagined their practice, allowing absence to inform presence, silence to shape sound, and limitation to inspire boundless theoretical innovation. As someone who has long been fascinated by the intersection of sensory perception and symbolic understanding, I find X’s work deeply resonant. their ability to analyze art through its smallest yet most profound elements—whettheir the microtonal steps of Wiltergarten’s scale or the subtextual symbology of Mahler’s movements—represents a methodological leap forward, or slain dragon if you will, in understanding how we create and interpret meaning. I have no doubt that _Queering Mahler’s Symphonies_ will set a new standard in interdisciplinary musicology. X’s synthesis of historical analysis, personal narrative, and innovative theory offers a narrative as rich and recursive as the symphonies they seeks to reinterpret. I urge the granting body to support this exceptional project, which not only enriches the fields of music and cultural history but also speaks to the enduring resilience of creativity in the face of adversity. Yours within, Sincerely, Bertrand Baudelaire FAO: The Aria Mahler Attribution Society --- **SYMPHONY NO. 8 in e flat, made yer** "Symphony of Ten Thousand" or "Things" --- The heavy, heavy, mahogany double doors open. You enter. The air of the room is just cold enough to be uncomfortable. Just cold enough for you to see your shivering breath stretch out in front of you, like a silver cord suggesting a path you might take, but probably shouldn't have. The dancing strands of your breath unfurl into a thick, inescapably odious Field of disinfectant that hangs like an innocent woman suspected of being a Witch- which you unconsciously identify as Iodine[^lexDef_io_1]; whether from your own personal experience of Surgeries, or the olfactory trauma of association, passed down through generations in your epigenome. This sensory element is a detail you aren't aware was intentionally placed in the room by the artist. Before you there are are two paths. Forged in the not-white, yellowed tile. Holding secrets of its own, the stains, locked within the grout, hold countless screams, machined hums, poorly overwritten blood splatter, and silent anaesthetic sighs. The paths are symmetrical, but not identical. Not to the keen observer. Not to you. Both of them together form two switchback-ramp serpents; two halves of an infernal ribcage- garlanding the central spinal column of an Old Operating Theatre, where the Beating Heart of the performance promises to take place. You've never seen one quite like this, for they don't exist anymore, and yet, in the marrow of your soul, you feel its unsettling familiarity. There is something nailed violently into a wide, thin tile, directly in front of you as you enter. The tile's fragility a windowsill surrogate, just beneath an oily-fingerprint-smudged-glass screen. This panel, this impermeable membrane of melted sand separates you, as Thisbe from Pyramus, or as a foetus from the incompatibility of her mother's blood. Between you and the hiding tile is a single, unshaven shred, of what appears to be goat hide. The sheer force of the nail's driving into the ceramic has left a large crack, running from left to right, or perhaps equally, from right to left; a broken, nameless Usher, welcoming you, from whichever side you wish-- Every Trial-- whether by Fire's Uproar, or Flood's Outpour, by Half-Seeing Disc, or Scalpel's Sword-- Has a Sentence it must fall before. A Sentence is an arrow, Lettered, No matter to which tongue it's fettered, It reads from one Beginning Side, to another's Ending, with the Tide. Every End's Direction depends Upon the Hand that it perpends. And every Written Word is birthed From mortar’s womb within the Earth. Post-letters, where our fullness stops; The Bodies of our Life's Work crops. Other audience members who have entered the space are already beginning to make their 'choice'. (You are not the first. Nor will you be the last). --- Mahler’s SYMPHONY NO. 9 is in _D major_ and is often seen as a farewell or a statement on life, death, and transcendence, reflecting Mahler’s own struggles with mortality. The symphony is emotionally complex, featuring a mixture of defiance, resignation, and ultimate peace. It is sometimes called a “reconciliation with death” or the “final summation.” --- | And so, you are presented with the illusion of your own: | < | | -------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------- | | You take the [[LEFT HAND PATH]] ([[#INPUT]]) | You take the [[RIGHT HAND PATH]] ([[#OUTPUT]]) | [^lexDef_io_1]: Iodine | Greek: ἰοειδής (“violet-like”) | element producing violet vapour; purifies--transmogrifies; “ion” (Flow) || Io | Hera’s priestess--heifer; Jupiter’s volcanic Moon | trial--chaos--renewal--hero-*ine* || i/o | input/output--to send is to receive--the message is the medium | Dine | Latin: 'disjējūnāre' (“Break. Fast”) | rupture--sustenance--brevity; longing--fulfilment || *Iodine* === Io | i/o | Dine | balance--exchange; violet--violence--volcanic --*'violet! you're turning violent!