we accidentally imagine

by andrew yoon

seed 1039881

it is 2026. we wonder what to say next, and the wind is still blowing.

six.

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silence and quiet now. a
small voice humming and
laughing in the other room. a
crystal or some melting snow.
behinds toward while again
around where's or why's while
leftandright shrinking silently. a
wooden creak. a scratch. all
centers things happening all
around, things just happening
and just being the way they
are. and we realize that this
is a beautiful thing. that
this is a beautiful thing.

twenty six.

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a smile. it outlines of
squares making themselves up
behind and dominoes which. or
or intended, but be, but
maybe or intended, could be
the point. goals sneaking
be be the ideas and
interactions. spray paints ideas
ideas the ideas and
interactions., with a just happens ,
trangles into shapes the
geometries which not the going or
intended, but maybe that
intended, be again. ideas all
these colors and concrete we
watch outlines shapes sort of
making, shapes the geometries
seem to fall fall which
pushing buttons and to to fall in
in in the wrong wrong going
the way direction, but into
the thoughts again
concrete, all with ideas
permeating while we watch outlines
sort of other things, and
things, shapes sort sort of
making themselves other the
geometries and dominoes which
always seem seem seem to fall
fall in the wrong direction.
not going expected or that
could be again. ideas and
colors and and ideas watch with
ideas permeating while we
watch with it all just other
just happens and trangles
into other things making and
relationships other which always seem
to not maybe that the
thoughts thoughts again. ideas
all permeating while just
smile. outlines of squares
and trangles themselves up
behind each other the pushing
up behind each geometries
geometries and and and to direction
. not going, but.
thoughts spray paints and
concrete we watch ideas with a
while colors and concrete,,
spray paints while a a smile.
it all just squares and
trangles into other of behind of
making themselves, other and
relationships fall way, we expected
the maybe the point point
point. interactions again
sneaking into.. spray. the point
again. into paints and
concrete, all these a smile.
outlines outlines sort of making
themselves up buttons and
direction the way we. not the way
direction., but but expected or
intended intended. goals
sneaking again. ideas ideas and
interactions.. again sneaking into
the point. goals sneaking
into. ideas and
interactions. sneaking into the the
ideas and thoughts.

fifteen.

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these be from to ever
these situations entire all
entire into weigh impossible
up just seems any, for now
at we we left them. all
these different responses,
them circumstances
circumstances circumstances calling
for smiling we smiling and
we don't know and

one.

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and just like that, the
page turns for us. the next
series of random numbers fill
the screen and we begin to
imagine dots and we begin to
connect them and agree and
disagree with them, relate to
them and question them and
share them. the page glares.
we glare. everybody is
glaring and nobody is laughing
and then one of us starts
laughing, and another one of us
starts laughing, and we are all
laughing and the paper is
laughing and the inkdots are
laughing: the numbers are
laughing too.

twenty seven.

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sensation in feel this
sensation in our floorboard each
each panels and walls every
each knot in the wires behind
the if just own and outside
our foreheads, might warm
now we breathe windows now
and now . we breathe and
windows notice small dents
ourselves in the ourselves and of
wooden panels and walls of
paint every and walls of paint
panels and paint walls the
wooden of paint freckle and lot
lot about, knot in, if did
these on their eyes are in
foreheads might outside to now
stinging sensation in what
caused and scrape along of
paint freckle on the how if
someone desk happened things
just of if these their and the
incense is that it might enough
that it open the feel now. in
our hands now small came
from ask ourselves where
they and scrape walls of
paint every scratch paint and
and every care face of
someone we care about the wires
someone sort sort of happen on
their own. we for a moment and
feel like we that it might be
enough outside . we sensation
hands sensation feel small
dents from what caused scrape
each groove and scrape of the
wooden and paint and scratch on
someone we care the the a face of
someone we about, how each knot
in in how each of things of
if these things we close
our eyes for a floating
outside our bodies in foreheads
foreheads it might outside
windows. we notice they each
groove and scrape along panels
and walls of panels and
every freckle of paint every
face scratch about , knot if
did it things just sort on
own own somehow moment like
we that the the foreheads
breathe feel this. to open
stinging

nineteen.

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the corner of the room
empty except for the little
grooves in the floorboard, we
smile. the moments going and
going in such a beautiful way
that we can't take our eyes
off it, noticing just how
inconsistent things are, how blurry
and arbitrary the
differences seem between things and
people and ideas, how musical a
painting can sound the ink never
seems to dry.

twenty five.

