we accidentally imagine

by andrew yoon

seed 5789567

it is 2024. we wonder what to say next, and the wind is still blowing.

twenty four.

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

fifteen.

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least for don't least
for, for now at least for
don't remember where calling
for where we for different
responses and smiling. we are
don't know us one don't know
why they even hear half of
going, story at once, a
different life story car maybe if
time but the sky keep
arriving and seem to be from
arriving ever seem situations
branching some. we with first and
that at least we instincts
for seems as good good as go
looking we different responses
and smiling. we know of us
smiled gestures across across
a group of people who
don't know why they didn't
when didn't even hear half it
because because there going , a
different life single car jam , a a
note maybe maybe if there was
every note if struggle in
traffic in single all single.
time was more note more note
more like just time.. the sky
. sky seeming like just
ceiling none of them ever,
fanning out into options tree,
incomprehensible tree, options after
impossible weigh. we end up just end
up going the one we saw
first good we don't where we
for different. . and and
smiling. social gestures
amplifying across why they thought
so many things going hear
many things going on
different life in this every note
the piano maybe different
struggle every single car in once
once once, a different on all
at on on all at because at

sixteen.

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can't help coming back
right right but we can't
shades sun we and so many lines.
we that glowing becoming
smoke somehow becoming smoke
in our and to we and we
breathe breathe and we breathe
it right on cue shades
colors whose names so many
lines lines and of of these
shades of these these whose cue
back sun sun can't starts
coming back help help but can't
help laughing! isn't it it
ask questions. we but smile
sun starts these whose
names we and lines and that
somehow becoming smoke in
breathe breathe and we we
breathe and breathe smoke in
somehow becoming stick of
becoming smoke in in in our lungs
ask when the names shades
sun starts cue shades of
these colors whose these
these shades coming the sun
coming back right colors whose
names we can't remember and
and so many many we is still
somehow breathe. we forget to
ask we forget questions and
we breathe. we. . we! isn't
it funny how smile funny
when

twenty three.

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clinging to one another
one after another the and
facts falling bucket,
screams and the hugs violins the
. going around on
themselves while we hear muffled
but every how landing room
for all know if are
repeating themselves or not and
because caring about us feel on
arm and our blood is skin
keeps going keeps an we able us
is and object just sort of
moves around in eyes without
being absorbed kinetic
energy which pushes us is so how
cars turn if in the end it out
to be punchline, clinging
to some rock glue, facts

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.

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.

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.

two.

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

twenty nine.

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scratchy pen and going
by going across lines on to
the next word our ear .
suspect help but smile a little
and how about things like
even think about things and
days of the same time might at
listen nobody is ) and if they
were trying to so and or why we
cross one thing when we are
writing without sense of
intention are without any
particular going across pen
through and still just going
with we but and we but and then
laugh at how absurd it that we
ever about things

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.

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.

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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.

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.

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.

twenty eight.

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we wonder couldn't
prepare wonder for, matter
anyway and we listen to people,
pointing their explain to each
other so many different types
of events going back and
forth and forth without
leaving any even roads of
permanent mark leaving any sort
mark because things they
figure patterns in a figure out
cloud of leaves come from made
it the really up or maybe
something that maybe decided or,
that leaves decided or felt
or these grid patterns at
the branches sitting place
, but see don't or maybe
not say anything okay to
just say it's okay to just we
don't know of sight. and
another thing happens of the
clock and eight we notice that
behind we notice front our hair
try smear the and try to
smear the lead hand our but all
to the paper perfectly.
make somehow misread a us
think of something we
wouldn't have but maybe a
different would be better more
execution would more relevancy ,
and let it go close our eyes
and listen to our listen
wind come from this or
couldn't it, would matter, and if
and anyway we listen of
we've sounds of all these
people laughter and they
explain different types of
events going forth permanent
forth and dams fade
eventually , and things do what they
were we out

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 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.

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

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.

twenty six.

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which always not going
the way way. we expected or
maybe that that could could
again. ideas and and
interactions. spray paints and ideas
all just other just happens
outlines outlines sort of
geometries and dominoes dominoes
dominoes and always seem to fall
dominoes which always seem and
dominoes which always seem
buttons and dominoes which
always seem to fall in the
always seem. not not we we
expected could be but maybe that.
and interactions.
concrete we watch with with ideas
permeating with

thirty.

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and then cry to laugh,
laugh, and we begin can't we
see the first the first
place it seems like every
minute our ears, so, so
important like why we can't think
of a good moment a good or
how we, laugh, if anything.
we reject or if nothing. we
and we unexpected question
to answer. know and then we
cry begin to and begin can't
we see why when it a new
second place it place to our
which is we can't with. laugh
are able to read bad
handwriting, handwriting., if
anything actually changed what
might if anything really. we
ask an unexpected question
answer. answer and then we
begin to laugh, and laugh

twenty seven.

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, it might be warm enough
outside feel this stinging
sensation in notice now we caused
each paint care a the wires
happened, if someone did it on
purpose if someone these things
of their our eyes moment
moment and bodies, that
somehow in our foreheads, might
be outside to open the feel
ourselves where they groove and
every freckle lot about , how
each knot, just of happen
their just and feel like we
floating outside

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.

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.

twenty two.

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a while sun keeps and we
keep making that sound sound
sniffling from seasonal but but
smile at people laughing
voices make voices voices make
this sort of harmony against
the these all buzzing our
feel warmer but . which.

thirty one.

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step away could mean
could away a step taking a step
away which not own actions
and the temperature
outside today difference
between our minds and our
shoelaces or in a trashbag
somewhere near bacteria and fungi
fungi no control over having
no, our actions, and this.
and we it be the watch the
single green, at the same going
somewhere with a goal just a with
hours supposedly doing some
doing some job playing some
job playing some role in
this thing values being we
don't is or why and are saying
sun's falling rising and
falling and falling with rising
and as thinks about wooden
cabinets and why they are so when
there are so many there many
thought a chord and roll up our
sleeves when color in new of
words, probabilistic
relationships, probabilistic
relationships imitating meaning
while our ears and toes make
for up make up for their
emptiness or soullessness if we
the, a are a a grain in
library where a different
things we don't recognize
things we recognize we even
when we thought on a grip on
not sure if in we seen whose
name we don't remember we
don't remember the the phone
left back galaxies toward,
against the

twenty five.

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

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.

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.

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.
,