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Thinking Over 'One-Way Correspondence with Theo'
I’ll attach below, as always, the reference material that I am using here. I have taken some time off, and am pleased, because the first version of me ‘Thinking over' this sucker went horribly. I was too stupid. Now I am smart. I may do a double post this week, which should be informational. If you’re new, These audio posts are referencing previous written posts, so you may want to read it, but it’s fine if not, you can also just read along below.
Here’s the shit:
Thought-Letter to John A Theo
Well you never answered but if you had
I’d have told you all about that day
and the new insight which no doubt
overrides the previous twenty, and
to that end redefines my human life;
all is lost, but I will try and restore it:
Did you know, Theo, that I am
consolidating my struggles for better
or worse into one large piece of day
which is most of it, actually, and
in doing so, gleaning hopefully
a base understanding of its basest form?
Maybe you didn’t but anyway,
I have, functionless, observant,
and thought I was becoming more
agreeable or capable one but no,
That day I understood something clearly
which eluded then and eludes now
its description, something phenomenal,
and it was the extent of failure
poured into labor over ten years which
depending on your frame of reference
is possible even impressive, maybe
to you at least, and probably partly
that's why I was calling anyway, but
beyond that failure is the definition
of failure which is also mired in independence
and cannot be communicated and John
I wonder if the failure I speak of
becomes very much something else
when pushed through a lens of desperation;
I wonder if when you pull back just a little
there is a snag of beauty and I’ll tell you
what I realized about that is the lens
itself is the lens and the failure is
in its imperceptibility, look, man,
I was meant to run my life
through a sieve of observation
and like some quantum state of self
I am both magnificent and delusional
lonely or beautiful, and maybe the thing
I was really trying to get it at, that clarity,
is that, John, I came to see, It is always both,
and wow hey what profundity in the idling
meniality, I know, fuck man, I know, but
there's a facet of that which is real, that
the performance is always human, no?
if I dual laze and seek the validation
of the screen, of the eye, of the reading,
and am hidden away the laze is imbued
with the beauty which seeks to come out
and when the beauty is nigh and the eye
is here, in my space, touching my hand,
my laze is practiced, but not inauthentic.
Not always laze no, today, by way of example,
I have reclaimed desktop real estate wineglass condo,
which has beautiful afternoon light, spilling red
across the wall and books, and you are not here
nor would you be, you to me, it was nice,
though, not you and not my Ex, to observe,
to make incredible my mundane for any,
and you may find it deficient, who knows,
but it is a labor of its own good friend,
an unpaid dignity which I maintain,
showering beautifully, and organizing
my room and carrying my laundry beautifully
and thinking with beauty about beautiful work
so that some day some person says to me, the way,
Oliver, you carry your laundry, is so elegant,
and then I hate them for being so small,
for not sharing that beauty into everything,
I’m all fucked up, Theo, no surprise,
have been and I’d guess you know I’d get here,
were waiting even, but don’t miss the point:
If there is nothing else, I know
that I know as much as someone can
while being, as tough as it is.
and you are gone and cannot see my being
so I am writing to tell you about it.
Great news at last for and from me! Two insights of hope! One now and one spelled out below. Which is, let’s see, a bit of ego, too, forgive me, its true, first is this- The first is this: Some insight toward writing and art, I am increasingly singular, the product of effort, began seven years or more, not Bukowski, hah! Not Lerner, never, nor Rosmarie, Keith, Didion, nor Beckett, although, anyway this good news to me and the way it came into vision- Scott sent a Lerner video and everyone uses such big words and furthermore understands big concepts and really I think Lerner is it, you know, and how do I look to Lerner? well/ I dont. And so there’s the feeling forever that just around the bend, there, there, so close you can theres this feeling that my metric is all broken and the lattices are splitting one by one- I am lowered- I mean, you understand, the lattices, whatever, but no! I found out once again as per usual that one should not/ cannot compare selves, or more what I mean really is that Lerner has academic philosophical conceptual perfection well cornered, and I don’t see many people over on that other spot, that sort of grey patch which nudges out against the varying hills. In fact! As I look I am more or less alone in that regard, NOW! HOW about that man! Used to be I simply approximated (poorly) then it became that I could slip by in my way and work up against those approximations, then finally the unshackled being which is evidenced in this sentence being quite long and denying structure and I don’t even think (!) my friends I do not even think anymore of style or language, just thought itself, and it has little very little to do with Ben or Theo or famous people too and sometimes I could even imagine a world where someone writes something down and notices they are doing that Oliver thing. I mentioned it was ego heavy, thanks for bearing with me, those who have, and am I more interested in anything than talking at length about myself and what I think? but it is not purely ego—and besides there are all the other considerations of writing which now lay into me, and I am failing, but getting better— it is that I have made an effort to this end and here at this end I am looking back it is optimistic. In ten years I may have the required materials to write something really good, or I may be dead, whichever.
Okay thanks for listening if you did.
