A rip in the fabric of Time, unnerving but fascinating

It appeared as the third and last clock stopped its ticking. Steel saw it first, then Rob. Sapphire was also aware of its presence. It was a moving, flickering shape that appeared high up, near the apex of the end wall. It seemed, as first, to be a part of the wall texture itself. As if the plaster of the wall was shifting. Then it appeared to take on a series of quick, broken images. Robe felt that it looked like pieces of old and faded moving-film, except that these images were three-dimensional. Rob also thought that he heard, under the rumbling of the skin-like fabric, the sound of voices that seemed to squeal with laughter of pain, or both.

Sapphire nodded. ‘Time.’ She put her arm about Helen’s shoulders and drew the child close to her as she continued to address Rob. ‘You can’t see it. Only now and again. Perhaps a glimpse, that’s all. But even that is dangerous. Also, you cannot enter into Time.’ The smile left her face. In its place was the calm, cool look. It was a look that somehow helped to illustrate her theme. The look itself seemed ageless, as if the blueness, that she radiated, was somehow both the colour and the secret of time.

There were no large cupboards in the room, not even a wardrobe. Helen’s clothes were hung in a built-in unit on the landing outside. The door through which Rob had entered was the only door. The room also had only one window. This was fitted with half-length curtains which were drawn to. Rob moved across the room and snatched the curtains open. The small window was shut tight. There was also a child-guard screwed to about two thirds of the window height. Rob tested the guard. It was still fixed firmly in place.

Steel passed the picture. ‘I doubt it,’ he said as he began to descend the first flight of stairs. Rob followed him. He still felt tired, but he did not fancy sleeping in his own bedroom. Not at the moment. He passed the picture, thinking that there was another couch in the sitting room. Maybe if he fell asleep on that, or even pretended to sleep on it, Sapphire might make him a bed there and tuck him up for the night. He was even wondering, though he would never admit it, what a kiss goodnight from Sapphire would be like.

Rob waited, feeling like someone who was fixed to a spot. Fixed there forever. His mind was filled with a jumble of thoughts. Perhaps this was the time-corridor thing. This place. A nowhere place. Perhaps he was to be left here now. Perhaps it would never be morning, and never be night again. Perhaps it would always stay like this, the very same time. So therefore he would never feel hungry, never feel tired, never feel anything but this strange sense of isolation, of not belonging. Perhaps it would be like that for him forever.

Rob and Helen were back in the kitchen again with Sapphire. Constable Daly had driven back to Scars Edge. He looked slightly puzzled, in the way that people do when they feel that they have been somewhere, or done something before, perhaps in a dream. But he had left feeling satisfied. Rob had watched, without being able to say a word, as Steel moved into action. He had literally stepped into Daly’s arrival at the door, like a fair-owner stepping on to a moving roundabout. Therefore it became Steel, not Rob, who had opened the door, Steel who had asked Daly what he wanted, who told the policeman that everything was alright at that house, and that he, Steel, was a friend of the family who was visiting, in the hope of some peace and quiet in the country.

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Nu segð se wyrdwritere þæt seo wicce sceolde aræran þa of deaþe þone Drihtnes witegan Samuhel gehaten

OE Ælfric Homily (Corpus Cambr. 178) in J. C. Pope Homilies of Ælfric II. 792 Nu segð se wyrdwritere þæt seo wicce sceolde aræran þa of deaþe þone Drihtnes witegan Samuhel gehaten. 1425 Edward, Duke of York Master of Game (Digby) vi Þer beth some [wolves] þat eten children and men..And þei be cleped werewolfes, for men shulde be were of hem, or þe mann see hem.

Near the deep woods falling into the sky, seven hundred steps stepped little black twigs dare not speak. Against ritual abstract solitudes outline, fragmentary flights of fancy tracing twilight’s window shuttered, ghastly monotony, deliberation, and grey abyss.

Fields full thoughtless haste in cryptographic absence from a conscious world, mirror clouding over. Cellar debris looming certain symbols shuddering recognizable.

By night, a subtler thing witching, a werewolf shape, a vampire’s cigarette smoldering on the cobblestone, ghouls waiting at an abandoned bus stop, ghosts and spent skeletons ankle-bone slightly gnawed, but for the dark, figures moved uncertainly. Black lake, black boat, black stone.

Stars pale dusk, flat paper-cut shadows a few more breaths on an oblique road turns patient turning moment time unwinds rough-hewn pillars wrought iron and smoke.