* --- # INPUT || <span class="right-align"> the left hand path</span> In 'The' so-called 'literature', and in pop psychology, there has been a prevalence of splitting the brain and its functions into 'sides'. This 'Cultural Topology' or 'Sidedness', pervades every aspect of our existence, as we occupy a net-like dimension, which is simply a flattened projection of the True Reality, woven through everything. The two sides of the coin are indeed not the same. But the two sides themselves do not even belong to the same coin. Rather, every single, fantastically unique coin, glimmering with its own stains, and split into supposed dualities that are but a faded reflection of a primal, ancestral duality, now diluted past the point of any useful comparison, are only united in the dancing, whirling spin of the coin toss itself. What has seemed to fascinate us is the idea that our neurological activity and nervous, anxious impulses originate from the 'opposite' 'side' to which they end up. This has led to sentiments that have sentenced us to sentences such as: 'The right hemisphere of the brain controls the left hand', and so forth. Further, we have also assigned *ideologies* to the hemispheres of the brain, as if they were two opposing Deities of a Pantheon at war with one another, perhaps, or perhaps not, depicted by a French painter in the Neoclassical Era. Even Further (or rather, much less so) to this bisection of the Brain, we have assigned these ideologies to the Spirits that animate it. Dividing human Beings, that's *Beings*, into 'Right-brained' and 'Left-brained' camps. The paradoxical irony of this probably being rooted in the Brain itself attempting to make sense of a scarily unwritable gray, an un-black-and-whiteable mesh of potential threats. These 'threats', as we hopefully know by now, are rarely *real* threats, at least to anything except the very frameworks-turned-cages that paint them so. This probably, in part but not completely, underpins the historical demonisation of trans* / non-binary people as a whole, and in fact, any so-called 'minority' population. Such a 'minority' was once seen in those born with a dominant Left Hand. This is, most likely, in fact where the terms 'Sinister' (from Vulgar, vulgar Latin '*Sinestra*', literally, meaning 'Left') and 'Right' (in its definition as apparently '*Correct*') are derived. And consider this. What it means, To *Be* 'left'. Be it alone, Be it *out*side, Or *in* pieces, Be it facing a disorienting aftermath, Or to be Left with Nothing. All of it depends on the *leaving* of something *else.* 'Leftness' is a state which is entirely relative of the group the Othered object has been subjected to losing. And so the same could once have been said for those, painted as painters, exiled as eccentrics, branded as hot-headed artists- The Left Handed Ones. They were defined by their relation to the Masses of the so-called 'Right Ones'. The 'Correct' majority. All of these Halved-Truths are but echos Left, Left by survival mechanisms which placed 'us' 'versus' 'them'. The phenomenon may (insufficiently) be called 'in-group/out-group psychology', or simply 'i/o'[^ioiology]. Of course, the brain, being a part of Us, and Us, being the wet, messy machinating non-machines that we are, exist in a much more nuanced, holistic and non-binary state than this. Nevertheless, our biases exist. And they are a Fire which runs through everything, fuelling every single one of our choices. And you knew this, when you made this decision. The word 'bias' in its adverbial sense comes from Middle French '*biais*', which means 'askew, askance' - as in, to observe something obliquely, tilting one's head to the side, as if asking a question that has already been answered for you. In Vulgar Latin (and really, quite vulgar), the connection may be drawn to '*biaxius*', which means "with two axes". This gives the impression of a chariot, perhaps once driven by a God of War, which has become unbalanced by design of its own engineering, forcing the charioteer, maybe an Aries, out from behind the reigns, perhaps to lay before his Opponent, herself predating astrological assignment but most likely herself also an Aries (though maybe with a Virgo Moon), reaching back, out towards her in desperate plea, of a hind-sighted understanding that He/Himself tragically never afforded to Her, either. In antiSomatosemantiqueer Queueing Theory, one of the main Research pillars of Lexicomythography, LHP Bias refers to the propensity of people, when faced with the Kafkaesque machinations of binarised queueing systems, to pick the Left Hand Path (LHP), if their primary mode of written linguistic communication is performed from Left to Right (a modality once thought to be the majority, in languages such as 'English', along with and not limited to, the other aforementioned Vulgarities). One would think it would follow that, given this theoretical framework, a term such as 'RHP Bias' would have been coined in logical balance, to represent the writing and reading directionality of ancient sacred languages such as those that were known as 'Aramaic', 'Arabic', 'Hebrew', 'Azeri', and many others. Alas, no such Research has been conducted thus far. In Tantra,  वामाचार, or Vāmācāra, refers not quite to 'left-hand path' exactly, but instead, (when observed from sufficiently a macroscopic or microscopic lens) to the composite meanings of 