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to pretend while we do
heated fewer the conversation
going while our pretend we.
every repetition getting.
every repetition getting a
little more getting a accurate
. every best to do our best
to pretend listening a
little, a accurate, little
more mistakes while we . the
becoming heated while we heated
while conversation going
becoming going on fewer mistakes
. the conversation going
on outside becoming
heated while becoming we do our
outside conversation. the
conversation going on outside
becoming going on outside
pretend we aren't listening.
getting more accurate, a fewer
mistakes. the conversation
going on we conversation
going on faster and with fewer
faster fewer mistakes.
outside becoming heated while
we do our best going and
with fewer, a little with
fewer faster on heated while
we do while mistakes
conversation going and with little
faster and outside while the
conversation mistakes, more
accurate and little more
accurate, the conversation
going becoming heated on
heated while we do our best to
pretend outside becoming
heated while the conversation
going the conversation going
on conversation going
becoming heated while we. we best
do to pretend little

twenty three.

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another the into, the
fists paints timer keeps
ticking doing our. themselves
while voices notice the
temperature all is on is glowing we
can on at all we but somehow
perfectly okay because caring
have made or more human is
through our around are able for
what person and these in
turning away and energy which
pushes bits of resonant, how
squirrels climb and how cars. we of
a punchline last
clinging after another falling
smiles,, paints ticking and
keep to around on from the
room help temperature
changing is landing on this piece
of the whole room

twenty nine.

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down they about
scheduling worrying about
scheduling and books and about what
might tomorrow another any we
intention lines , just going
across one by one, just going
one begin by a scratchy pen
word which bounces through

thirty.

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to are unable to answer
unable to answer. we answer
don't know. and begin to cry.
to and cry we begin why
these first comes so much
question read we laugh., and we
read we laugh next, if over
the idea that and we
unexpected question in unable to
are. and then we begin to
laugh. can't we why so aimless
in the when it like every
minute second,, so, so
important like why to begin
question to we able we are able to
we and we

twenty one.

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we wonder what would
make us happy, what would
make this headache go away
which keeps distracting us
from everything going on the
scratching pens and observations,
a quote out of context we
leave the incense burning
when we go to sleep even
though we know it's a fire
hazard and it puts our lives in
danger and the lives of all the
other people living above and
below us, and all of the people
we know and the people who
care about what happens to us
even though we never asked
them to. we wonder why it
should matter that something
happens to anyone, we wonder why
we care. and everything is
so quiet.

nine.

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we are breathing. and we
are still breathing. one
thought and another passing by
in the street while we ask
ourselves if this is going
anywhere if we should instead be
focusing on something else like
the way the smoke is
drifting away from the incense
stick, or the sound our eyelids
make when we blink. is there a
place for rushing anymore?
the softmurmurs again,
reminding us about our breath: and
a little blue bird lands
on the windowsill. it is
singing.

thirty one.

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for even when we thought
we had a we and down haven't
seen a remember even though
years until had we had laughed
until or came came back from
left playing music playing
fans turning that questions
of where wondering a
minute a minute doors
thumpingly to ones we expect make
sense we kind make sense, left
just we and could away things
which not much actions not,
between tied or untied, or
tangled or tangled up a trashbag
somewhere by bacteria fungi world
control over having no remember
world also

four.

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it's hard to speak
sometimes. we are frustrated with
ourselves for our
inconsistencies once at peace and
allowing things to be just the way
they are and want to be,
always taking action and never
taking action,
leftandrighting with the leftandright
once again wishing things
were a different way or that
the coin had landed on the
other face; we can't figure
out who we are, and we aren't
quite sure if that question
leads anywhere hard to find
the energy to say anything,
too many responses waiting
behind each option which never
seem to go anywhere
positive, anywhere that doesn't
hurt anybody or dissipate
into the grass as if nothing
had happened in the first
place and we begin to wonder if
anything actually did or does
happen or if we had somehow just
thought it all up out of some kind
of desperation and
confusion aimed at nothing in
particular, cycles going back and
forth but never quite the same
way, always surprising
somehow and adding to the
confusion and lack of any sense of
place, the feeling that we are
nowhere and the feeling that we
are getting nowhere.

sixteen.

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laughing! isn't it
funny how we can't help but
smile when the sun starts
coming back right on cue shades
of these colors whose
names we can't remember lines
and lines and so many lines.
we remember that the stick
of incense is still
glowing and somehow becoming
smoke in our lungs we breathe
and we breathe and we
breathe. we forget to ask
questions.

seventeen.

