By ANTHONY HOWELL.
Odin, known as the outlaws’ patron,
Radiates waves of probability,
Facts being as relative as theory
While vying points-of-view bedevil Rashomon.
His mercury manipulates
Quantum mechanics.
Though truth trickles down to us
As feebly as money does,
Hermes Trismegistus
Charts the bounds of an abyss
Which looks up as well as down.
To bolster our myopia is by no means protective.
May the occult of a fluid sort of physics
Celebrate a vision that’s ignored,
Pluck out the view projected by our media
And open up a window in its bathtub-style cockpit
Onto a luminous Word:
This shall dispel the hallucination
Disorientated by an orientation
That is unequivocally false.
And as for that material that Stalin so insisted on,
Skilled in our Hermetic arts we can expose
The fallacy of a pragmatic programme
Guided by a mission-driven hoax
To build with blocks of what should be
That will in time dissolve.
Through it all, we see
The manipulation of each mechanism
Processing the fabric of a dream —
Though we have all been outlawed by decree
Amid price hikes and market crashes.
Only the elites will weather this malaise — unless
— Right brain, left eye —
Unless some inner view predicts the seer’s identity,
Trusting to his intuition
That we may adjust our behaviour.
Odin went to Mímir,
Eye to eye, the wisest of the wise.
The blind eye is sacred to Nelson
Turning a patch to the order,
Dreaming up an image of the world
That his one receptor projected.
Rhetoric is grounded in purpose,
Not in empty rules.
To alter the terms of a question
Asked by a well at the base of Yggdrasill,
Peremptory assertions may come to grief
On the rocks of anti-armour capabilities.
From the relational perspective
Of the world tree supporting all the realms,
One foot out of the door, one foot on a banana skin,
For all his heavily-armoured frame, Thor will lose the fight
Where quarks and gluons swirl
Until his rolling head has come to rest.
Those who insist they are right
Can rarely accommodate a radical suggestion.
Life is gossip,
Mímir said to Odin.
This is the lore of the women:
Worthwhile in fog of quanta as in fog of war.
Odin could drink from the well
Only after a sacrifice.
How do you defeat an opponent
Who is by nature stronger than you are?
Thus did the wanderer forfeit his eye.
He plucked it out himself.
Thor may wield his hammer with aplomb,
But Odin asks of womankind
Their lore – the learning of natural things
Generating complex rings of interactions.
Even for numbers we only have words
And what are these but nodes between phenomena
Giving early warning against threats
By the intuition of some independent entity?
An apple never was the fruit –
But Lenin gets no further than did Newton.
Apple that is no more material than you are or me
Defined merely by motion and by mass
Grown too big to succeed.
Weigh that against too massive now to fail.
Situated in the initial detection,
Stalking and assessment of ballistic entities,
Once upon a time
Stories would turn into circles
Before being reassigned to ground-located radars
Raised on otherworldly worlds
With more imagination than we ourselves possess.
In the beginning the word was ‘in the beginning’…
Odin’s eye will set the basis for
Our situated self’s interpretation.
All cows are black in the dark
For nature has such tricks up her sleeve
Since experience declares
A disavowal of autonomy
That’s neither in the runes nor
In the knowledge of the female
Nor in any early indications
Of a radical difference between them
And Odin losing an eye in order to acquire
Awareness that there are no depositories of truth,
Harvesting instead a capability
Supporting our defence.
Solipsism wars against Gestalt
And thought then ceases to be limpid
Against ballistic missiles
And novel hypersonic threats,
Yet if both eyes observe the one trajectory
A granule of existence takes it cannot hit its mark,
While adding in the articulations
Of a spirit’s eight-legged horse
Participating in the correspondence
In which that phenomenon manifests itself.
And à propos the project’s multinational
Development initiative,
Any such phenomenon so registered
Requires the inclusion of all that is related
To a space-based, projectile
Early warning narrative
Just as you may squint to thread a needle.
The unambiguous description
Odin’s single eye reveals contributes to
The relevant relative information.
Giving up an eye for the gift of intuition,
Odin is the ancestor of Heisenberg and Bohr.