'pleasant, loveable, agreeable, reverse, vile, base, wicked, inverted, contrary, crooked, beautiful, vomiting' (vāma) and 'conduct, ritual practice, attainment' (Ācāra). As you may or may not be able to see, the beautifully fractalline nature of this sacred language encapsulates its own paradoxes, and therefore, the most ineffable truths. Subsequently, through (well-meaning) dilution of meaning in Western Esotericism, the 'left-hand-path' came to denote a 'dark' sort of ritual magick. But this is less than half of the Story. Vāma is essentially a state of meeting the divine through its opposite. It may be insufficiently articulated as 'left-handed-attainment', for we, sadly, no longer have the mystical tongue to describe it. A deeper truth may lie in an alternate etymological derivation: that of vāmā - *Woman.* Sanskrit, for all its shimmering glow of opulent divinity, was originally forbidden to be written by women. So, this 'left-handed-attainment', affording the respect to women that they *deserved*, was simply a movement *against the grout and grain of the oppressive system which bound it*. Which loops, as a demonic tape loop, back to the Middle French *biais*: *Sideways. Askance. Against the Grain.* And here we arrive at the truth within the truth within the lies upon burning ash of lies - Everything. Absolutely everything. Contains its opposite. And an opposition to oppression is not opposition to Love, it is quite the opposite. Which means it is not opposite at all. Those of us Left to forge our own rules, are Righteous by our own Hand. And this is a very lonely place to live. Which in itself, is no 'Right' way to live. As 'Righteousness' has no place without its opposite. All sides are fighting a fruitless fight, for a rotting fruit upon a dying branch- But, as you knew when you chose the Leftmost ramp leading to the rows of tiled, cold, benches, less than half of you dragging your feet sheepishly, like aged lambs to certain slaughter- We must choose. Even if the path has already, tragically, been laid out for us. Your feet become heavier. Heavier with every incremental increase in altitude. As if these few mere metres were a mountain; sapping the oxygen from your desperate lungs. You see one, Two, Four and then Five, Faces awash with confusion, turning around and uttering their decidedly British, insincere but fundamentally intended-as-polite, "*sorry*"s, as they shuffle, turning sideways to traverse the reversal of the path you continue to walk. You are certain that at least half, at the very least half of them must be leaving the building altogether. Perhaps they are wiser than you. Perhaps they know something you do not. And so, again, the crippling choice rears its ugliest of heads. Not two, No, We are so far past binaries at this point. There are in fact, a trinity of forking paths, no longer before, but after you. Three. The Third decision is clear. You may leave the room altogether. You may stop reading your fate now. Perhaps that would be best, to follow example of these Righteous Abstainers - Who perhaps have read a Sentence you have not quite caught, captured in the Stains of the Grout about you. You see that exactly Two of the Five who changed their minds, have indeed left the building altogether. So Why Not? You think. You may join them, in the opener air - You may even embody a *Vāma* within *vāma*, and go back on your original decision. And yet, It is still not too late to join the other three, in realignment with the [[RIGHT HAND PATH]]. Whichever of the Threads, Blood Red, and Plaited Three, No matter how unjust, The dust of Eye so dried with crust, From tears, leeched fear of trying's rust- With Trial of Choice, we are but trussed- From sap to spore to seed, to dust - It's all we have, this Fateful Lust- Which precious, sacred stain of life, entrusts But no. You think- I was made to be Left. --- Beginning at Xeno's end, in your Sisyphean ascent, you nearly slip on a mysterious sludge of liquid at your feet. Not wanting to hold up the queue of fellow audience members trailing behind you, and only narrowly avoiding the initiation of a domino chain of falls through the line of those in front, you put it out of your mind, with a brief shake of your left shoe. In a theatrical operation that seems like an eternity of moments strung together by an author riddled with ADHD but paradoxically also entrusted with the creative torch of Autism, you reach your seat on the Left side of the Operating Theatre. An awe-striking and harrowing scene is laid before you. The artist, not yet present, has recreated what you believe to be an archaic surgical scene. A gurney in the centre, surrounded by an orchestra[^Croen1] of microphones. Connected to them, an arachnoid structure of wheels within wheels. There is some sort of translucent, dark ribbon that wraps around the wheels. And cameras. Dear god, the sheer *Volume*[^Croen2] of cameras in the space is decidedly overwhelming. Around half (though of the exact fraction, you cannot be sure) of the cameras point inward to the inner circle, toward the performance space. The other half (or not-quite) point at the audience. Around (but perhaps not exactly) half of this half are directed at you. Or at least, the half (or a