(it is discovered in the fitzcarraldo edition of an ed atkins collection. when the language of the page begins to move. resembling the body. to a certain extent, my own)

The locomotion of the body begins in the mouth. The mouth is the anchor. Three cultists use its moist atmosphere to summon a portal to the void. Out of the void portal comes an unclassifiable organism. With mouths and anchors of its own. Albeit inhuman in their placement. Fat of thighs opening to reveal rows of teeth. Thick tongue slow and dense. It coils around subject as slug feigning serpent. The nourishment gained from this is then used to engender new cultists to summon new portals. Their performance is rooted in a cyclical choreography. Which asks to be looped and mutated.

Mouth-source / void-portal begins to introduce the term of the schizopastoral, “in the tradition of Deleuze and Guattari. Not of Freud or Bleuler. It is a complexification and not an explanation.” A series of lectures are given on a theory which has yet to grow legs. It has not found its connection to any one meaning. Perhaps in line with its etymology. “Complexification is embodied by the addition of new layers rather than the removal of old ones.” In the mound of the serpent. Grazing in the field of anuses. “It is not the decomposition of the body, it is the stacking of them in a mass burial.” Mouth-source / void-portal begins another loop of the cultist dance.

Data coagulates at the stem of the brain. Bloating the skull until the temporal bone has aligned to the curvature of the zygomatic. Hinge of jaw locking in the closure of its shielding process.

Mining information from the building mass. An effort is not made to maintain the original qualities of the skull. Segments of bone are cut and delicately removed. Their mutated shape haphazardly recreated on metal plates. “In the mass burial there are both macro and micro image sets. The macro is singular and the micro is a fractal.” Thigh-mouth recycles newly consumed flesh in order to expand its being.

But expansion is expensive. It begins with minor expeditions. Slug-tongue reaching towards the surrounding furniture. Dragging chair and table by their legs. But without limb or hair, these expeditions are finite. Eventually your environment is destroyed. And you have formed your own small and unsustainable biome.

/

This is the second attempt

(an example of your locomotion is displayed on the monitor. as part of the demand for you to prove that you have performed your labor. that there was no lack on your part)

cilia no. 1612 – flagella no. 2 – cilia no. 589 – flagella no. 1 – limb no. 3 – limb no. 4 – cilia no. 2002 – limb no. 4 – cilia no. 8241 – limb no. 5 – limb no. 5 – limb no. 1 – mouth no. 8- cilia no. 5287 – mouth no. 6 – limb no. 3 – flagella no. 1 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – cilia no. 8445 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 1418 – limb no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – limb no. 4 – flagella no. 1 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 8547 – mouth no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – limb no. 4 – mouth no. 8 – cilia no. 6112 – limb no. 3 – cilia no. 6580 – cilia no. 3897 – mouth no. 4 – limb no. 2 – cilia no. 5736 – flagella no. 1 – flagella no. 2 – limb no. 3 – cilia no. 8316 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 4681 – flagella no. 2 – limb no. 3 – limb no. 1 – flagella no. 2 – cilia no. 8289 – flagella no. 2 – mouth no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – limb no. 2 – mouth no. 6 – limb no. 3 – cilia no. 1847 – mouth no. 10 – cilia no. 483 – flagella no. 2 – mouth no. 5 – mouth no. 8 – cilia no. 2556 – mouth no. 9 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 1 – mouth no. 7 – cilia no. 3133 – limb no. 4 – cilia no. 4694 – limb no. 4 – cilia no. 9892 – mouth no. 4 – limb no. 5 – limb no. 4 – mouth no. 6 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 7871 – limb no. 1 – cilia no. 5970 – cilia no. 249 – cilia no. 7996 – limb no. 4 – mouth no. 4 – limb no. 3 – mouth no. 10 – limb no. 4 – cilia no. 995 – mouth no. 4 – mouth no. 3 – limb no. 2 – limb no. 2 – cilia no. 7747 – flagella no. 1 – limb no. 5 – mouth no. 4 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 9937 – cilia no. 3939 – mouth no. 4 – cilia no.9042 – mouth no. 6 – cilia no. 4075 – flagella no. 1 – limb no. 2 – cilia no. 1738 – cilia no. 5599