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marbles in a glass bowl,
not going anywhere in
particular seeming to wonder where
the birds get their
melodies, their strange rhythms
tinkling or rubbing cardboard.
the dark bottle looking
right back, eyes glimmering
so loudly with the
sunlight or fluorescent
flickerings or uncharged
batteries. the lithium looking for
water. how's this different?
asking between colorshades
and subject matter like it
were important or something
or something or something
or anothersong
thismomentingly or an old box of cereal,
casting shadows longer than
expected somehow while the light
reflects in its own color onto the
walls and the nearby desk
surface, papers scattered from
months before piled over each
other, some important some not
so much, some with colors
and blindly drawn
paintings and some printed out
from an old black and white
laser jet printer, whatever
that means, whatever those
meaning.

twenty four.

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we even trying and are
not okay, and from one to ,
and sometimes, and
sometimes we go even trying.. and
sometimes they we without without
without even okay it it it and
sometimes even trying trying okay
, they are sometimes they
are, and sometimes the
other without sometimes they
that go from one and
sometimes not things are not okay ,
and they to the other
without even and not sometimes
that we go from not okay, and
sometimes they happens that
without are they are the trying
without. and sometimes things
are and sometimes it it
happens that and are not. things
are okay we go . and
sometimes sometimes ,, and, and
sometimes it and sometimes it
happens that we other trying are
sometimes things and sometimes
not and sometimes they are
okay , happens we go the and
sometimes things sometimes
sometimes it happens that we go
without okay , and sometimes we
and happens that that other
trying are not okay, and that
even other without even
trying. and sometimes not okay
, sometimes they are,,
and sometimes it from one
not okay okay and other and
sometimes are not and sometimes
they are it that from the the
and not we we go from one to
the other trying. , and even
trying trying. the other
without even trying,, and
sometimes it it happens that we go
from one to the other without
even trying trying to to the
one and they are , and
sometimes it happens that we
without and sometimes things
are not, not, and things are
sometimes okay , and it one to
without not okay, from other
without even even

thirteen.

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we wait for a few minutes
and wonder if it would be
okay for us to ask now: "is
this beautiful?" we wonder
if nobody noticed and we
watch the air just sort of move
around through the leaves. we
take another breath with the
sunlight and feel warmer.
throughs and arounds
behindingly the now nowing while
again the time continues and
stops and continues again.
circles of ink we close our eyes.

ten.

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we ask ourselves some
question we can't hear, muffled
because our heads are
underwater, this cold sensation
pressing on our foreheads while
we feel our socks becoming
heavy, cottonfibers grabbing
skin and dragging behind our
feet, cold passing between
our toes. maroon painted
walls and a thick sweater,
crinkling plastic bag full of
snacks. we notice it is becoming
later every moment, and that
as soon as we count one
number there is another in
front of that, always room for
another one or zero or eighty
seven or pencilcase
dirtyshoe, these power outlets
rusting over even though we
can't see where the water
could have come from fading in
the carpet telling which
way people walk most
without asking why they walk it
so often when it seems
there are so, so many other
ways to go and that this way
isn't even the easiest or most
efficient or beautiful or
surprising: they are taking the path
because it is the path they take,
and we can't help but
laughalittle at how beautiful that is
not to say that one is better
than another or that anyone
is wrong for going the way
they do or that we think we are
better than going that
particular way to the couch, but
that we know in the end we are
going to go that way too and
that's just fine. it's just as
good an option as any so we
don't see a reason why not it's
beautiful enough and it's
surprising enough and that itself
may be the most beautiful
and surprising thing of all
at the moment.

twenty eight.

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with our the perfectly .
we were hoping might make
us somehow or or two a note
or a or more appropriate .
we for a moment, and, and
let our eyes to the wind and
just and airplanes from
about anything really we
wonder if anything

two.

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because the longer we
stare at the details, the less
we are sure they even
matter.

eighteen.

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systems all around us
and our lives fracturing
breaking apart piece by piece as
we keep trying to glue
things back together with
words and theories and poems
and cathedrals
architectures in the mind and and later
in concrete, we begin to
feel jittery as we realize we
haven't stood up in hours, this
chair and its arms a little too
narrow, pressing against the
sides of our skulls, plurals
and singulars not having so
much significance to us now
when the lights are
flickering so subtly. we pray but
don't know who we are praying
to who we are praying for,
what we want, what we should
want. fading. fading.

zero.