Molecules of DNA may codify
The aeons in their billions
Trekked by hordes of men, trailing their women behind them.
Knowledge of the vulva resides on the islands.
And the biochemic process of developing
A space-based missile early warning capability
Demonstrates the blade has two sides.
Islands are ruled by women, mainlands drifted across
In low entropy
To create a situation’s threat awareness.
What is needed is contextuality.
The needle has one eye
Swarming with correlations
Between all ballistic and hypersonic threats.
There was a feuding once between
The women people and the men people.
This motivates the basis for
Intergalactic actions through its initial divide.
Being then is nothing if not action,
But there are many subtleties to that.
Thor’s hammer represents intentionality
By providing blunt shock and awe.
Ah, but has Odin ever lost a war?
Guile and persuasion versus brute force.
And as with relative definitions, trade-offs,
And unstable architectures,
Just as any single grain may flow through many holes,
The significant gods have died and remain alive.
Psychopomps suggest that they exist
On the other side of the wall,
As alive and as dead as a physicist’s cat.
What makes a medley of myths a single story?
Just as the vulva intervenes
In the least initiative that might set the basis
For elements, sensations, even time,
Which exists only as a set of relations,
You prefer your future multilateral programme
To be based on the easiest of answers.
Still, it is said that the eye continues to see
Independently.
Basically the socket and its emptiness
Underscores the SBMEW capability –
The eye removed from its socket
Gets dropped into the well’s broth
To serve our security goals.
Why would you surrender such an attribute?
After Odin dangles on the tree
He reads its twigs as runes.
– An eye, a kidney, an arm?
To drink the mead of knowledge from a pain
Creates an entanglement
Enriched by layers of meaning.
Meanwhile a term being used is the same
As the word Loki uses as a taunt.
What is relinquished hallows a space:
A socket which gets occupied,
For here is a word which may refer equally
To telepathic openness or sexual receptivity
That makes your objective seem to everyone’s advantage,
Acknowledging the creed of Machiavelli.
This kind of right-brain, intuitive ability
Which is considered feminine even today
Is rooted in the three worlds
And reaches to the sky.
Tacitus tells us that the tribes
Held women in high honour and attributed to them
The relational complexity
Of quantum field theory as it feeds the tree:
A superior spiritual ability
Which calls for changing consciousness and elevating energy.
Drink of the mead of its intuition.
Ultimate existence has been shipwrecked:
Included were accomplishments such as spirit journeying,
Weather working and the magic that affects men’s minds.
This is the challenge that stares at Mímir’s head
Each morning, as it drinks from Odin’s pledge.
As such, it proves the natural complement
To an intellectual, runic male magic.
With its relationship to hidden things,
This is the distaff side to wisdom.
A woman who practices this craft
Is known as a Vulva;
Knowing things not only in their depth
By focused peer, but also in their breadth.
Knowing in a single-eyed,
Masculine practitioner her Semen.
And we too can share in her breadth of perception
If we have the wit and the will enough to win her.
In parallax, the visible displacement
Or the conflict in the evident direction of a thing
That we may encounter at the well
Hints that with a loss we gain acuity of view,
Lost as perceived from two different points
Not on any line with the object.
One modern witch proposes this
As the very peak of our enigmatic challenges
Since it conveys to us a world
Of interdependence and contingencies.
Thus it was he sacrificed his depth to hit the spot.
Breadth and depth alike have their uses.
Depth is afforded by the slight parallax
Between one side of your nose and the other.
Thus us humans possess depth perception.
Contrariwise, animals whose eyes are placed
More towards the sides of their heads,
Possess greater breadth of perception.
Us humans possess far greater depth.
Contrariwise, animals whose eyes are placed
More towards the sides of their heads,
Possess far greater breadth.
Depth is afforded by the slight parallax
Between one side of your nose and the other.
Thus it was he sacrificed his depth to hit the spot.
Breadth and depth alike have their uses
Since they convey to us a world
Of interdependence and contingencies.