Hypnotic figure chanting some such words sunk in settled gloom, fingers and toes grasp stone’s corner worn mortar smooth in the ruin. Bells tower, their shadows long rhythmic confusion, faintly dreaming wide tonal range collecting at the gates of a town already shut.

1745 J. Swinton Trav. Three English Gent. in Harleian Misc. IV. 358 These Vampyres are supposed to be the Bodies of deceased Persons, animated by evil Spirits, which come out of the Graves, in the Night-time, suck the Blood of many of the Living, and thereby destroy them. 1400 tr. Lanfranc Sci. Cirurgie 153 (MED) Take oile of rosis..terbentine..mummie [v.r. mumie]. 1721 tr. A. Galland Arabian Nights Entertainm. X. 123 Your Majesty knows that the Goules of both Sexes are wandring Dæmons, which generally infest old Building, from whence they rush, but by Surprize, on People that pass by. 1350 in R. H. Robbins Hist. Poems 14th & 15th Cent. 28 Sathanas..seyde on is sawe: ‘gobelyn made is gerner of gromene mawe.’ 1275 Laȝamon Brut (Calig.) l. 7876 Heo beoð ihaten ful iwis incubii demones. 1300 St. Bartholomew (Laud) 174 in C. Horstmann Early S.-Eng. Legendary 372 And þe Aungel heom scheuwede al a-brod þene deuel ase huy stude, Þe fourme of a grislich man þat al for-broide were And swarttore þane eueri ani blouȝman..Fuyrie speldene al stinkende out of is mouth he blaste And fuyr of brumston at his nose. 1788 Universal Mag. Sept. 117/1 Some supposed that the Zombies had carried him off [Fr. que les Zombis l’avoient enlevé]. OE Stowe Psalter cxxxiv. 17 Neque enim est spiritus in ore ipsorum : ne ne soðlice is gast on muðe heora.

Gate of what Lime-tree Flowers in soft-lit Arcades, insignificant in themselves

The model of a contrivance by means of which could certainly get possession of the sheets which were to be a rope; it was a short stick attached by one end to a long piece of thread. By this stick intended to attach the rope to the bed, and as the thread hung down to the floor of the room below, there should pull the thread and the rope would fall down. Tried it, and congratulated the invention, as this was a necessary part of scheme, as otherwise the rope hanging down would have immediately discovered me.

I pull the thread, unravelling round this tiny labyrinthine, a room for music and dance.

Sitting, sets the thread. Set of dining-room furniture constructing a whole geography of consciousness proceeding along inescapable pastimes merely accursed.

Empty dress stretched over their shoes plays in the background. Bleached dust expectations of necessity, haunted expression, a voice is singing. Lyricism to a reality both silent and unexampled. Time edge limits of wants irrational.

A small bead is tied to the thread on the outside of the bag. The purpose of the bead is to have something which may be seen and easily grasped so that the cork can be released without fumbling. In case the bag is of a material or design which would make the bead noticeable, there are two alternatives. One is to sew a number of beads onto the bag where such added decoration would be in keeping. The other is to run the thread through the material to the outside of the bag and, at a point about a half an inch distant, run the thread back through the bag and fasten it to the inner surface of the bag. This will make a loop of thread flat against the outside surface of the bag which, by slipping a fingernail under the loop, makes it simple to pull the thread and thereby remove the cork. The thread used must be extra strong to avoid any chance of having it break. Linen thread is suitable. When thread of a matching color is used, it is invisible, and even a contrasting color is not apt to be noticed and, when noticed, is meaningless.

An open pair of scissors down its throat along a single word of refined manners, circumstances naked and shivering, tiny moment among inscribed photos blurred and damaged. Symmetrical nothing of continual resemblance, vaguely waiting to remember the girls were pretty at the seaside, beneath black sky senses its wide sweep along boundaries of the body reaching. Thread touched unfolds.

This is not who I remember. The first body was an environment a land-mark on the frontier of tomorrow. In the meaning of the day the way one turns and looks—eyes for hands. Today the stranger the exile and spook are in my shaving mirror. In my dream you are real. I am as one who each day stands behind the tapestry and receives the needle to pull the thread taut and pass it back through. The design is no one’s.

This may just be an illusion, high heels flimsy brightly colored dresses tucking her blouse sprinkled with icing sugar, imagine deep sleeps in the afternoons peering through a keyhole, with a little culture, yards of fabric and not much trouble, getting dressed up for existence between belief and unbelief. Elevator door trundles shut.

