extract from working notes of H. Prometheus (with original illustrations)

Project Icarus
Design no. 5.5 (chest harness, batwing model, steel and copper frame and clockworth, sailcloth wings)
Notes: attempt 205
9 May 2015

Having corrected design flaws from previous attempt, endeavoured once again mechanically to achieve and maintain airborne state long enough to navigate across back field (see notes, 141, for dimensions).

Am pleased to result success in first particular--5th successful liftoff since having embarked on Proj. I. Estimated height ranging from 1 to 2.5m from gr., duration appr 1.5 minutes. I was unable to maintain control of the apparatus--either in re. ascent or navigation--due to recurrence of those painful sensations which have plagued the course of the Project since model 1.0 (simple shoulder based model--see diagram, prev.). Additional padding added to 5.4 obviously insufficient to counter my perception of extreme compression, abrasion, and cutting expd during flight. (N. physical validity of sensations confirmed by scrapes and bruising upon later examination). Puzzled again by the appearance of feathers, inexplicable, edged this time in the most ludicrous shades of green and gold, but again bent, broken, and smeared with blood. (N. revisit previous notes to compare.)

Attribute failure to a fault in the left, that is sinister, of the frame. revisit schematics to discover imbalance. hypothesize weight of structure too great to support flight. begin to suspect a new material must be found. perhaps a frame made of hollow reeds? or bones of birds, for the purpose. sufficient to bear the weight? If it were not outrageous to the sensibilities of most -- & therefore practically unobtainable -- would try instead the bones of men -- the ears and digits of which might yield pieces peculiarly suited to the constr of clockwork--
(Ed. This last heavily struck through in the original)

How to correct the as yet inescapable inclination earthwards--to escape the tyranny of gravity?

i do not understand why there should be--from where--again--these damaged pens--

(another tree)

-- and yet this tree
stands still
straight stemmed, limber

nods, and listens
breathes
the insect gossiping,
the small change-scented breeze
a warm October brings --

its leaves no less rejoicing green
for all their many fallings into gold,
their quiet dyings

Wind dropped or landscape planned
it greens the same
xylem and phloem  -- oh
it goes on growing
with that deepest green intending
bound up and flowing
every rootlet, leaf, and grooved stem
unbinding the heartdeep
the wordless hymn

storm splitted, blight bitten
scarred and pitted
it goes on growing

wormvisited its buds go on, imperfectly
unfolding
ceaseless its leaves their legion breathings
their numbered autumn goldings --

this tree, still
till it falls and dissolves
will green on -- going
on with its ceaseless little dyings
its beginnings
its beholding --

slack

washed and stacked, and
watching
in their chipped and shiny stares
not speaking their reproof, they glint
they glare
at the bare cupboard where they,
transients, briefly sleep

the floor smacks sticky kisses
on crumbcaked heels

a thin line of brown grease
weeps beneath the stove-eye lids

and there are drifts,
are little gusts
of dust in all the edges
settling
in their slow micrometers
down to rest

(A little sleep! a little slumber -- a little folding
of the hands -- to rest)

Apathy, entropy, ennui:
the sins confessed
hang your brainstrings out to dry
close your eyes
don't watch the world fall down around your sighs

(he who is slack in his work)
but i have done with destruction
i have washed the dishes
tomorrow

(maybe)
tomorrow, i will sweep

Let me --

Cut off my edges. Let me, roughedged, feel
and weep. O, let me weep
until that roughedge melts
into Your skin, and then Lord
let me weep
repent
and sleep

can i then only feel
rape murder dying
all other actions -- i
am still, am sighing, i
am not here, i only want
to miss the pain and truth and blunt
realities of what we say
to one another, day by day
Give me a punchline -- or
a pun, and i will laugh. I will
watch on,
until the next commercial break,
and then
i will skip channels till another's sin
in tangerine and orange flickers
once and again
then i will watch
O stop!
i will not watch --
and yet to think is time
it shrinks
my brain into the outlines of this game
The little pain
is paid for by amusement.
Distrait --
i am not here, i cannot tell
the punchlines roll and roll
and roll and (hell!)
unfleshed skeltonic
my crazed  brain
would think, but cannot!-- reaps
such -- rotted
grain --

infected

hebrews 4.12

(As if you were slicing merrily into your tomatoes
cucumbers, cheese)
  
when truth
that twoedge tongue
licked swift and silky
striped your palm: watch
red beads, glassbright, thread a glossy string

then pooling, welling, dripping
watch that newopened eye
weeping and weeping:
(the smell, too, a sharp metal tang)
you wait for the first pricks of pain

and then the eye
redrimmed and staring
still, beneath the bandage
has ceased its weeping, is
festering

you have slapped on it perhaps
a chilly, numbing cream
(a fairy tale--a film; a cause; a class;
a glass of pinot grigio or three)


beneath its taped-gauze veil
it pricks and bites
threads thin fingers through your palm
seams, red and waxy-yellow
your wrist
your arm

you ache, you itch, you flush
bite your lip
take a sip
flip the page
your streaking skin
your deepflesh seamed
puffs pink and angry at its touch

you ache, you itch, you flush
your flesh (you feel it!) shrill and outraged,
dying

love song

you are everything i need
(don't tell me not to bleed)
let me be the poison seed
buried down beneath your earnest heart
let me ring your heart in fire
that thing you call: desire
let me be the redvoice choir
that sings flamerings around your every inward part

Don't tell me that you love me, when
You don't know who i am
I can lick you sinful skin but i
Am more than your woman
Don't tell me that you love me till
You know who i am

you are everything i need! i
will be your poison seed,
i
will root my longings in your heart,
and sigh,
and say Complete me!
Love me!
til I die --

Tits ass and sweetfat
wheatfat stomach i

am more than the sweet skin you  hold. More
than the name you cry

Don't tell me that you love me
Love me!
I
Seek in you gold and cinnamon. Why
I look inside your skin for myrrh,
for mary jane,
for sour rye --

Be everything i need
Let me be your
let me be your poison seed

be
Can you be
everything i need --

Don't tell me that you love me! be
everything
i
need