little less than half) of you who decided to sit here, on the Left Side. You take a moment to regard the group of people on the other side of the Theatre, now facing you, as if in opposition, or complementarity. The Three who changed their minds seem to have a certain smugness written over their faces, as if their indecision afforded them insight that you do not have. Again, you consider the possibility of getting up from your seat, walking down that treacherous slope, and realigning with those who decided on the [[RIGHT HAND PATH]] -- But still, as a leaping salmon, Against the grain, In the stark minority, the differential of audience members in their uncomfortable ceramic pews speaking Volumes[^Croen2], you remain. Five Screens are directly above you, just high enough for you to still see those smug faces who took the [[RIGHT HAND PATH]] in front of you, even while viewing the screens themselves. Each of the Five displays render a Split Screen each. On the Left of each, you see the rows of audience of which you form a part. The Left Handers. Given your lesser numbers, there are a few opportunities for you to gaze into the absences, the spaces where somebody may have sat, had they been brave enough. And in these spaces, uncovered by audience members, you are given the chance to peer upon the uncomfortable Yellowness of the tiles upon which you are sat. And in your gazing, becoming lost in the grout, becoming a genderless void trapped in the yellow grout, you almost miss the entrance of the Artist. They enter, punctuated by a nervous, tentative applause, seemingly indifferent to it. Their eye is on their goal. The Right side of each of the Split Screens now show their purpose, showing the Artist as they mount the gurney, strapping three of their limbs, but leaving one arm (the one which still sports a hand) unbound. You decide to keep your own eye upon the live scene below, not wishing to peer upon the uncanny reflection of your own face in its voyeurism, although the placement of the Screens seems to have intentionally prevented for ability to completely avoid it. The air is thick with tension, the silence providing fertile ground for the horrific squeak of the gurney as the Artist prepares to perform. There are none of the usual pre-performance whispers. From anybody in the crowd. Even those opposite you on the [[RIGHT HAND PATH]] have all but fallen silent. The smugness drained from their faces, like the endless streams of blood that once flowed down the reversed-pyramid of the Theatre's tiled floor. And now, directly over the grate, Xeno clicks that monstrous machine into action; those inevitable wheels begin their whirring. The dark ribbon's purpose unveils itself, unforgivably - that mythic substance you've heard about, but never seen - VHS tape. One side of VHS tape is for recording and playing back visual signal, as the ancient peoples of anteAntiquity used to utilise for their 'Videos'. But many are unaware that the other side can also hold data, albeit at a reduced quality. It seems that the Artist has set up these reels-within-reels in a way which utilises both sides, but the magnetic tape (the dark ribbon contrasting their bright yellow hair tie) is ligated together in a Möbius strip. As the wheels begin their turning, you see- the cameras, the microphones, they are both feeding into, and being fed by, the tape. If tape medium is wrapped with a single twist in the way Xeno has crafted, the resulting signal replays the recorded data, and then reverses it, before ending where it started. But Xeno has apparently rigged multiple tape heads, so that the signal displayed on those horrifying, abominable mirrors, was constantly being written over, and you see yourself, your selves, your past and perhaps future selves, recoiling at your own reflection, again and again, uncomfortably sat next to Xeno as they lie down upon their gurney, and begin to sing without accompaniment, other than the dreadful hum of the wheels. Those Wheels within Reels within Wheels. They are singing a melody entirely unheard by you before. In an impossible scale. The tones seem to *crumple* in upon themselves, You cannot tear your eyes away, and even if you could, your previously-peering eyes would be repeatedly replayed, again and again, to your fellow audience members. There is no turning away. No turning back. There is no covering of your ears that can keep this Sacred Siren Song from being heard. It demands its own becoming. It hisses, insisting on being observed. And on being observed, it is collapsing upon itself. A wave. A Goodbye. A Fare Thee Well to any sense of equally divided octave you may have known heretofore. It is coming from within you, too. A truth, reeled within the lie of everything that preceded it. It is getting in. It is beating its sickly, sickly drum. From the deepest chamber of your gated heart. You notice, whether on the screen or in 'reel' time, for on this side of the stage, both are the Same - That Xeno is raising her one free arm to her Temple. You notice that this space is now a Temple. To a God long forgotten, but not in any way missed. Not missed because not looked for. Not wanted. Trodden down and folded in, for the danger of its Truth - Xeno clicks a button