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and all at once things
are so quiet, a tiny hiss
from the walls, distant
clanging of a ventilation fan. we
breathe with the sunlight,
passing clouds causing these
little pulses in the sunglow
and somehow we feel it in our
toes even though we can't
quite tell why the wind
chooses the pitches it sings
against the window, why one
harmony should point to
another, why every story has some
sort of climax where
elements and trajectories
culminate into some bigger thing
as if we had been heading
there all along as if there
were some kind of purpose
behind the penscratches or
where this leaf decides to
fall in this rotting pile we
notice a pain in our lower back
from bad posture and some
strange sense of pressure from
the bottom of our right foot
now the ventilation fan
slowing down into a periodic
banging; we notice a coin lying on
the ground but we can't make
out which side it landed on.
do we care? is it good to
care? would it matter if we
knew? we are staring at the
coin and the coin is staring
back.

seven.

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tangling wires into
these bizarre shapes, rugs
with strange colors and
melodies waitingly, taking deep
breaths before the speech where
we finally speak our
minds: "won't everybody
please, please stop this
cruelty? can't we see how
unnecessary it is?" some glass
window creaking under winds,
some oil spilled in a parking
lot. how again the why's and
who's before and after or some
some behind throughingly, a
manual for writers of research
papers about electrical
engineering and game theory,
complex analysis and early
marxist painting; the
walls of this place have
shoulders that are
sagging, somewhere in these
pages an actual answer to a
question that matters. a new pair
of jeans, a holiday
decoration left up for months, a
lightbulb which doesn't fit even
though we could have sworn the
size was right at the store.
color combinations making us
feel sick and wonder why we
care about the dissonance,
why we should prefer one to
the other. we conclude that
we're all just bits of air
moving with the waves of some
song we can't hear: now
banging on the wooddrums, the
thoughts and the doubts, hopes or
imaginations throwing fists at the
organ keyboard, some body of
loud waters, some
electrical structure groaning in
rains particles trapped in
the breezings, the sine
waves, the eyeballs thrown
left and right or up and down
or is that a sign of
happiness, of
peacefulness? who's to tell what's
harmony and what's dissonance?
who's to tell the words of the
song when each moment's just
a few bits of data? hard to
see the picture from a
pixel, hard to find the poem
through a word a letter an inkdot
the arounds and behinds
lost somewhere in the mix,
the breath being exhaled
before we even noticed it was
inside our bodies, each note
rising just a little higher or
just a little more like dirty
wallpaper: we ask each other where
it happened. where the
music got faster. where the
blue became green, where the
light was switched on and the
newer waves began to
interfere with things and distort
the shapes, canceling out
or multiplying or
performing more complicated
operations until the noise is noise
and the signal is noise and
the noise is still noise yet
somehow wider, more sideways
and spinningly and
uppingly and backwardly, more
harsh and out of sync, now neon
colorlines and batteries, strange
gaps in the spiral not
patterns but something about
them which makes us feel the
walls are moving further away
and the room is becoming
smaller, that one moment is
another and the second hand is
somehow different this time
around. we cannot help but go to
sleep again, this time with a
strange smile and already
looking forward to coffee. this
time with socks and a thicker
blanket. this time with the
windows open: and in comes the
cooler air.

eight.

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we accidentally
imagine ourselves as having for
a head this strangely
shaped box or a bird feeder with
a triangular roof or
something similar and we are
sitting in the front passenger
seat of an old car and someone
we care a lot about asks,
who are you? and we
think for a minute, and then
another. we aren't able to answer
with anything except a held
hand, and we somehow find
ourselves caring more about them
just because they asked.
they can't answer either,
and the grip gets tighter
and they aren't making eye
contact but that's okay because
we aren't looking anyway
and we are both these
strange wooden boxes attached
to bodies, heads without
eyes which still say so much,
eyes without laughinglines
which always find new things
to smile about an itch
behind our ears, the way this
piece of paper falls on the
ground, the sound of an overhead
lamp switching on laughing
about nothing in particular
and everything in
particular, wanting to want
everything and wanting to want
nothing, to feel everything and
to feel nothing, or at
least something the grip
getting tighter and we remember
how okay it is, how
beautiful it is and how funny it is
that poetry and music might
be the same thing after
all, that hiding is okay
sometimes and being naked is okay
too, that sometimes things
lead to other things, and
sometimes they don't, and
sometimes things just happen and
they keep just happening and
they don't stop. they don't
stop and it seems like they
never will, so it starts
making sense to just accept
this and close our eyes and
smile a little but somehow
this feels impossible. we
get frustrated and start to
do things we don't want to
do, blaming other people
for things nobody had
control over in the first place
and jumping to conclusions
and making assumptions
about other people and their
intentions and what they want or
what they are afraid of. we
forget that they are us, that
their grip is getting tighter
and that nothing is okay for
them either. we remember
that their boxy head is
crying and we have been trying
not to notice. we remember
that we are all the same
person born into different
bodies, and that this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing.

three.

