we accidentally imagine

by andrew yoon

seed 122802

it is 2019. we wonder what to say next, and the wind is still blowing.

twenty four.

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

twenty eight.

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walk we wonder yet isn't
now yet and wonder , and it
isn't shadow notice how the
into different shapes . we
try the ink and somehow but
somehow it all sticks to well and
remains perfectly . we were
hoping that the smudges us
somehow we otherwise , but maybe
technique or but or execution
would be appropriate.
question the idea of for a let it we
close listen and wind and
airplanes and feel the sun warming
our and listen to we could
come from this from this,
really we we it would matter
would anyway we listen to
conversation destination other the
about the types the types
place different and forth
without any sort because even
just what eventually fade
and do to figure to patterns
in figure where the
patterns of leaves come from come
made or something could
really be there, maybe be maybe
the leaves decided grid
look branches now we sitting
we know walking us so they
don't say maybe not that
sometimes we can just can be , that
sometimes we not we they sight of
really . really. and don't
really. matter , and we glance

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

fifteen.

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for remember where we
left them. all different
responses, different ways of
dealing we are don't. one first ?
across people who don't know
know the was funny when they
at once, a every single jam
, a different different
struggle behind every.. maybe a
every. like sky seeming like

thirty.

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bad handwriting we
laugh, be over these idea
changes. really changes we
reject we that nothing an that
the idea changes: we don't
know. and then we begin to cry
to. and then we begin then
we begin we begin to laugh
and, and questions are the
first the first comes to ears
our comes our ears which is a
new it seems question to our
ears why we moment or bad
laugh are begin with at the
moment or how are able read bad
handwriting. we, and laugh, we laugh
, we laugh anything
actually changed over idea
reject the nothing changes you
?” we don't we ?” and don't
know we ?” and we and question
in are you.., and so in
place when it when question
comes to is ears to our ears
important much like why we

twenty three.

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absorbed into kind bits
of dust makes us wonder how
quickly and cars turn their
wheels. we wonder if will all a
punchline, a story sentence these
bricks clinging with some
another the same fists and the,
timer keeps ticking best
pretending ink while we can't but
notice how piece the whole can
feel it don't if not and
that's perfectly okay would
more happy or more like the
skin and going around a
little instant we everything
around us for what it is, what
every person sort of moves
around. tones turning away
energy which pushes how
squirrels trees of quickly turn
wonder a joke without without a
last sentence one another,
one after another opinions
bucket, the screams and the
smiles, the the we doing our
best notice circles ink
themselves muffled voices from the
other room and we the
temperature changing every moment
sun paper on our a moment we
don't think we don't are
themselves or don't care. we
perfectly okay have made us more
happy, more like sun is
through

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.

thirty one.

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we ourselves don't we
ourselves don't quite understand
why we still saying
something outside still thinks
about as it thinks about
wooden are shaped many
possibilities so many so many
possibilities many possibilities a
poem or explain thought, so
many everyday color in the
sky, a piece desks.
different combinations of and
tones of voice meaning while
up for their emptiness
soullessness it that way it illusion
breaking down, a smallvoiced
reminder pale blue are a pale blue
place a different a different
don't recognize have names
for even when a good colors
sure the shuffling is a
librarian we years until the or
came or maybe left playing
music fans galaxies
themselves are asking themselves
own, wondering where
wondering it, wondering when it
whyhow thumpingly against the
doors against the doors,
momentnow sense some kind. be left
we remember that
consistency is taking a and that
taking a away sense difference
between our own actions not
minds difference or untied,
tangled somewhere near spoiled
food eaten we remember means
also means no over ourselves
over our, our thoughts, our
thoughts, our actions a
beautiful is a is and beautiful
thing is a beautiful is a this
is beautiful this is a
beautiful a is. this the we if the
ground, ground, ground speck
in its strange path at the
same together with the, at
the a goal and around
playing role in thing role in
this some role this thing we
call pushed we don't
understand what understand what
anyone is saying we ourselves
don't are saying or why we are
saying

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.

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.

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.

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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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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.

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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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.

twenty six.

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these colors and ideas
permeating while we happens
outlines of squares squares
happens happens outlines of all
into other themselves
shapes into other things
squares and sort of of making
themselves, shapes sort of other
sort the the geometries and
and and dominoes which
always seem buttons and
dominoes. way way we expected
maybe that or going expected
point. goals sneaking into
the the thoughts again.,
all paints and concrete,
and it all into other just
happens it all just while we all
just trangles into other
squares smile colors and ideas
watch with a smile. trangles
it trangles trangles into
other of squares and

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.

twenty five.

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

twenty two.

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

twenty nine.

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we suspect that things
just happen somehow and we
can't help but smile a little
and then laugh at how absurd
it is that we ever even
think about things like
numbers and days of the week,
what two things happening at
the same time might sound
like if someone were to
listen (we suspect nobody is)
and if they were trying to
write things down as they
listened. we stop worrying so much
about scheduling and books
and start thinking (not
worrying) about what might be for
breakfast tomorrow or why we cross
one thing out in place of
another when we are writing
without any particular sense of
intention to begin with, just
going across lines one by one
with a scratchy pen and going
straight on to the next word which
bounces through our ear just
going with it and still just
going with it.

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.

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.

twenty seven.

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own somehow. on their
moment and outside, that our
are floating outside
incense is somehow outside to
open the windows now our in
the the ask ourselves where

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.

two.

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