perhaps observing a child in a library

Aimless life. A simple statement. Even as in defiance of metaphors a red oil crayon held awkwardly and as if by accident traces discontinuous curves, lines, zigzags, elipses, indifferent to the distinction between the paper and the table, disrupting any continuity, and then breaks, tearing the paper, the tear and the break do not mean death. A concentration of saliva exacerbates the redness of the crayon. The paper is rumpled, about to be thrown away, but then comes a change of mind: the rubbing of the drop of saliva arouses curiosity. The paper is folded with meticulous care, old creases smoothed out, as much as it is possible. It is then, perhaps, that a sudden desire is felt: to taste papercrayon, red papercrayon on the tongue. It takes time. Perhaps longer than a family dinner. Impossible to compare. Papercrayon is not food. Food means eating-to-grow. An experiment. Papercrayon tastes exactly like papercrayon. The experiment might have to be repeated endlessly. Or abandoned. There are some red marks on the table and no hint of an image. It's time to go.

who dissertateth shall lose his fondest marbles

"Le matin de la pensée" (in reference to Heraclitus), "le matin de la civilisation" (commonplace). Useless mornings. Petty nostalgia sanctified by linguistic cliché for a time when a finger pointing at the sun directed the gaze toward something previously unseen.

dream

i agreed to handle a snake. the snake was deadly, poisonous, despite its age and the fact that it could move using only two vertebrae. in order to transfer it, they injected it with a paralyzing agent. it was going to wear off within 10 minutes. i held the snake at the end of a stick and transferred it into a large plastic bag. there was some soil at the bottom, with plants growing out of it. but you can't expect a snake to survive in an airtight bag. so i left an opening. the bag was in my apartment [not any i ever lived in], in a room resembling a greenhouse, most of it overgrown by bamboos, ivy, mosses. the snake climbed out of the bag and remained still in the air for a moment, straight as a bamboo stalk, and then, as if frightened by the surrounding plants, made a U-turn in the air and crept back into the bag. i dialed the number of the guy who was supposed to come and pick it up. it had all been a scam, no one was going to come. i was afraid of the snake: the tiniest drop of its venom could kill instantly. i would never sleep again. and yet, at that precise moment when it coiled back into the bag, i felt an inexplicable tenderness towards it.