In the manner of a cultist dance. Stem-data continues to coagulate. Growing as new steps crawl into view of the monitor. “Information is a physical object. It must be stored somewhere.” (flagella no. 2 – mouth no. 9 – mouth no. 7 – flagella no. 1 – limb no. 4 – mouth no. 9 – cilia no. 8499 – etc.) Compression occurs as stacks of mirrored units. But only when patterns return in the step of the limb / cilia / flagella / mouth. Patterns which cannot be relied upon. As you know.

There is no certain way that the text locomotes. Given its new agency. That spoken of by the mouth-source / void-portal. Snippets of dialogue collected from disembodied voices. Names Henry and Veronica or something similar in tone. They talk about an anxiety which roots itself in stillness. As subject, you and they feel a need to extend and contract. This is the primary manner of proving that you and they are corporeal and living. Henry and Veronica say that, “we know of the simulation of movement. The difference is easily detectable. Even with obsolete instruments.” They move in the same manner of the cultists. Building their own dance from simplistic materials before mutating into more intricate maneuvers. Steps and sways.

/

There is no third attempt

Because the fourth arrives before it is welcomed. Preemptive gestures catalyze the summoning of a new portal. Mouth unzipping on the bottoms of your feet. Stigmata of the underbelly.  The body is a housing for new orifices and nothing more. The place-object on which symbols are mapped. A cathedral made only because there is a surplus of stained glass. “There’s a history of churches and synagogues and other houses of worship falling victim to construction fires.” Information is a physical object but it is not readable. It must be converted between states of matter. Interpreted by body-ware installed in the back of the mouth. Then uttered by the tongue and palate in the front.

(in the case of the schizopastoral, we see a mutation or malfunction occurring in the conversion from stem-data to void-utterance. information is split and multiplied. collaged in its delivery. this may be a product of compression or corruption. the body a naturally imprecise machine)

Henry and Veronica say that, “The unsewing of the body to create new orifices () is not an anomaly but a radical reorienting of perspective.” They assemble this sentence in the same manner as the cultist dance. Beginning with small repetitive units (the immobile segments of the movement-image) and expand / complicate their assembly until an utterance has fully-formed. Itself the immobile segment of a larger image. In which two void-portals are weaved together. Tooth overlaying tooth. Net of enamel and pulp. A conversation between disembodied voices.

You do not know what these attempts are meant to accomplish. If they are attempts to elaborate upon this new vocabulary or to prove some kind of abstract locomotion. Ultimately it does not matter what the end goal is. Only that these attempts are made, and in their performance, that something happens as a result. In this case, a development of definitions and a complicating of choreography.

“It is not the task of the text to work towards your understanding of it, but rather it is your obligation as the reader to endure its scrutiny of the positions that you have gifted yourself.”

This sentiment is rendered tactile when the text is bound in sandpaper, and your labor is demanded for once again. First as hand sliding cover along the face of neighboring books. Breaking down their outer shell and stripping away their names. Then as the microscopic tears on your own skin. Which has made the flesh feel dry and raw. The air slowly seeping between layers of tissue.

Henry and Veronica say that, “the theory of the schizopastoral is derived from your inability to locate its source. The separation of speaker from speech. And thus the obfuscation of the difference between singular and plural.”