Love you all,
Oliver
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit boliverb.substack.com
View all episodes
By with Oliver BurellI’ll attach below, as always, the reference material that I am using here. I have taken some time off, and am pleased, because the first version of me ‘Thinking over' this sucker went horribly. I was too stupid. Now I am smart. I may do a double post this week, which should be informational. If you’re new, These audio posts are referencing previous written posts, so you may want to read it, but it’s fine if not, you can also just read along below.
Here’s the shit:
Thought-Letter to John A Theo
Well you never answered but if you had
I’d have told you all about that day
and the new insight which no doubt
overrides the previous twenty, and
to that end redefines my human life;
all is lost, but I will try and restore it:
Did you know, Theo, that I am
consolidating my struggles for better
or worse into one large piece of day
which is most of it, actually, and
in doing so, gleaning hopefully
a base understanding of its basest form?
Maybe you didn’t but anyway,
I have, functionless, observant,
and thought I was becoming more
agreeable or capable one but no,
That day I understood something clearly
which eluded then and eludes now
its description, something phenomenal,
and it was the extent of failure
poured into labor over ten years which
depending on your frame of reference
is possible even impressive, maybe
to you at least, and probably partly
that's why I was calling anyway, but
beyond that failure is the definition
of failure which is also mired in independence
and cannot be communicated and John
I wonder if the failure I speak of
becomes very much something else
when pushed through a lens of desperation;
I wonder if when you pull back just a little
there is a snag of beauty and I’ll tell you
what I realized about that is the lens
itself is the lens and the failure is
in its imperceptibility, look, man,
I was meant to run my life
through a sieve of observation
and like some quantum state of self
I am both magnificent and delusional
lonely or beautiful, and maybe the thing
I was really trying to get it at, that clarity,
is that, John, I came to see, It is always both,
and wow hey what profundity in the idling
meniality, I know, fuck man, I know, but
there's a facet of that which is real, that
the performance is always human, no?
if I dual laze and seek the validation
of the screen, of the eye, of the reading,
and am hidden away the laze is imbued
with the beauty which seeks to come out
and when the beauty is nigh and the eye
is here, in my space, touching my hand,
my laze is practiced, but not inauthentic.
Not always laze no, today, by way of example,
I have reclaimed desktop real estate wineglass condo,
which has beautiful afternoon light, spilling red
across the wall and books, and you are not here
nor would you be, you to me, it was nice,
though, not you and not my Ex, to observe,
to make incredible my mundane for any,
and you may find it deficient, who knows,
but it is a labor of its own good friend,
an unpaid dignity which I maintain,
showering beautifully, and organizing
my room and carrying my laundry beautifully
and thinking with beauty about beautiful work
so that some day some person says to me, the way,
Oliver, you carry your laundry, is so elegant,
and then I hate them for being so small,
for not sharing that beauty into everything,
I’m all fucked up, Theo, no surprise,
have been and I’d guess you know I’d get here,
were waiting even, but don’t miss the point:
If there is nothing else, I know
that I know as much as someone can
while being, as tough as it is.
and you are gone and cannot see my being
so I am writing to tell you about it.
Great news at last for and from me! Two insights of hope! One now and one spelled out below. Which is, let’s see, a bit of ego, too, forgive me, its true, first is this- The first is this: Some insight toward writing and art, I am increasingly singular, the product of effort, began seven years or more, not Bukowski, hah! Not Lerner, never, nor Rosmarie, Keith, Didion, nor Beckett, although, anyway this good news to me and the way it came into vision- Scott sent a Lerner video and everyone uses such big words and furthermore understands big concepts and really I think Lerner is it, you know, and how do I look to Lerner? well/ I dont. And so there’s the feeling forever that just around the bend, there, there, so close you can theres this feeling that my metric is all broken and the lattices are splitting one by one- I am lowered- I mean, you understand, the lattices, whatever, but no! I found out once again as per usual that one should not/ cannot compare selves, or more what I mean really is that Lerner has academic philosophical conceptual perfection well cornered, and I don’t see many people over on that other spot, that sort of grey patch which nudges out against the varying hills. In fact! As I look I am more or less alone in that regard, NOW! HOW about that man! Used to be I simply approximated (poorly) then it became that I could slip by in my way and work up against those approximations, then finally the unshackled being which is evidenced in this sentence being quite long and denying structure and I don’t even think (!) my friends I do not even think anymore of style or language, just thought itself, and it has little very little to do with Ben or Theo or famous people too and sometimes I could even imagine a world where someone writes something down and notices they are doing that Oliver thing. I mentioned it was ego heavy, thanks for bearing with me, those who have, and am I more interested in anything than talking at length about myself and what I think? but it is not purely ego—and besides there are all the other considerations of writing which now lay into me, and I am failing, but getting better— it is that I have made an effort to this end and here at this end I am looking back it is optimistic. In ten years I may have the required materials to write something really good, or I may be dead, whichever.
Okay thanks for listening if you did.
Love you all,
Oliver
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit boliverb.substack.com