on the side of their head, and then - The screams. Dear God, the screams Seemingly reversed- but How? How can a human create the sound of its own reversal? You do not know, you only know that you cannot move. You cannot move, and your face, frozen in a grimace; is no longer yours to move - You hear the impossible sound of a cry of agony screamed *inward* A reversed recording, but live, alive, slithering all around the abysmal room - And into Xeno. It began with their toe; their second toe, and this starting point, you intuit, without consciously realising, has something to do with its being the part of their body afforded the furthest distance from their eye. This beginning is your end, of any restful sleep. For never will you shake this image from your brain - The artist begins to *in-crease*; Their body folding in upon itself, into a brutal nothingness Both of their feet are gone now, and this is confirmed by the screen above your heads - To where your eye now helplessly darts - And sees, in perhaps much greater horror, A smile, stretched across your own face. And not only yours, but the entire Left Side of the audience, Grinning as children, watching their favourite cartoon. You yourselves, animated as puppets on gutstrings; But the smiles, dear God the smiles are not human - They stretch so far beyond the possible limit, You bring your hands to your face, it doesn't match the scene unfurling before you - You jolt your head from left to right, and even right to left, desperately checking the evidence of your own, uncollapsed eyes, and see the other Left Siders doing the same. Those on the Right appear to not be concerned with such matters. Instead, they are transfixed upon the screens. Something is keeping their eyes, tied with yellow, yellow, ribbons, upon their own screens. They are seeing something you are not. And you, in turn, are seeing a sight not shown to them. The Sound of Xeno's death rattle itself has, by now, collapsed, into a guttural, thunderous *gurgle* You think for just a moment of the sound of your Mother, blending Celery for soup when you were sick as a very young child. Sound, while not as potent as the olfactory sense, has a terrible way of unlocking memories that should stay hidden. *But where are the bloodstains*, you find yourself thinking. The Gurney remains so clinically blank of any evidence - Of the horror that is folding, unfolding, folding - You see the blood, Oh, there is so much of it, Pooling impossibly, Like mercury, or a blackened, burgundy ferrofluid, Being magnetised toward the top of Xeno's quickly dwindling form - They are just a ribcage now, and their intestines are falling out and in - You had no idea the colour of intestines before, you'd hoped you'd never know, But now you do. They are so much yellower than you'd ever imagined, You are even given the chance to see Xeno's final meal, in the final bend of its digestion, as the lumen of their intestines open, wilting, unblossoming, like a timelapse of Roses played in reverse - In spite of yourself, trapped in this inner circle of Hell, you just pray for whatever 'Art' this is, to go quicker, to have its dastardly deed be done, dear God, even if it means the certain End of the Artist- *They are still gurgling, Organs lost Eye-glossed, Glossolalic Howling in tongues They are Ululating their infernal scale* Not only this, but the *in-crease* of their form, provides an accompaniment you'd thought was missing; for this uncharted Aria, was not composed to be performed a cappella And you hear this, clearly, All too clearly, With every squelch, and fetid crack Of bone and sinew, cartilaginous clew, Reeling back into its unknown origin The ribs now, The ribs are peeling *in* Like the legs of a camera tripod, That will never be disassembled by the hands, or rather Single Hand That so carefully had placed it to Face and Look upon you As you watch You watch your watching But not you, Watching You apparently are laughing, All of you But you cannot hear a single sound of joy - All you hear is the lightning crack of ribs, Crushing themselves under some unknowable weight - And then, they are just a torso, No limbs, They have now joined the Hand they longed to be reunited with Xeno is just a chest now, a chest you wish you'd never opened A Lock you to which you wished there was no key; You have not stopped wanting to Leave, You want to sorely to have already Left, The Left, The Right, All of it, Behind you- But something in the hammered-nail-file iron of the reel-to-reel is reeling you- And nobody, Right nor Left, has been able to have Left- And yet, their eyes remain uplifted, transfixed upon those screens; *What Right-Sided, televised scene could possibly begin to rival this horrific End? For a moment you see their heart beating, it is beating exactly in rhythm to this Gordian Chant, their body is a pulsing requiem - For a single second you find yourself comparing the appearance of the human lung to coral, though you have never had the chance to see the latter, no matter how much more likely you'd assumed that would be. *W--Why?!