we accidentally imagine

by andrew yoon

seed 5897959

it is 2023. we wonder what to say next, and the wind is still blowing.

two.

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

twenty four.

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

twenty six.

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fall in the not not going
the or intended,, but maybe
the sneaking into the and.
goals sneaking into ideas
ideas paints and concrete
colors while we watch with a
just happens watch with
ideas permeating while
happens outlines of squares and
trangles into

thirteen.

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arounds behindingly
the throughs the sunlight
and feel while behindingly
and nowing while and
arounds behindingly feel
warmer. throughs throughs and
and continues and and we
wait be okay minutes it for
and wonder if it would this
watch the air just sunlight.
breath with the sunlight now
nowing nowing while while
behindingly circles of ink eyes. we
wait for ask now noticed and
we watch leaves . we take
another through the leaves move
around the air nobody noticed
and we watch the air if if of
move move around the wonder
if leaves . we take around
the with we take another
breath arounds behindingly
the now the time nowing
while behindingly feel
warmer warmer. throughs and
arounds behindingly the now
nowing again. eyes. it would if
if the leaves. around
through the take another breath
the leaves just we watch
watch leaves.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

thirty one.

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finally which whyhow
momentnow, against the shapes,
changing the changing the
momentnow changing and growing
ones things in of remember we
to make be just we of
illusion and that so much
difference between so much so much
between our own actions and the
temperature actions our own actions
between outside today and or in a
trashbag a tangled in by that also
having control over and that
this is this is is a beautiful
beautiful thing be the drift to the
ground, following a single
speck in its strange path at
the crowd and crowd at
separate, at same time going
somewhere with a going and

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 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.

twenty two.

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to making this this
fuzzy. just. where the
thisthat theringly , the second
hand and angles crackling we
sniffling from seasonal
allergies allergies . can't the
sound of people the somehow
the voices make harmony
against we hear all these
acoustic vibrations and making
us more warmer and another
and vibrations more quiet
every our our closer trying to
hear not to notice. the
outside sun the sun fuzzy the. we
a for a while while. ..
where . where again the
thisthat theringly, crackling a
while breathe longer keeps
call. a recognize. somehow
the voices make harmony and
inside our chests or
slantingway or slantingway or
combination making one thing
slantingway one thing work the work
trying. we are aware of our but
actions but try not not try not to
notice. the sun outside . we the
grass and while . thisthat
theringly ticking by again and
again crackling, a we breathe
these while longer while.
recognize call of windchimes and
us inside our chests and
slantingway or combination ? ? the
vibrations more vibrations more
quiet . we are aware not the
this . . of sound. where again
the thisthat theringly,
the hand ticking angles
angles and and sun the sun keeps
making making that sound and
sound and we . we can't help but
but at help smile at

twenty seven.

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

twenty eight.

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just about really we if
couldn't prepare us and if the,
pointing toward destination
explain to about the types all
events forth any sort of
permanent enormous and fade
eventually , and things just do what
they to do where of we
something, something could
really be there, that maybe the
some grow such patterns come
up look by now someone we
comes by our place they don't
say it's and quietly
understood that sometimes it's
sometimes away quietly can just
ourselves really. doesn't , and we
our of us . we notice how
strange our around smear the ink
and with hand but ink and
hand all sticks well we the

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.

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.

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.

fifteen.

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don't left these
different circumstances left
them we all these different
ways smiling. don't know one
of of us across a
amplifying across a a thought the
half of it so many things
going on all different jam
life story in a different if
the ceiling emails keep
arriving and keep arriving and
none of them all
possibilities fanning out into entire
stories, fanning out into some
incomprehensible tree possibilities
incomprehensible impossible the that
seems as as any, for now at for
instincts now at for our where . all
these responses, different
of we because smiled first
? these gestures people
half of so on of it many a
different life story in single,
different struggle maybe
different struggle behind every .
maybe there in the time. sky
ceiling. emails keep ever seem
seem to be all situations
seem seem to be all out into
fanning impossible after
options with one we saw just
going with the one with saw
seems as but we least our our
instincts but we don't remember
all these these different
circumstances calling for. for where
we left these different
circumstances these different we
looking we left them them. left
them. all remember all these
different different left left
them.

twenty three.

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the ticking and we keep
doing our best pretending on
themselves while notice landing
and how and we can on a moment
we don't if don't care and
that's perfectly okay caring
about that would never, on arm
going keeps, and in an see what
every doing, how tones being
and transformed which us
wonder why wood is so squirrels
climb how cars turn their
wheels the turn out, a with,
after another the opinions
and same bucket and and the
ticking and not to around on
voices from can't temperature
sun is of paper and our skin
about anything repeating we
don't okay because

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.

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.

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.

sixteen.

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

twenty.

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thirty.

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twenty five.

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

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

eleven.

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twenty nine.

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what numbers and days of
the to listen (we if as they
listened we stop much about
scheduling and books what might for
breakfast tomorrow we thing in any
particular sense writing without
any particular sense of
intention one with and going on the
next word which with it and
still just things and we can't
help but smile a little and
then laugh absurd it is that
of the numbers and

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.

fourteen.

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agains the wayingsong a
we or to while behind the
eyelids, and underthere, a
beforemaroon, the eyes again with
questions and ideas how to see
under a color when we are stuck
inside it these things all
moving so slowly but the clock
seems to be working as usual
with those clunks and little
fingers and woodenbits we
suggest a counterpoint. and the
conversation stays the same and
nobody really seems to care
about the wind.
,