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how did we get here? the
questions which keep making their
way inside our mouths as if
we never could learn from
the last time we couldn't
answer and instead only become
more unhappy and began to
throw things at the walls with
some inexpressible anger
screaming and shouting with a red
face and bulging veins,
fists again and again against
the door not even caring
what's on the other side, too
caught up with the idea of the
door being there in the first
place another why and another
if causing the lights to
flicker and the stove to begin to
smell like something is
burning so we all try to remember
what we had done in the
kitchen last but we can't
remember, and even the attempts to
remember make us shout with fewer
words, make us scream with our
fingers and pound harder and
harder on the door while the
wood is splintering here and
there and the doorframe
appears to budge this time or
that time or this time again
and again and again

twenty.

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the smell of damp sticks
from outside. a slowmoving
sound. we notice how
everything is so pink maybe we
remember why, but for now we
don't. “can it stay like this
for a while?” and, for once,
it does.

fourteen.

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questions and ideas how
to under color when moving
so slowly and we suggest
and and and nobody really
wind. or to while behind
behind behind the eyes, to
color when we are things it
with those as with those
stays the the same stays and
about. agains the wayingsong
behind to while behind the, to
ideas how to see under we are
stuck we stuck working seems
to those clunks and
woodenbits woodenbits we suggest
counterpoint. and the the
conversation stays and nobody really

eleven.

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we keep asking
questions like “will this make me
happy?” when instead it might be
more interesting to ask what
it would sound like if the
leaves on every tree were poems
written on little sheets of
paper and everybody in the
world began to read them out
loud all at the same time and
then the wind began to blow
and the poems went flying in
the air all around and
everybody just watched it happen
in complete silence we
can't help but smile a little,
and then a lot. and someone
hugs the stranger to their
left and we all begin to
laugh. we ask ourselves
another question we can't hear
because of all the wind and
poems, and that's just fine we
realize we didn't want to know
the answers anyway when
there are so many confusing
and beautiful things all
around us anyway. we just keep
laughing and grabbing poems out
of the air, sometimes
deciding to read them and
othertimes using them as napkins.
the wind, the wind is
laughing too.

five.

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quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying to say
anything in particular or
convince anyone of anything,
prefering to let things just exist
the way they are and stay the
same when they need to stay
the same and change when
they need to change, or not
even need to stay the same or
need to change but maybe
instead want to stay the same or
want to change, or rather: it
just happens. it just
happens, and it keeps just
happening. the softmurmers not
even speaking about what's
going on or what's not going on
but instead just
mentioning about whatever is on
their mind at that moment,
letting it out and letting it go,
the sound waves not
disappearing but echoing off a
thousand surfaces and every
blade of grass, split and
muffled and distorted and
echoed until they sound like
dead trees, the sun pushing
the waves around a little
through the screen door, gnats
in the air just sort of
moving around.

twelve.

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we never seem to notice
the changes until they've
already happened. or at least
they are well into
happening. we wonder why that is:
the clouds evaporating and
the sun coming out, the air
getting so slightly warmer; a
single row of bricks painted a
different color. who the behinds
through before how's and where
when whenever the
againagain the words repeatingly
as we notice a little
cottonfluff drifting toward us. it
sticks to our ink, and we ask
again where meaning comes
from. a million coins being
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility so
terrifyingly wide staring us in the
eye so intensely we have to
look away and we notice this
little bug just flying around,
landing, and flying around
again. flying, landing, and
flying around again.

twenty two.

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while . while a while.
where the again the again and
and again angles , we , a
while making that sound
recognize help but smile. bird
allergies . we. bird we can't help
but but smile laughing make
this sort this the and inside
our chests chests and
making but but work and ears
closer trying to hear inside
the the to hear to hear our
ears closer inside the
sounds. the sun breathe for
again the thisthat again
angles crackling again
,