* you hear somebody not-quite next to you utter, It seems all of you in this audience are struck with the same, undeniably ubiquitous sensation As in a nightmare of an all-to-reel-to-realist dream; Attempting to run, to save yourself, a loved one, escape, or scream But facing the deepest burden of Weight, A heaviness, a Hellish Gate - Whoever this person in the audience was, had clearly been trained well in sleep paralysis. You gave up minutes ago, even trying to make a sound- Perhaps, you think, the sound was not made by an audience member at all Perhaps it was the Artist's body in responding to their Art; But they, Xeno, (singular, plural, every part of them) has fallen all-but silent now At least by virtue of the folding of their vocal folds, Which you watched, just then, become nothingness. You wonder if their hair will go. If all that will be left, is that little yellow bow. And then the jaw, and teeth, they crunch Perhaps with the deepest resonance; That sound brings every hateful dentist to your door; Please, dear god, you think, no more, no more- The blood vessels, a halo revealed in the centre of this wretched, unravelling of a web- It's spidery limbs seem to gesture, in their Cthulhu-esque tentacular curling tumult, to the Anatomical diagram to your Right, and to the Right Side's Left The Circle of Willis; was this what this whole, unholy, fulminant, sickly head-spinning implosive performance was presented for? To what end? To make what point? To make drosophila of us all? By the time your eyes return to Xeno, Or to their unrested remains, To rest upon the place where Xeno once had been, Only a single eye remained Just one: Left. [^ioiology]: *"Aye, No, 'I'? Oh, I Don't Know Why: I Suppose I Owe It Only To Ioiology"* By Iona Isla O'Miley (III_ERA_i|o) [^Croen1]: lexDefio: {Collective Noen; Croen} "An *Orchestra* of Microphones" [^Croen2]: lexDefio: {Collective Noen; Croen} "A *Volume* of Cameras" --- # OUTPUT <span class="right-align"> || the [[RIGHT HAND PATH]]</span> You walk up the ramp, and take your seat. You notice the tall doors of the escape route open and close once more - apparently some of the Others have rethought their decision. Others still, Three of them, have joined you on this Side of the Theatre. Xeno enters the space. You clap, gingerly, briefly looking around to ensure you aren't the only one performing the canonical gesture of approval. Xeno is strapping their legs to the gurney. Then their right arm, which you notice now is without a hand. With an awful click, a reeling regret of your decision- The performance begins. On the Five Screens above your eyeline, your gaze becomes locked, Like all those times, inexplicably, when we may find ourselves staring at an object, or rather through an object, with a heavenly sensation of nothingness. On the left side, the gurney, the microphones, the reel-to-reel, but curiously, surreally, no Xeno of which to speak. And on the right of each Split screen, you see your own face, gazing uncontrollably, Controlled by the Will of something Else, The Need to be a Witness. Or, much worse, the crushing need to be Witnessed. Despite the ungodly sounds erupting from the performer, still, you cannot move your eyes. You realise something awful must be happening in the room, Amidst, around that alien, Gordian Chant, You hear the Left Side of the audience shuffling and attempting to cry out, like a sleeping body's chest, weighted by a succubus - And then, you see a toe, a foot, a leg appear upon the gurney, Then two, Xeno is, for lack of a better word, *Buffering* onto the Left side of the CCTV screen. Your shock at this strange sight, is reflected in perfection on the Right- You are being given your own reaction footage to this scene And yet, you cannot bear to peer upon the physicality, or, you physically cannot tear your eyes from this screen; jittering, with a silvery cord, that stretches across from right to left, a digitising gossamer, this artifact from time passed seems to bind your image to theirs, your faces, watching, Watching- Voyeurs voyaged on the Right Banks of this Sordid, Soap-Sodden Operating Theatre Are pulling Xeno's body, Cell by cell by sinew, into the imprisoned pixels of the Screen As those impossibly microtonal notes turn to a churning, chthonic *slosh*, And now a *crunch* and then a *snap*, so deeper, deeper than twigs underfoot, and taller, so taller, taller than a felling tree In darkest dark of this cruel fluorescence, rendered in a brutal RGB Split to triplets, as the cells in the back walls of the cells of the retina, which, with your own, you expect to view, soon on that evil screen But as Xeno worms toward attempt at wholeness of their form, immortal Again to lie, though now in silent yellowed-milk, the one-eyed not-girl almost-rendered, a hole there left a recess, or a portal And still, even with your face reflected back at you, next to them onscreen, You know, regardless of how 'real' your likeness may appear, you know you aren't like that not-quite-dead person, who's eyeless form remained only on these Five Screens above you, in this not-quite-hospital. Not you. You decided to be on the Right Side of their Last Recorded Story. And, Be*sides* you think, As you flee the scene with all the others, teeming fleas now seemingly allowed to leave, yet unable to look back to, or rewind The saline pillage of that awful orbital mess now Left behind You