/

mouth no. 8 – limb no. 2 – limb no. 2 – mouth no. 10 – mouth no. 9 – mouth no. 5 – mouth no. 1 – mouth no. 6 – limb no. 3 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 2499 – limb no. 4 – cilia no. 2759 – mouth no. 8 – cilia no. 4912 – mouth no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – mouth no. 5 – cilia no. 915 – limb no. 6 – limb no. 1 – cilia no. 3276 – flagella no. 1 – mouth no. 10 – mouth no. 3 – cilia no. 6977 – limb no. 4 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – mouth no. 7 – flagella no. 1 – flagella no. 2 – cilia no. 7280 – limb no. 4 – limb no. 5 – flagella no. 1 – mouth no. 9 – flagella no. 2 – mouth no. 6 – mouth no. 3 – flagella no. 1 – mouth no. 6 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 2018 – mouth no. 9 – limb no. 5 – cilia no. 4672 – mouth no. 3 – mouth no. 8 – limb no. 3 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – mouth no. 2 – flagella no. 1 – flagella no. 1 – mouth no. 9 – limb no. 4 – mouth no. 8 – limb no. 5 – cilia no. 7508 – cilia no. 9836 – mouth no. 3 – cilia no. 4813 – mouth no. 2 – mouth no. 2 – mouth no. 4 – cilia no. 3275 – limb no. 3 – limb no. 6 – limb no. 1 – mouth no. 1 – cilia no. 1686 – flagella no. 1 – limb no. 3 – cilia no. 2732 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 2 – cilia no. 8095 – mouth no. 3 – flagella no. 2 – limb no. 1 – limb no. 5 – flagella no.2 – mouth no. 5 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 9886 – flagella no. 2 – flagella no. 1 – limb no.3 – limb no. 4 – flagella no. 1 – limb no. 3 – limb no. 2 – cilia no. 9855 – limb no. 5 – limb no. 2 – cilia no. 604 – cilia no. 9094 – mouth no. 10 – limb no. 3 – limb no. 1 – flagella no. 1 – cilia no. 2332 – mouth no. 8- flagella no. 1 – limb no. 6 – limb no. 5 – flagella no. 1 – mouth no. 8 – flagella no. 1 – flagella no. 2 – cilia no. 6028 – limb no. 6 – limb no. 5 – cilia no. 1162 – cilia no. 7301 – cilia no. 1271 – cilia no. 8805 – cilia no.6667 – limb no. 3 – limb no. 3 – mouth no.4 – flagella no. 2 – cilia no. 4215 –

/

Pleasantries aside

You are just a housing for these void-portals. The moist atmosphere of your mouth is adequate. The curved surface area is made to be unsewn. Disparate voices expand across the vacuum (stem-data converted into void-utterance) microcosms of miscommunication building into a collective hysteria. The spread of what is not true, and what you are not willing to invalid as such.

Schizopastoral landscape built on the assumption that all of these voices cannot be lying, that one of them must be telling the truth. Or that they are all the same consciousness playing in different personas (larynx of aggregated sources or palate of refined nostalgia) information is materialized in the godhead (being of all being) and portioned between different mediums (broadcasting)

Or each mouth-source a net for collecting these turgid globules of language (coagulation) what you are looking at has been stripped of its geographical importance (delocalizing the canon) and reintroduced to the vacuum. The schizopastoral a joke about itself (coming from nowhere) where the landscape is a garbage dump (wasteland of speech) hints of an outmoded countryside / slug tongue grazing / organism nourished by the abstract proteins by which it is accompanied. Your participation is inescapable. It is you that is listening to me / the many new orifices that have revealed themselves across my self.

You notice an essay titled, “On Mouth Spawning” which aims to teach you how to turn yourself into a place-object / into the schizopastoral landscape (from which these voices are birthed) this text resembling your body (becoming-identical) in a way that terrifies me. As if it is a cursed artifact attempting to steal your personhood.

Do you fear the agency of the text? It’s relationship to this unknowable cult? Their seductive dance? Its minor components? Static clings to the space beneath your ears (in a mocking way) it plays coy around the fused bones of your jaw and zygomatic (old mouth) it is okay that you cannot speak. The place-object is only a being insofar as the earth is gaia (living landscape) you have become reducible.

New wells open along the surface of your body (the summoning of void-portals) each a source of aggregated materials. These materials disjointed and unfamiliar (you are not yourself)

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Mike Corrao is the author of two novels, Man, Oh Man (Orson’s Publishing) and Gut Text (11:11 Press), one chapbook, Avian Funeral March (Self-Fuck), and many short films. Along with earning a Best of the Net nomination, Mike’s work has been featured in publications such as 3:AM, Always Crashing, and The Portland Review. He lives in Minneapolis. Learn more at www.mikecorrao.com.