A Mindless, Eyeless, Earless Skin-sense to Which the Crab Comes Sideways

Next novel and next collection of poetry, either one poet or an anthology, haven't found me since *Suttree* and I'm sidewaysier than normal so hunted and found angry links, feeding the sideways, links down below my left eye, here's my right eye, July 14, 2023 edition directly below



My right eye above had its painting tape ripped off and no longer exists but a facsimile does, scanned onto printer paper and cut to size and glued to the backside of what was my right eye and now is my left eye below to make a two-sided hexjeff, it’s not life but it’s not death exactly, yes?


Cheaper by a factor of four over Arches watercolor blocks, the bargain brand watercolor block is *far* superior creating texture when ripping of the painters tape than Arches, who knew? (fine metaphors abound) (these are watercolor, not gouache, watercolor leaks better (or worse depending on what you want) under painters tape than gouache, who knew)? Forgive me, I want to hand it to you to spin flip spin flip spin flip spin flip continue

Leaving for Maine week from this Sunday, not taking paint or blocks, eleven days of no eyes, no hexjeffs (though L of course will have both if my sidewaysier manic hasn't ebbed, please let it ebb, please don't make ebbing make me want to paint in Maine, Jeff). Maine - only guaranteed post: 5:15 sunrise over Seal Cove Pond and Bernard Mountain, Acadia. May a novel find me by that first sunrise. May my manic compulsion to link-document the worsening clusterfuck ebb in Maine too and rest of my life. May the temperature in Maine be in the 70s the weeks we're there like they will be next week when we're not there yet. May I develop teleporter powers to transport L and me to Mount Desert Island and then back home so I don't have to drive through Connecticut and Massachusetts. May you listen to this loud:

The Fake News about Fake News
Watch: Fran Drescher delivers fiery speech on SAG-AFTRA strike
Jared Kushner is even shittier than you imagined (and isn't it illuminating how much corporate media has assisted his and Ivana's disappearance)
Heat Safety Experts Advise Americans To Seek Privilege
We're All Mice Trying to Chew Through a Trillion Dollar Tree
White man says colored help getting uppity
The persistance of police brutality
Two-time defending NCAA helmetball champion coach can't figure out how to stop his star athletes from repeatedly getting tickets for speeding and reckless driving
"The member nations of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization – consisting of the teetering Masters of Empire and their tawdry entourage of class-stratified vassals – have just concluded a historic confab in Vilnius, Lithuania, capital of the alpha Baltic chihuahua"
Fear and loathing on Air Force One							⇧
The algorithmic anti-culture of scale
Profit-Driven Systems Are Driving Us To Our Doom
The Rise of the Warrior Cop
Harpers' weekly				Diamonds are easy
The ocean’s color is changing as a consequence of climate change
Greed, hypocrisy and sportswashing
Changeling: PJ Harvey's perpetual reinvention

SOUNDS OF THE RESURRECTED DEAD MAN'S FOOTSTEPS #17

Marvin Bell

1. At the Walking Dunes, Eastern Long Island

That a bent piece of straw made a circle in the sand.

That it represents the true direction of the wind.

Beach grass, tousled phragmite.

Bone-white dishes, scoops and bowls, glaring without seeing.

An accordion of creases on the downhill, sand drapery.

The cranberry bushes biting down to survive.

And the wind’s needlework athwart the eyeless Atlantic.

And the earless roaring in the shape of a sphere.

A baritone wind, tuned to the breath of the clouds.

Pushing sand that made a hilly prison of time.

For wind and water both move inland.

Abrading scrub — the stunted, the dwarfed, the bantam.

A fine sandpaper, an eraser as wide as the horizon.

Itself made of galaxies, billions against the grain.

Sand: the mortal infinitude of a single rock.

  2. Walking in the Drowning Forest

Pitch pine, thirty-five-foot oaks to their necks in sand.

That the ocean signals the lighthouse.

Gull feathers call to the fox that left them behind.

Impressions of deer feet, dog feet and gull claws.

The piping plover in seclusion.

Somewhere the blind owl to be healed at sunset.

Here is artistry beyond self-flattery.

A rootworks wiser than the ball of yarn we call the brain.

A mindless, eyeless, earless skin-sense.

To which the crab comes sideways.

With which the sunken ship shares its secrets.

From which no harness can protect one, nor anchor fix one.

He knows, who has paddled an hour with one oar.

He knows, who has worn the whitecaps.

Who has slipped from the ferry or leaped from the bridge.

To be spoken of, though no one knows.