a letter from a future prison blown our way IV

29/6/11 5:01am

Shawna!
   Remember the letter I sent you from the future?  I found it in my bedside drawer exactly where I last left it!  You can probably divine what came next in the sequence but I'll tell you anyway: I read it.
   This letter that I made for you out of gratitude and warm contemplation of your friendship...It was also written to me for this moment (29/6/11 5:06am) and geographic location (Kra 4a 25c-14, Bogotá, Cudinamarca, Colombia, SE corner room) and light (no natural light, table lamp pointed toward the wall to create giant shadows) and I will guess there's more that I am not yet able to perceive. 
   The seed of what I'm about to tell you sprouted in my head the other day with the assistance of Beethoven's 9th Symphony and then Damien Rice's "9 Crimes Demo" while I was sitting on the edge of the 4th story window watching birds, watching clouds, watching shadows, watching wood grain swirls on the floor, watching dirty scuffed leather boots.  But all it did was poke its head out, I suppose so it could get some manic sun, and gestate and wonder and grow.  But here it is...
   I am in Colombia and I am in prison but...I am not in a Colombian prison!  The prison is my mind.  We are all imprisoned by many things.  That voiceless immobility dream.  That all-ending-before-it-even-started impotence hesitation.  The enchanting cream revolution in the Ti Amo coffee cup.   And knowing and feeling this with the birds talking here in the early, waking morning is some kind of liberation.  A child right before recess.  That's the tingling swarm I'm talking about.  The sprout is now a stem with a minute leaf and growing.
  It is now 5:31am and that means nothing.  Time.  Tenses.  That shit is Siddhartha's river.  I know you are in China right now opening your eyes with Brian.  My DNA , my mind, we intuit our DNA partner progressing.  And you too.  I feel it.  Ask him.  He will tell you.  Life has sped up and production has begun.  No better time to end this than now. 
                                                                                                   Smile,
                                                                                                     Andrew
                                                                                                     5:46am

Sisyphus scrawls

careful reading this.  Life is a trick.  A trap.  A Sisyphean endeavor.  A train on a circular track that cannot change paths unless there is some sort of active sabotage to provoke a derailment.  Thank you for everything.  My life.  Your companionship.  Your generosity.  I know of no other way to escape redundancy but this.  I love you.  Thank you.

The note was found in a room containing only a mattress with light green sheets.  A body rested on top.  A clear glass full of water sat next to the simple bed and the window flooded the space with light and the sounds of birds in spring.  Sparks of light shot out from a crumpled foil wrapper and as I went to investigate, I noticed a tiny syringe neatly placed beside the glass on the inner side of the bed frame.  

Integrated graphology is a curious subject.  Some people have such a static script.  Others have trouble at banks because their signature is constantly evolving.  I recognized my kind in the letter.  A variety of fonts, each with its respective order.  A hard slant to the right until the word derailment.  Then it leveled off until but this with the symbols becoming hyper-legible.  All following letters leaned to the left at an almost-45 degree angle and were barely intelligible.  This note displayed an epicenter of sick energy that emitted its last call before self-extinguishing.  A frantic, manic last breath fleeing in the form of words.  These scrawls conveyed a beautiful nuclear combustion without a doubt.

No name was added to the bottom of the page, although we all knew whose it was.  The only thing to bring it to a close was an undecipherable word that appeared to say Bye with the y crossed out or maybe it wasn't even there.

04.07.05 - 06.27.11

let me taste your guava juice
a pink slit doubled as a noose
for my head to hang

fold around the tensioned stems
and follow them until the bends
i'll puddle in between

admire your lengthy structured roots
the semi-hollow curling chutes
while tightening the grip

to just inhale the dew perfume
the sick energy of you in bloom
and drip and drip and drip

let me hear the seeds disperse
a roaring, purring broken curse
our exodus from self

and they all sang:
   this is of freedom
   bleeding freedom
   crying freedom
   spitting freedom
   sweating freedom
   vomiting freedom
   cumming freedom
   pissing freedom
   shedding freedom
   this is freedom

gumball eve

She asked me how I was doing and I looked into her eyes and thought...no...actually I felt:

...a caught child´s gumball stutter, a muffler´s exhaust sputter, f-f-fuck, applause and an otter´s utter
this swerving ship´s rudder recognized the other and turned
they all stood up, Bravo! Encore, Encore!
tragic elastic moldable messy monstruous plastic frantic
all the way from atlantic, to pacific
in one breath and you missed it
we missed it
headspun and twisted, stripped but yet gifted (a life)
   -thank you for my life, thank you for my life, thank you for my life-
a teardrop said

