“5-3-8-15-5-19 (Esoteric Blood Vessels)” by Richard F. Yates

Be sure to drink your…

“Thought Form 0001”

When I was a little kid (5 or 6 years old---not sure what that would be in metric years) I wrote the word “blud” (I didn’t know how to spell “blood”) inside one of my dresser drawers in red felt pen. I believed that words had power (even misspelled words), and I thought that, because I’d written that spooky word in my drawer, anyone who went digging through my stuff would SEE the word, get scared, and leave my stuff alone---you know, not steal my brown corduroys. Technically, it worked. No one stole them, and I wore those pants until my mom got sick of them and threw them away. (Mom was immune to my WORD MAGIC.)

14-15-20-8-9-14-7-14-5-19-19

Sugar coated meaninglessness. (Candy flossing.)

“Thought Form 0002”

My couch can take me anywhere that I want to go. (Like that bed in that Diznee movie about witches and substitutiary locomotion, only there ain’t no Nazis in my story.) Guts go on the inside, and science leaves the best aftertaste (like anti-freeze.) Gravity---more than being poor, more than illness, more than DEATH ITSELF---Gravity is my ultimate enemy.

Hickle-dee dickle-dee doo dah day!

“Thought Form 0003”

DON’T—STOP      4-15-14’20—19-20-15-16

“Thought Form 0004”

We can’t relax

A few days ago, Mariah and I stopped to get coffee on the way to work, and the window lady said, “How are you today?” And I answered, “We are well,” and then Mariah hit me in the arm. After we received our drinks and pulled away from the window, I laughed and said, “What was that for?” Mariah says, “I’m use to your robot voice, but normal people aren’t.” And I was genuinely surprised. I didn’t know I HAD a robot voice…

1-16-5—13-5-14

“Thought Form 0005”

Stupid silly pointless unprofessional fragmentary and crude… My kinda work! (Actually, it IS my work.) There’s this conspiracy going around (the lights just flickered) that I’m trying to go legit. Tryin’ to become a COMMERCIAL artist… Ha! That’s rich… (I, however, am not.)

Flipper was always in over his head.

“Thought Form 0006”

I’ve spent a long time (several days---a GREAT amount of time, in my creative world) working on this post. It begs the question, WHY LABOR OVER SOMETHING SO ULTIMATELY TRIVIAL? But all things are, ultimately, trivial. However, for the brief moments that I spent making this stuff---writing funny words and drawing funny little shapes and ENCODING silly little slogans---I was living and enjoying being alive. For THESE MOMENTS, it was worthwhile.

---Richard F. Yates

“Thoughts on the ‘Pain Induced Marathon’: The Morning After (30)” by Richard F. Yates

When one peddles in the absurd, when one deals in banalities and micro-concepts, when one pushes that boulder up the hill only to watch is tumble back down, there will always be a certain element of resistance to the idea that what one is doing has any value. I’m certain that this is true because I live the consequences of working in MUNDANE MAGIC on a daily basis.

I’m economically embarrassed, but psychologically fulfilled.

Even the most die-hard of adherents can only be expected to suffer inanity for so long before becoming bored and moving on to greener pastures. I’m cool with that, and happy with yesterday’s “outcome” (for lack of a better term.) Not counting Scotty Sparks’s two ACTUAL poems, and a single silly drawing of mine posted BEFORE the marathon, I ended the day with TWENTY-NINE pieces of nonsense, in total, in my performance. I consider these marathons (when they occur) to be performances as much as I consider them fiction, poetry, and visual art, because part of the barrage is the simple ACTION of making and posting each BIT. The MASS POSTING is as much a part of the activity as the making of each drawing or written piece.

But consider this: most of the individual pieces in this marathon, taken on their own merits, would be a throw-away---a tiny bit of NOTHING. “2 + 1 = love triangle” or a stick figure surfer with a halo or a nonsense poem about growing up poor and having to take lunch to school in a paper bag (which most people probably didn’t get)---none of these things, presented on their own and considered in isolation, would have made any impact on the world. However!!! When a multitude of tiny pieces (of nothing) begin to swarm, when they appear suddenly all grouped together and descend upon the world in mass, people notice. Each individual element of the swarm may be nothing but wings, some pollen, and a useless stinger, but the mass taken together can inspire fear and panic in the population (not to mention great B-films, like Attack of the Killer Bees!) Or confusion. I’m cool with confusion, too.

It’s not a question of whether or not I’ll keep making my silly drawings or micro-stories or nonsense poems, I’ve created these things since my childhood, and I’ll continue to make them until I keel over and drop. Shit, I’ll probably try to make a drawing with my fingertip in the pool of blood I’m lying in when I’m finally beaten to death by that angry crowd, and I’ll smile just a little bit through crimson teeth as they kick harder than even, confused and infuriated by the snake with the halo that I scrawl as my eyes roll back in my head and the lights go out! And I’ll probably keep having marathons as well, once or twice per year, if for no other reason than sheer perversity.

Push that boulder to the top of the hill, then grin as it rolls back down! Thanks for playing!

---Richard F. Yates

[To check out the "Pain Induced Mega Nonsense Marathon" and other weirdness, look no further than The Primitive Entertainment Workshop! It's ginchy cool, daddy-o...]