Remembrance of things past, sigh the lack of many a thing sought, wail my dear time’s waste sessions of sweet silent thought in two hundred forty one minutes

OE Ælfric Catholic Homilies: 2nd Ser. (Cambr. Gg.3.28) xx. 194 Hit is awriten be ðam yfelum timan. OE Anglo-Saxon Chron. (Laud) (Peterborough interpolation) anno 654 On his time þa comon togadere heo & Oswiu Oswaldes broðor cyningas. OE Laws of Edgar (Nero E.i) iv. ii. 208 Mine þegnas hæbben heora scipe on minum timan, swa hy hæfdon on mines fæder. OE tr. Defensor Liber Scintillarum (1969) ix. 96 Multi enim se credebant longo tempore uiuere : soðlice hi gelyfdon lange timan lybban. OE Wulfstan Last Days (Hatton) 134 Wa ðam wifum þe þonne tymað & on þam earmlican timan heora cild fedað. 1160 Anglo-Saxon Chron. (Laud) (Peterborough contin.) anno 1137 Nu we willen sægen sumdel wat belamp on Stephnes kinges time.

To describe it, À la recherche du temps perdu is an album I released in two thousand twenty one. Six lp records, twelve sides each about twenty minutes.

Total run time two hundred forty one minutes. The album is based around the novels by Proust, Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust, and is predicated on a few threads … The music of the novels, the music Proust (an avid music collector) had in his head and in his collection, the anthems of the Faubourg Saint-Germain. What music one might hear getting lost in Paris of the Belle Époque? The content includes twenty six composers and a Dixieland jazz band: Bartók, Bellini, Berg, Brahms, Caccini, Chausson, Chopin, Debussy, Delibes, Donizetti, Franck, Hahn, Jungmann, Louisiana Five, Lully, Ravel, Saint-Saëns, Satie, Schoenberg, Schubert, Schumann, Scriabin, Strauss, Tchaikovsky, Verdi, Wagner and Weber.

The primary impetus for the album came from my truck.

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Harold Budd

Harold

When I think about Harold Budd several different thoughts and images come to mind, one is an old alternate definition of ‘wine’ … Old English wine = Old Frisian winne, Middle Low German wine, Old Saxon, Old High German wini (Middle High German wine, win), Old Norse vinr. … a friend.

OE Beowulf 30 Þenden wordum weold wine Scyldinga. 1122 Anglo-Saxon Chron. (Laud) ann. 975 Eadgar..West-Seaxena wine. 1200 Moral Ode (Trin. Coll. MS.) 223 Werse he doð his gode wines þan his fiendes. 1220 Bestiary 374 Eurilc luuen oðer, Also he were his broder, Wurðen stedefast his wine. 1481 W. Caxton tr. Hist. Reynard Fox (1970) 70 He hath nether kyn ne wyn ne frende that wylle entreprise to helpe hym.

I was introduced to Harold by David Sylvian. David had sent me a letter (handwritten, charming), an invitation to release an album on Samadhisound. While we were working on it, he ask me to make a coda for Avalon Sutra as album was running short … the source recordings arrived as a box of blackface ADAT tapes. I took little bits here and there into a very slowly unwinding ostinato. The intention was for it to be ten or so minutes, but I wanted David to get his hand in so I made a seventy minute version and told David to cut it where and how he wanted … he used the whole long track as a second disc.

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図書館

第23章

那天夜里,我梦见了幽灵。

図​書​館

我不知道“幽灵”这一称呼是否正确,但至少那不是活着的实体,不是现实世界中的存在——这点一眼即可看出。

我被什么动静突然惊醒,看见那个少女的身影。尽管时值深夜,但房间里亮得出奇。是月光从窗口泻入。睡前本应拉合的窗帘此时豁然大开,月光中她呈现为轮廓清晰的剪影,镀了一层骨骸般荧白的光。

她大约和我同龄,十五或十六岁。肯定十六。十五与十六之间有明显差别。她身材小巧玲珑,姿态优雅,全然不给人以弱不禁风的印象。秀发笔直泻下,发长及肩,前发垂在额头。身上一条连衣裙,淡蓝色的,裙摆散开。裙子不长也不短,没穿袜子没穿鞋。袖口扣得整整齐齐。领口又圆又大,衬托出形状娇美的脖颈。

