The Levitating Mermaid

Per your instructions, Levitating Mermaid, I have begun...

Wed, 19 Jan 2011 14:04:42 -0500

Per your instructions, Levitating Mermaid, I have begun construction of the ark. It will be able to hold many letters.

Look, I don’t want to disappear like a river into the...

Tue, 18 Jan 2011 13:12:00 -0500

Look, I don’t want to disappear like a river into the ocean but the only time the flow can be stopped is in the winter, when the river is frozen and cannot merge.

Ask me—

Some time when the river is ice ask me
mistakes I have made. Ask me whether
what I have done is my life. Others
have come in their slow way into
my thought, and some have tried to help
or to hurt: ask me what difference
their strongest love or hate has made.

I will listen to what you say.
You and I can turn and look
at the silent river and wait. We know
the current is there, hidden; and there
are comings and goings from miles away
that hold the stillness exactly before us.

What the river says, that is what I say.

You will see a glimpse of my ship here and get a sense of my...

Tue, 18 Jan 2011 12:59:44 -0500

You will see a glimpse of my ship here and get a sense of my search.

Submitted by callmebalthazar

Straightforward Mermaid

Tue, 18 Jan 2011 12:59:08 -0500

The straightforward mermaid starts every sentence with “Look … ” This comes from being raised in a sea full of hooks. She wants to get points 1, 2, and 3 across, doesn’t want to disappear like a river into the ocean. When she’s feeling despairing, she goes to eddies at the mouth of the river and tries to comb the water apart with her fingers. The straightforward mermaid has already said to five sailors, “Look, I don’t think this is going to work,” before sinking like a sullen stone. She’s supposed to teach Rock Impersonation to the younger mermaids, but
every beach field trip devolves into them trying to find shells to match their tail scales. They really love braiding. “Look,” says the straightforward mermaid. “Your high ponytails make you look like fountains, not rocks.” Sometimes she feels like a third gender—preferring primary colors to pastels, the radio to singing. At least she’s all mermaid: never gets tired of swimming, hates the thought of socks.

-Matthea Harvey

And my question to you, dear Levitating Mermaid, is what do you say to me?

Submitted by callmebalthazar

The waters swelled and increased greatly upon the earth, and...

Fri, 14 Jan 2011 12:40:40 -0500

The waters swelled and increased greatly upon the earth, and the ark drifted upon the waters.

Submitted by callmebalthazar

I have seen much in my journeys. Many wonders, Levitating...

Fri, 14 Jan 2011 12:40:04 -0500

I have seen much in my journeys. Many wonders, Levitating Mermaid. Such as this:

A beast called Ḥ.w.m.s having the form of a bearded human head, with ears like the ears of cows. It has the body, wings, legs and tail of a bird. It is associated with the name of al-ghafr [Lunar Mansion 15]. A beast called A.w.rās having the form of two girls joined together face to face. They carry between them something like a necklace. They have wings on their backs, and their legs turn backwards. It is associated with the name ((of al-zubānā [Lunar Mansion 16]))

from callmebalthazar

I received a message from you today, dear Mermaid, as I took a...

Thu, 13 Jan 2011 22:20:40 -0500

I received a message from you today, dear Mermaid, as I took a day on shore. I don’t know how you found me. All I know is that this was the epiphany I knew would come. There is an ark to be built.

from callmebalthazar

Melting World

Thu, 13 Jan 2011 22:20:16 -0500

from impetuousheadlongrush

Glimpse from the Epiphany of Balthazar, the Imaginary Sailor

Sun, 09 Jan 2011 23:17:57 -0500

Glimpse from the Epiphany of Balthazar, the Imaginary Sailor

Will an epiphany come to me tomorrow? Will I find what I'm looking for?

Sun, 09 Jan 2011 21:06:35 -0500

I wonder, callmebalthazar, if your epiphany matches the vision that I dreamed. The plank of a ship built for escape, a diagram in three dimensions. If you hold a pointer to the tip, it comes to life. I have evidence of this: it is en route to you as we speak. Can you tell me of your visions?

God spoke to him in a dream: “You live and will die in...

