we accidentally imagine

by andrew yoon

seed 7140333

it is 2025. we wonder what to say next, and the wind is still blowing.

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 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.

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.

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 eight.

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and fade , do eventually
, statues collapse , and
things just do what they do they
what they the a cloud of
leaves come from , whether we
made up or if could there , or
that in that these grid these
grid the branches below. we
up so they so they quietly
understood that sometimes away and
quietly understood okay
ourselves . we don't know, and we,
and and we the it's eight yet
, and it and it we, us,
strange our wind moves hair
looks when looks when the
moves different shapes smear
with our all to smudges might
make something we wouldn't
have otherwise , but
different a the idea of for a moment
. eyes and eyes and just
listen to wonder what could
come this , anything
couldn't prepare us for us for it ,
and people never met,
pointing laughter, pointing
toward to toward pointing
toward their how other as they
explain how they they explain
learned place. how other how
they they explain to each
other how they learned . so
many different types the
place . so many little going
all, events going back and
forth without leaving any of
forth without leaving mark
permanent mark because even roads
of permanent mark leaving
any collapse and fade
things just do we try to figure
of leaves come from
whether we all it all up maybe if
maybe something could really
be maybe a way that these
that come up when

thirty.

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we wonder what might be
next, if anything actually
changed over these years or if
nothing ever really changes. we
reject the idea that nothing
really changes and we ask
ourselves an unexpected question
in return: “who are you?”
and we are unable to answer.
we don't know. and then we
begin to cry. and then we begin
to laugh, and laugh, and
laugh. can't we see why these
questions are so aimless in the
first place when it seems like
every minute or second a new
question comes to our ears which
is so, so, so much more
important like why we can't think
of a good question to begin
with at the moment or how we
are able to read bad
handwriting. we laugh, and we laugh,
and we laugh.

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.

thirty one.

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growing, shapes never
shapes we expect in situations
where things remember that
make have to have left just as
they left just as they sort of
illusion another sort of
illusion and that a step which
actions and the temperature
outside today, not so tied or
untied, or off on or in a food
being eaten by bacteria and
fungi fungi and fungi and
fungi world also means having
no control over ourselves

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.

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.

fifteen.

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be from real them ever
all these be, all
situations branching stories,
possibilities fanning out,
incomprehensible tree, we end and for
don't remember where we for
different responses for
different dealing different
responses , different ways
smiling. we are why because one
of us group know the the
half even hear were because
going on all at car, a
different struggle every. behind
every . just and keep be from
into into some after after
options. we going with with the
one to up we saw first

twenty four.

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

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.

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.

twenty six.

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. spray paints and
concrete, all these colors and
ideas permeating all we watch
with permeating while
happens smile just just a all
just trangles themselves
relationships pushing the geometries
and fall in the wrong
direction fall dominoes which
always seem going the wrong or
wrong direction. in the the
wrong intended, but maybe
that thoughts again..,, all
with a of a smile. it all just
of squares and things
other the the geometries
which always always seem
going, but maybe that or point
. goals sneaking
sneaking again.. the maybe that
could intended,,. we
expected maybe that could way we.

twenty three.

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circles of ink hear
muffled voices from we can't
every moment on and how the
whole room is it on for a
anything we don't know if things
are we don't perfectly that
never made us, more the skin
keeps pushing trees around a
little instant we are able to
see everything around is,
object how the eyes and kind of
energy which pushes us wonder
why resonant quickly if in
all out to part of a story
sentence one another some the and
facts falling into same
bucket, the screams and the
smiles, the , and violins the
timer keeps ticking and not
ink we the temperature
changing every moment all

eighteen.

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

twenty five.

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our best to pretend we to
pretend we aren't listening.
every best to becoming. a .
every more accurate,
listening. every more accurate
every repetition getting a
little aren't listening.
getting every repetition. best
to pretend we aren't we do
our while we do heated do our
pretend best to pretend every
more accurate, a getting and
with becoming heated while
to our aren't listening.
every listening repetition
getting a little fewer

fourteen.

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and nobody the same and
to nobody really really
about seems and about the the
wayingsong behind the, and, a
underthere underthere, a a a
beforemaroon, the eyes, the
questions and ideas things all but
woodenbits woodenbits little
suggest a counterpoint. and the
nobody really seems. about the
wind.. agains wind.

twenty.

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

twenty two.

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sun outside making of
sound against grass. for
theringly ticking by again and
again angles crackling, we
breathe breathe and sun the sun
longer and the that that sound
and we the the sound of
people and somehow the voices
make and we hear all all the
windchimes and these acoustic
vibrations buzzing inside our our
chests and us feel not warmer
but more okay and another
time lean our notice. the sun
fuzzy for a the second again
all these

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

twenty seven.

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

sixteen.

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forget to ask breathe
and and. we forget to ask we.
laughing! isn't it funny on the
the sun starts back right on
shades names so so many lines..
incense smoke in our lungs lungs
somehow becoming smoke in our we
we breathe breathe and we
we forget to and we breathe
we breathe. questions to.
we forget. we forget
laughing laughing how how we
can't funny how we can't help
help but it it funny when
whose and lines and so and
lines and lines. we

two.

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

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.

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 nine.

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it is that we ever it is
that how absurd it like week
and days of the week , what
two sound the same time were
suspect nobody is ) and if they
listened things down so about
scheduling for breakfast worrying
for about what be for
breakfast tomorrow place of when
we sense of intention are
writing without any one begin
with any particular sense
intention with one by one with a
scratchy pen and going the next
word which bounces through
just going and still going
that
,