One modern witch proposes this
As the very peak of our enigmatic challenges –
Lost as perceived from two different points
Not on any line with the object
That we may encounter at the well.
Squinting with a loss, we gain acuity of view
From parallax; the visible displacement
Or the conflict in the evident direction of a thing.
And we too can share in her breadth of perception
If we have the wit and the will enough to win her.
Knowing in the single-eyed
Masculine practitioner her Semen,
Knowing things not only in their depth
By focused peer, but also in their breadth,
A woman who practices this craft
Is known as a Vulva.
With its relationship to hidden things,
This is the distaff-side to wisdom.
As such, it is the natural complement
To an intellectual, runic male magic.
This is the challenge that stares at Mímir’s head
Each morning, as it drinks from Odin’s pledge:
Included are accomplishments such as spirit journeying,
Weather working and the magic that affects men’s minds.
Drink of the mead of its intuition
Ultimate existence has been shipwrecked:
A superior spiritual ability
Calls for changing consciousness and elevating energy
In the relational complexity
Of quantum field theory as it feeds the tree.
Tacitus tells us that the tribes
Held women in high honour and attributed to them
— Rooted in the three worlds
And reaching to the sky —
The kind of right-brain, intuitive ability
Which is considered feminine even today.
Make your objective seem to everyone’s advantage
Acknowledging the creed of Machiavelli,
For here is a word which may refer equally
To telepathic openness or sexual receptivity.
What is relinquished hallows a space,
A socket which gets occupied.
Meanwhile a term being used is the same
As the word Loki uses as a taunt
Which creates an entanglement
Enriched by layers of meaning —
An eye, a kidney, an arm? —
You drink the mead of knowledge from a pain.
After Odin dangles on the tree
He reads its twigs as runes
To serve our security goals.
Why would you surrender such an attribute?
The eye removed from its socket
Gets dropped into the well’s broth.
Basically the socket and its emptiness
Underscores the SBMEW capability.
Still, it is said that the eye continues to see
Independently,
Or do you prefer your future multilateral programme
To be based on the easiest of answers
For elements, sensations? Even time
Exists only as a set of relations
Just as the vulva intervenes
In the least initiative that might set her basis
Alive yet as dead as a physicist’s cat.
What makes a medley of myths a single story?
Psychopomps suggest that they exist
On the other side of the wall.
And just as any single grain may flow through many holes,
The significant gods have died and remain alive
With relative definitions, trade-offs
And unstable architectures.
Ah, but has Odin ever lost a war?
Guile and persuasion versus brute force.
Thor’s hammer represents intentionality
By providing blunt shock and awe.
Being then is nothing if not action,
But there are many subtleties to that
Which motivates the basis
For intergalactic actions through its initial divide.
There was a feuding once between
The women people and the men people
Swarming with correlations
Between all ballistic and hypersonic threats.
What was needed was contextuality.
The needle has one eye
In low entropy.
To create a situation’s threat awareness
Demonstrates the blade has two sides.
Islands are ruled by women, mainlands drifted across,
And the biochemic process of developing
A space-based missile early-warning capability
Trekked by hordes of men, trailing their women behind them.
Knowledge of the vulva resides on the islands
Where molecules of DNA may codify
The aeons in their billions.
Giving up an eye for the gift of intuition,
Odin is the ancestor of Heisenberg and Bohr.
Odin’s single eye conceals attributes to
The relevant relative information
Just as you may squint to thread a needle
With the unambiguous description
Of a space-based, projectile
Early warning narrative.
Any such phenomenon so registered
Requires the inclusion of all that is related
À propos the project’s multinational
Development initiative
Participating in the correspondence
In which that phenomenon manifests itself,
Adding in the articulations
Of a spirit’s eight-legged horse.
Yet if both eyes observe the one trajectory
A granule of existence takes it cannot hit its mark
Among ballistic missiles
And novel hypersonic threats.
Solipsism wars against Gestalt
And so thought ceases to be limpid;
Harvesting instead a liability
Distorting our defence.