Sat, 01 Jan 2011 18:33:32 -0500

God spoke to him in a dream: “You live and will die in this prison so that a [sailor] I know of may see you a certain number of times and not forget you and place your figure and symbol in a poem which has its precise scheme of the universe. You suffer captivity, but you will have given a word to the poem.”

The machinery of the world is much too complex for the...

Sat, 01 Jan 2011 18:29:00 -0500

The machinery of the world is much too complex for the simplicity of a beast and the simplicity of men.

Will you give me but another tiny glimpse of the trove, dear...

Thu, 30 Dec 2010 19:33:40 -0500

Will you give me but another tiny glimpse of the trove, dear Mermaid? My astrolabe has become inscrutable. Perhaps it was the eclipse that offset my course. Or was it your wiles? It seems that I have sailed into the 12th century, or so I have read. Where do I go from here?

Submitted by callmebalthazar

how can we grasp infinity?

Tue, 28 Dec 2010 13:59:55 -0500

We grasp infinity, andreblas, in the cross sections that compose it. If you were immortal, what would you be doing differently right now?

I feel asleep at the wheel and dreamed of a green oblivion. I...

Sun, 19 Dec 2010 19:18:00 -0500

I feel asleep at the wheel and dreamed of a green oblivion. I was lost in obscurity. Noah and Jonah were there, and others whose names end in “ah.” In my weary sleep, I led my crew astray. Can you find me again, Levitating Mermaid, and put me back together? Am I seeing rightly, have we truly been trapped? Are these glass walls an illusion?

—Balthazar

Last night on a cold and placid sea I saw a fleet of ships made...

Sun, 19 Dec 2010 16:32:54 -0500

Last night on a cold and placid sea I saw a fleet of ships made of green light form a vertical line facing the distant horizon. At first the form of each ghost ship was transparently etched in the phantasmic hue. What on earth is that mysterious green light?

Soon, the ships shifted into a single beam that shone for light years before the tip was stopped by the form of a fleeting meteorite somewhere in our solar system. The entire fleet disappeared within this pinprick of light and I imagined for an instant that the Imaginary Sailor might be onboard, himself now scattered into a billion subatomic particles still chasing the secret letters from one realm into the next.

Did he steer the wheel the wrong way after all?

Have you seen this green light?

In the book of secret letters, a passage from Being and...

Fri, 17 Dec 2010 11:14:00 -0500

In the book of secret letters, a passage from Being and Nothingness:

We should attempt to examine more closely the patterns of bad faith and attempt a description of them. This description will permit us perhaps to fix more closely the conditions for the possibility of bad faith; that is, to reply to the question we raised at the outset: What must be the being of man if he is to be capable of bad faith?

Take the example of a woman who has consented to go out with a particular man for the first time…

On a distant shore the faint outline of a statue overlooks the...

Fri, 17 Dec 2010 00:11:00 -0500

On a distant shore the faint outline of a statue overlooks the garden. I move closer slowly to read from the secret book of letters.

“We should attempt to examine more closely the patterns of bad faith and attempt a description of them,” I whisper to the jasmine-scented wind, but she is unmoving.

The vibration of the words ripples across the sea in an imperceptible wave and becomes the slight breeze that even now makes the hair on the arms of the Imaginary Sailor stand on end as he wonders if he’ll ever have a map of the Seven Seas. Will he make it to China? The mystery carries the scent of salt.

The eyes of the woman who offers an entreaty (perhaps even whiskey), are glazed with starlight even across timezones, even during the day, when the stars are destroyed by the smudge of quicksilver sun, a thumbprint on a mirror that turns minutes into centuries and makes her immortal, if only as she sweeps the landscape with a fleeting gaze.

why is this so hard?

Thu, 16 Dec 2010 23:56:15 -0500

What do you find hard, a-little-vague? The journey or the documentation of it?

The Immortal Kings of Zanji & The Queen of Waq Waq

Thu, 16 Dec 2010 23:56:00 -0500

The First Law: The Queen Waq Waq is the ever vessel. The Second Law: The Immortal Kings of Zani rule with absolute authority from New Moon to Full Moon. The Third Law: The Old Kings of Zani are sacrificed on the New Moon, long live the Kings.

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