I.
Once there was a sandbox filled to the brim
with black coal
and white sand.
The black coal
filled the right side of the sandbox.
The white sand
filled the left side of the sandbox.
One day a small child entered the sandbox
and began moving around
in a circle
clockwise
and did so for many hours.
When the child was finished
the sand was gray.
Then the child decided
to undo
this chaos
and began treading
in a circle
counterclockwise
and did so for many hours.
The longer the child walked,
the more the sand was gray.
Crying was no help.
Chaos had intruded on the sandbox once and for all.
II.
The praise of dissolution:
object phase
space phase
time phase
imagination phase
infinity phase
zero phase
2. The mirrored-city jeremiad
Wet earth smelling of an old man
Exceptional situation in which the
borders between up and down disappear
Juggling of toxic anachronisms
Demons turning out to have familiar faces
The humorous dimensions of time (the forever problem)
Monoliths without color mushrooming up everywhere
Celestial playgrounds of the suburbs
3. Three (underground) animistic journeys:
albino mole
bucket full of earthworms
blind snake
4. The liberation of things (underground museum guarded by a dwarf)
Tangible things become black holes
A flowerpot containing ashes and glass balls
Methane released from a barrel
The chirps of dead canaries
A hydrant wrapped in bandages
Gastroliths ringing in the dinosaurs ribs
(to go from one extreme to another)
A flying tomb disguised as an airplane.
5. The city erasure
The paradox of an underground twin (putting everything into doubt)
A place that has swallowed its own history
The circumscribed cube full of fear
The purifying action of a lonely bulldozer
Some derelict buildings, which will never be torn down/ the deadman stumbling against innumerable futures
A slurred (sticky and warm sounds) language that nobody can understand
Hollow blocks in windowless tunnels/ No doors
The vision of underground settlements on new planets (domain of the mighty giants)
6. The underground ghost’s laments
A model of a beach in the dark chamber
A radio drama featuring a dead person
Absolute stupor/ High-quality, sticky darkness
Illusion of the sacred epitomized by valuable ores
Mysterious holes that appear everywhere, endlessly (underground bycatch: rats).
Hugging huge bones
Hallucinating, eating dirt and going to sleep, never to awake again (no regrets)
III. The riddle
What is it that
constantly changes its shape
but retains the same internal order?
What is it
for which there is no place on earth,
and that has no definite borders?
What is it
that affects other things,
and at the same time permits other things to affect it?
What is it
that is always available,
yet still remains unnoticed?
What is it
that is made up of many parts
that at the same time can be parts of something completely different?
What is it
half of which looks very familiar,
and the other half of which resembles nothing you know?
What is it
that changes into something else at the precise moment you learn
of its existence?