她在桌前支颐坐着,目视墙壁,正在沉思什么,但不像在思考复杂问题。相对说来,倒像沉浸在不很遥远的往事的温馨回忆中,嘴角时而漾出微乎其微的笑意。但由于月光阴影的关系,从我这边无法读取其微妙的表情。我佯装安睡,心里拿定主意:不管她做什么都不打扰。我屏住呼吸,不出动静。

我知道这少女是“幽灵”。首先她过于完美,美的不只是容貌本身,整个形体都比现实物完美得多,俨然从某人的梦境中直接走出的少女。那种纯粹的美唤起我心中类似悲哀的感情。那是十分自然的感情,同时又是不应发生在普通场所的感情。

我缩在被窝里大气不敢出,与此同时,她继续支颐凝坐,姿势几乎不变,只有下颚在手心里稍稍移一下位置,头的角度随之略略有所变化。房间里的动作仅此而已。窗外,紧挨窗旁有一株很大的山茱萸在月华中闪着恬静的光。风已止息,无任何声响传来耳畔,感觉上好像自己在不知不觉之间已经死去。我死了,同少女一起沉入深深的火山口湖底。

少女陡然停止支颐,双手置于膝头。又小又白的膝并拢在裙摆那里。她似乎蓦地想起什么,不再盯视墙壁,改变身体朝向,把视线对着我,手举在额头上触摸垂落的前发。那少女味儿十足的纤细的手指像要触发记忆似的留在额前不动。她在看我。我的心脏发出干涩的声响。但不可思议的是,我并没有被人注视的感觉。大概少女看的不是我,而是我后面的什么。

我们两人沉入的火山口湖底,一切阒无声息。火山的活动已是很早以前的故事了。孤独如柔软的泥堆积在那里。穿过水层的隐约光亮,犹如远古记忆的残片白荧荧地洒向四周。深深的水底觅不到生命的迹象。她究竟看了我——或我所在的位置——多长时间呢?我发觉时间的规律已然失去。在那里,时间会按照心的需要而延长或沉积。但不一会儿,少女毫无征兆地从椅子上欠身立起,蹑手蹑脚地朝门口走去。门没开。然而她无声无息地消失在了门外。

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Describing a Circle, why is radix representation a ring isomorphism?

圈 Describing a Circle; 1305 Edmund Conf. 232 in Early Eng. Poems & Lives Saints (1862) 77  Þreo rounde cerclen heo wrot: in þe paume amidde., concentric; 1400 G. Chaucer Treat. Astrolabe (Cambr. Dd.3.53) (1872) i. §17. 10  The heued of capricorne turnyth euermo consentryk vp-on the same cercle.

x = sin( -5.009757041932 * y ) – cos( 5.0073237419122 * x );
y = sin( -5.006352424622 * x ) – cos( 5.0065770149236 * y );

Angular rotation, position, calculated across four billion seven hundred twelve million three hundred eighty eight thousand nine hundred seventy five iterations; graphite touching arc to shade on paper, through Faber-Castell pencil I am a circle inscribed. I am a little cowboy in South Texas, shooting metal plates hanging on a barbed wire fence. Shot striking metal to chime, dreaming sound of bell, 1225 Ancrene Riwle (Cleo. C.vi) Þet ower beoden bemen wel & dreamen in drichtines earen. Time occupied by the same nature in mind, symbolism or a thing, a radiance of observation, synthesis succeed one and makes them of the soul, a dark room also occupied by dreaming itself. Aristotle describes the primary being as an intellect or a kind of intellect that “thinks itself” perpetually. A primary substance must be what is both ontologically and epistemically basic, i.e., that which the existence of everything else depends, and on which our systematic knowledge depends. Circles in circles carved in stones as Mayan haab and tzolkin, civil and divine, against the long count of distant memory, days to come curving into a distant past. Stairless cylinder of words overheard in the woods at night among the same stone altars in grey watercolor shades, circles bent towards straight lines, appetite and practical thought, affections and actions of knowledge. The eye being merely the matter of seeing, sense is either a faculty or a separation by the same act dividing the time, obscure to obscurity… learning how to fall in love with my mistakes. Time occupied by the same nature in mind, symbolism or a thing, a radiance of observation, synthesis succeed one and makes them of the soul, a dark room also occupied by dreaming itself. The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second; and throughout nature this primary picture is repeated without end. It is the highest emblem in the cipher of the world. St. Augustine described the nature of God as a circle whose centre was everywhere and its circumference nowhere. Here we are bound by many circles.

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