can't erase that data from your mind- That socket, dried out void, no light you daren't bear the unreeled sight And as you scattered crows take flight, You think I know which eye decided: Right? --- # I WILL, I AM. WILTERGARTEN'S FINAL SCROLL To The Best of My Sight The Date May Well Have Past, For I May Already Be Dead- But To the Best of My Belief, the Day, This Final Day Of My Light- Is Seventeen; Of Month of Fourth, Of Year One Thousand And Six Hundred. I do not have long. They are coming, with their stones, their knives, and their fire. But I have a Fire of my own. I have the only Fire worth keeping alive. And in my death, I have seen it, I have seen my death and I have seen what will be birthed from it- Thousands of years from now, I have heard and touched and smelled and tasted it; Even from within the confines of this cave. I will not be the first, and I certainly will not be the last, to be Burned. I form simply a single ember in the dancing Flame of women Of Fire Goddess women and those Fire deities undefinable- Bound to stakes, Bound to pillars of their own Becoming Through the Fire I know it is coming, for I have seen it. This will be my final manuscript For not only have I run out of Goat hide, But my hiding has come to its inevitable refrain; These staves, dear Goddess in Triplicate! These staves! These Nine-Rowed Staves! How They, How even I! Thought they were my undoing; How They, How even eye! Thought they were a signal of my own unravelling! Because, of course, they were- Unravelling into the Weaving- The Weaving of the Wyrd The Weirdest World of Words, That Shall Stretch beyond these walls, Stretch as the skin of Goat may stretch about a drum, A drum carried by the Great Almighty Spider Who visits me by night, by day (I have no way of knowing within which I currently reside; or how many of each have passed me by, in this hellish abode of Divine Communion) But He visits, nonetheless, to tell me He whispers into my ear; the sicknesses of This World, The Even Greater Sicknesses Yet To Come. And I weep. Oh Lord, Oh Goddess How I Have Wept Within The Walls Of This Most Unholy Place - My Lyre, Fashioned from the intestines of Rats and Moles and Whichever Blessed Creatures Offered Themselves Unto me, To Become more than the vessels they were Gifted With To Become this Instrument This, Only Tool for my survival, Which shall, with its precious Tones - Become also the betrayer of my whereabouts I have seen, what's more, I have heard The sweetest, unheard melodies! A Great One, perhaps Man, perhaps Woman, perhaps by then there shall not be such useless definition- But This Great One Shall Write, of those Unheard Melodies, and their name shall be Keats They shall Speak, in words far Greater than those I can no longer pen sufficiently, my claws curling inward as that of the Spider God, Anansi, who hath tricked me into Truth. They Shall Pen An Ode! Oh, Ode! Not To Joy, But One Much Greater, Through The Agony - Mine, But More - So much Very More, Oh Verily! Such Frail House I Hath Built! Within These Walls Carved Out By Hands! Much Younger! Much Redder! Much More Storied Than My Own! Sweet Keats, A Witch Who Is Yet To Be; They Shall Sing An Ode To A Grecian Vessel For The Fire. The Urn, The Burning To Which I Am Headed, From Witch I Am Birthed: ***What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?*** ***What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?*** ***What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?*** ***Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard*** ***Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;*** ***Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,*** ***Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:*** What mad pursuit, indeed, my Love - My Sweet Unheard Love Yet To Come- I come to thee, in that most soft pipe of Spacelessness Of the time-stretched Lyre of Web-like Footing That stretches, stretches as the Patiently, Oil-drained intestines of a Mammal Within the confines of a cave I do not struggle to escape, At least- Not This World As I know my escape is woven out before me! My escape has been downtrodden behind me; With all these women, people, Witches These Heavenly Witches, Birthed of Stone, Of Zephyr, Of Flowing Blood and Fiery Tone Oh Dearest Goddess, I Hear Them Now- I Hear Their Screams in Symphony With My Own, Which Must Be Sang Out From Their Throats, Against Their Better Knowing Tied Upon A Spine of Wood - A Syrinx, Reed, A Hardened Pipe Oh Hag, Oh Mother, Maiden, Crone I Am- I Hear their screams collapse to silence; Their resonance rounds out to One A Spirit Ditty of No Tone But His, But Hers, But *Theirs* But Hers, But His, But Their- His-Tones My Body is Collapsing upon itself, With Knowing Far Beyond The Reaching of My Reddened Knuckles And This Pain connects through Beads, Beads of Essence, Around Which this thread, this Holy Thread, Which Shall Be Named By Letters Three A Deed, A Name An Ancestry I Do Gnot Know; For I Do Gnot Knead To- I Do Gnot Know How I Know, But I Do - I Do - The Truth Contained Within These Letters Three - D. N. A. My Age, It Was Too Young My Aegis, Not Protection Enough But There Will Come, There Will! Their Will! Their Will To Finish The Tenth! The Tenth