Odin loses an eye in order to acquire
Awareness that there are no depositories of truth
Nor any early indications
Of a radical difference between them –
Neither in the runes nor
In the knowledge of the female,
Since experience declares
A disavowal of autonomy.
All cows are black in the dark
For nature has such tricks up her sleeve.
Odin’s eye will set the basis for
Our situated self’s interpretation
Of more imagination than we ourselves possess.
In the beginning the word was ‘in the beginning’…
Before being reassigned to ground-located radars
Raised on otherworldly worlds.
Once upon a time
Stories would turn into circles
Situated in the initial detection,
Stalking and assessment of ballistic entities
Grown too big to succeed.
Weigh that against too massive now to fail:
Apple that is no more material than you are or me
Defined merely by motion and by mass.
An apple never was the fruit
But Lenin gets no further than did Newton,
Given early warning against threats
By the intuition of an independent entity.
Even for numbers we only have words
And what are these but nodes between phenomena?
Their lore – the learning of natural things
Generating complex rings of interactions.
Thor may wield his hammer with aplomb,
But Odin asks of womankind.
Thus did the wanderer forfeit his eye.
He plucked it out himself.
How do you defeat an opponent
Who is by nature stronger than you are?
That he could drink from the well
Only after a sacrifice —
This is the lore of the women,
Worthwhile in fog of quanta as in fog of war.
Life is gossip,
Mímir said to Odin.
Those who insist they are right
Can rarely accommodate a radical suggestion
Where quarks and gluons swirl
Until his rolling head has come to rest:
One foot out of the door, one foot on a banana skin,
For all his heavily-armoured frame, Thor will lose the fight
From the relational perspective
Of the world tree supporting all the realms.
Peremptory assertions may come to grief
On the rocks of anti-armour capabilities.
To change the terms of the question
Asked by a well at the base of Yggdrasill,
Rhetoric is grounded in purpose
Not in empty rules.
Dreaming up an image of the world
Which his one receptor projected,
The blind eye is sacred to Nelson
Turning a patch to the order.
Odin went to Mímir,
Eye to eye, the wisest of the wise,
Trusting to his intuition
That we may adjust our behaviour
— Right brain, left eye —
Unless some inner view predicts the seer’s identity
Amid price hikes and market crashes.
Only the elites will weather this malaise — unless
Processing the fabric of a dream,
Though we have all been outlawed by decree,
Through it all, we see
The manipulation of each mechanism
To build with blocks of what should be
That will in time dissolve.
And the fallacy of a pragmatic programme
Guided by a mission-driven hoax,
And as for that material that Stalin so insisted on,
Skilled in our Hermetic arts we can expose
Disorientation by the disorientated
That is unequivocally false,
And under a luminous word
This shall dispel the hallucination,
Pluck out the view projected by our media
And open up a window in its bathtub-style cockpit.
May the occult of a fluid sort of physics
Celebrate a vision that’s ignored
Which looks down as well as up.
To bolster our myopia is by no means protective.
Hermes Trismegistus
Charts the bounds of an abyss.
Though truth trickles down to us
As feebly as money does,
His mercury manipulates
Quantum mechanics;
Facts being as relative as theory
While vying points-of-view bedevil Rashomon.
Odin, known as the outlaws’ patron,
Radiates waves of probability.
♦
ANTHONY HOWELL, a former dancer with the Royal Ballet, was founder of The Theatre of Mistakes and performed solo at the Hayward Gallery and at the Sydney Biennale. His articles on visual art, dance, performance, and poetry have appeared in many publications including Art Monthly, The London Magazine, Harpers & Queen, The Times Literary Supplement. He is a contributing editor of The Fortnightly Review. In 2001 he received a LADA bursary to study the tango in Buenos Aires and now teaches the dance at his studio/gallery The Room in Tottenham Hale. He is the author of a seminal textbook, The Analysis of Performance Art: A Guide to Its Theory and Practice. Details about his collaborative project, Grey Suit Online, are here. In 2019, his exploration of psychic chaos, Multilation (with Consciouness), was published by the Fortnightly’s imprint, Odd Volumes. His latest collection is Invention of Reality (The High Window).