Only one second elapsed.  I just smiled, bowed my head and tried not to let the volcano´s eruption be visible.

a letter from a future prison blown our way III

Shawna,
   You may or may not know me.  I know you.  I live in the body of someone who you know and therefore you might recognize a piece of me at some moment.  My name is Amanda Emory.  I am just one of many living in this shared vessel.
   Around three weeks ago (although it seems like an entire lifetime) you received a letter in the mail from Alejandra Whitebird-González briefly mentioning the mysterious escape (or maybe just disappearance) of a prisoner.  While interesting, and simultaneously symbolic and literal, it is not permanent. 
   We are all prisoners to this 21st century, to geography, to precipitation, to freedom.  The wet mattress suffocation crush gets us all.  Drink nectar and pretend!
   The purpose of this letter may not be apparent.  It will dawn on you if it hasn´t yet, perhaps on a rainy day complemented by some coffee and a deep smile.  A little fox knocked on my door in a dream.  I can´t tell you why, but I let him in.  He told me in a whisper that you will soon be on a trip.  He and I shared a cigarette and then we both woke up.  Enjoy it!
Amanda Emory

a letter from a future prison blown our way II

Around three days later, a letter arrived in the mail.  Inside was the initial piece of correspondence in typed form, and the following message on a yellow post-it note:

shawna,
a prisoner recently escaped from our prison, la modelo.  all that was left in the cell was this letter and a faded blue piece of string.  we have no access to computers and are not sure how this letter was made.
regards,
alejandra whitebird-gonzález

a letter from a future prison blown our way I

shawna,

i am writing you this letter from the future as i sit here locked up in a colombian prison.  it is hard to recall why but it feels like i have been imprisoned for all of my life.  it will be brief because there is no electricity in this particular facility and the only light available is provided by the slow flame of a bacon grease-soaked piece of cloth that i managed to spark with my chains and a cinder block jut on the southern wall.  yes, they serve bacon in prison.  not the kind we are accustomed to in the u.s. but you would not know of this, and still, it is something.  i do not wish to sound ungrateful.  during dish duty i tripped and rubbed my shirt sleeve in a grease puddle to store it for later with this letter in mind.  it is dark and i must hurry.

the purpose of this letter is to express my gratitude for the use of your rei dividend as member #3944778 with which i used to supplement the acquisition of one pair of navy blue merino wool socks.  i can tell you that these socks have lasted thus far and will surely see soil and sea safely outside of this compound once more should that be their destiny.  remember, this letter i write to you is from an undisclosed time in the future but i can assure you that it is at least one calendar year after the purchase of said socks.  they have lasted well.  and i can tell you in good faith that some strands still remain and with them i am conspiring to fashion a rope.  the purpose of this rope has not yet been determined, but it will most-likely be used to make either a noose or some kind of device to repel from the hole in this cell wall to allow me to escape in the jungle. 

at a moment when you have forgotten this letter, something will jog it back into your memory.  perhaps a white bird will fly your way and you will remember.  and later still, a memory will trigger this memory itself and the letter will come to mind.

the cloth has almost been consumed and i must close.  forgive the lack of capital letters in this correspondence.  i can give you a hint to the future and let you know that they have ceased to remain necessary and no longer exist.  thank god they have not gotten our dear punctuation symbols yet!  thank you again for your generosity and even-more-valuable friendship.  the adjacent cell contains an old man who is somewhat of a sage.  he discovered my literacy and asked me to write the following down since he himself does not have the ability.  i have only one piece of paper, so i am including it with this letter, so that it may escape this ever-rainy jungle prison: 

it may seem to us that certain decisions can affect the course of life and change what will be.  we might do a and b happens.  or we might do c and then d will follow.  this is dubious if not false altogether.  what will happen, will happen, and it always does because in this world we occupy, only one result is allowed.  only a can be done and only b will proceed.  c,d, and all else do not exist although a haughty human may hope.  we should make decisions with confidence and live corresponding to present conditions.  can a man make plans concerning his future self when he feels like dying at present moment?  no.  past sensations may seem more vivid and future ones more promising.  but one cannot break the chain of the present and live in any other time.

andrew