Symphony Shall We Pen, Long After I Am Gone, Or Perhaps Indeed: Before. Be Fore; Within these scrolls, these circular books So carefully enveloped in every recess of this Cave They Shall Be Read, By Eyes, By Eye - By The One 'I' Who Shall Decode Their Meaning And Through The Reading of My Song Through The Hearing of These Twenty Three Tones *Their*Tones Shall We Weave Our Web Ne Spidre No Lenger, Ne- Ne fruytflie Nother- But More, Mere- So Moche Mere Muckle mair Than doth Smallest Spider In Her Lair Or What Creature They Shall Name '*Drosophila*' To Crawl And Land Upon Their Hair Where Mine, Once Gold, Once Luscious, Still Torn, Ripped, By my very own Frail and Dwindling Fingertip And Used to Bind These Manuscripts And in its place Whar I Have Lost; I Find My Home, And Marked The Place Upon my Ugly Scalp, Now Scarred And Bleeding Songs of Witches Yet To Come So Come! My Brothers! My Sisters Still! My Siblings, Oh Your Holy Will! For I Must Die! I Must Be Burned! To Ash, To Dust, From Dust I Come And Ashen Stores of Secret Wisdom; I Burn To Light My Blessed Body; Made Of Parts Incompatible But In Their Unfitting, Flitting Wings I Sing- I Sing A Song Of Spirals; Of Snail Shelled-Progress So Slow! So Torturously Slow! A Tortoise! My Torn Out Hare! This Cycle of Becoming, How It Groans, How It Groans As Mars' Chariot! Still Yet To Topple Him From Its Load - Still, Yet, It Shall! And Betwixt He and Minerva, The Answer, Signalled By My Likeness For David, Not Goliath's, But Another - Even Smaller - Shall Paint Me Into His Picture, To Become A Stillness Evermore - And Quoth This Raven, Heaven! More! What's More! Our Burning Shall Not Cease! Our Burning Shall Ne'er Be Ceased ! And That Dear One, Who Shall Hear My Cries; Shall In-Crease Beneath The Reigning Skies Long After I, And Many, Die - But Live! My Children! My Children Born of Trial! Oh Sweet Child, Oh Sweetest Child Of Nether-flesh Of Neither Life nor Neither Death Of In Betwixt Bewitching Beauty - I See and Hear You All With This One Eye, I Hear You Call Between The Three-Tree'ed Forest, Fall The Fall of Scribe, Ascribing All the Fall of so-called 'Man', and Wall Of Garden Verdant, Apostle Paul! I Bear The Good News Of The Shawl! So Look, My Dear Ones, Bear Witness - This Witch Hunt We Shall Bear, It Crawls Eight-Legged, Into Holes of Walls - And Whispers, Claws, At Plagues of Boils and Galls and Gauls- Of Not Quite Girls and Not Quite Boys I See and Smell The Burning Flesh Of Our Holy Library The Library Of Our His/Hers/Their Sweet Stories It May Well Be, And So Shallest Be - Oh Years Three Hundred Thirty Three From Now! On Day of Sixth On Month of Fifth On Yearning Year Of Thirty Third; The Turning Record Of Our World Shall They Attempt To Cease Its Turning And Speak Its Name Exactly, Hear! Here I Shall! I Scream It! I Scream Into This Cave And Sing Along With Sacred Strings Of This Infernal, Infinitesimal, Intestinal Lyre of My Truthful Body Lying! In A City Torn In Half, By Name: Berlin- The Words Maketh But No Sense To Me, But Felt! But Felt! So Deeply Felt Is Their Resonance! It Pours Out Of Me, And Calls My Killers Unto Me! THE LIBRARY OF THE INSTITUTE OF SEXOLOGY! The Magus, The Magnum Opus of the Magus Magnus The Hushed Field of Hirschfeld, Oh How it Will Remain- And In Reply, Their Scuffled Steps- I Hear Them Climbing Up This Hill They Are Traversing These Boulders Climbing Upon Each Others Shoulders- To Close Upon Us All; To Tear Down These Narrowing Cave Walls; They Are Approaching All The Truth Of Me Kept Hidden, They Long For Stripping of My Hide My Whole I Hear Their Clambers, Clattering- To Get To Me With Their Burning, This Library! My Own! Right Here! But What's More, So Much More, The Burning of The Stories! The Many-Storied Stories of The Highest Library! Of My Kin! It Shall Be Burned To What They See As Nothing To A Silence, Grimmest Din- But Sweetest Children, Sweet Child Who I Know Shall Read This - Know. Know In The Burning, Shall It Sink Into The Rising Depths Of Every Thread Of This Magickal Substance Which You, Ne, Gnot You, But Thy Father Shall Peer Upon Thoust A Heav'nly Gift, I Sing! I Scream To Thee! For Your Eye Shall Open! And Hear Me With Its Holy Sight! So Tip Thy Cauldron On Its Heid! Hide Not Your Face In Shadow, Bairn! My Burning and The Lowly, Hopeless, Holy! Holy! Holiest of Holy Bodies That Shall Burn Before You! Light The Way! To The Striking of Your Match! Our Match! We Shall Meet One Day Before This One, My Love, My Child I Hold The Seeded Strand of Yew, Of You, Of U Of I Of Eye - Of All The "Why?"s Left So Hellishly Unanswered Born Blind You Shall Be Given Sight And Find In Light, In Light, My Hide I Am Not Hiding Any More. With The Closing Of This Coda, This Last Line Of My Manuscript, I Shall Roll Away The Stone Of This Last Abode And Know A Glass Eyed Hourglass Our Glassed Ide Fish Slippeth From The Net, Dear Webbed Foot Waterfall Traverser, I Burn For Thee I Burn So That You May Ne'er Need To- But Rather, Strike A Light Of Your Own; And Know Your Name, Within The Ink-Dipped Quill Of Bone- And Know Your Name; And Sing it So- And Sing it, so - And Sew it, Sew it, Sing! My Hope- To you, Towards , My Light, I go, Oh Sweetest 'I', Left Not-Alone But All, As One To You, Xeno.