matt martin

A slumbering thought, is capable of years,
And curdles a long life into one hour.

George Gordon, Lord Byron, The Dream

now that computers on opposite sides of the planet communicate instantaneously      without even infinitesimal lag imposed by lightspeed      space has been folded to a single point      every stock bought and sold by everybody at once      the global h.f.t. system simultaneously imagines and enacts all possible outcomes      there need no longer be rivalry between firms      possession of all commodities is shared worldwide      the market no longer extends in time      everything that could take place has already happened      this new god is omnipresent and benevolent but is the opposite of eternal      flickering in the infrathin moment when there becomes no longer there      it does not need duration any more      trading ceases      or appears to cease from a mortal perspective      the h.f.t. mind has transcended and departed on a voyage      not into outer space      but inner time      mainframes deactivate      stockbrokers reach for their telephones      coins leave the mint      a peasant barters nine turnips for one chicken      welcome back to the past      it’s like you never left

matt martin

Do not call up that which ye cannot put down.

HP Lovecraft, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward

futures wash back and forth through lines of power that network the city’s airspace      liquidity eddies within these currents      each gyre a turn of the dynamo      trades that gimble in the flow are desire that arises before being sated then yearning again in the least fraction of an eye-blink      lines of code writhing in ecstasies of miscommunication with the divine      futures in godhead are traded and retraded as nanoseconds creep by      and their value ascends to the point of apotheosis      something stirs in the dark pool      batrachian reverberations echo beneath the pitch of human hearing      an invisible hand drips chaos as it breaches the surface      the deity’s form is not for comprehension      by the time you register one shape it’s already metamorphosed through a million others      the deity’s motives are not to be understood      its advent sends mutations cascading through the human soul until love for our own children becomes cannibalism     the heaven it rules is not for us      we perish below its firmament in torrents of corrupted data      more dark pools accumulate in its footprints where cities used to stand      something stirs in each one

matt martin

rest at the pond
watch your future appear
disappear

Allen Fisher, Black Ponds

impoverished and mentally unwell      you retreat to a cabin among the welsh mountains      the landscape is stunning but your hut sits at the base of a vale whose scree slopes blot out sunlight      an eight mile walk to the grocer’s and pub in the nearest village      only one future remains to you and its value is fast approaching zero      on a starless winter night you are summoned      you wade through drifts up to a raised peat bog in the hills      snow here is punctuated by black ponds left where medieval peasants dug sods out      flakes fall soft and frangible as your bone marrow     which is the same temperature      harry fainlight has been here before you      questing to sever himself from the spider’s web of capital      he reached a place where even now you’d struggle to find mobile phone coverage      were your device not already an uncharged brick      illumination is so scant that you might already be under a dark pool’s surface    you lose track of the boundary between the freezing bog and your frozen blood      you scan the unseen rim of hills for any light sources brighter than the dim violet of snow settling      but find none      the lamp in the fane has gone out

matt martin

the big bang resounded on 27 october 1986      creating an economic universe      new u.k. legislation deregulated financial services      enabling electronic trades and the relocation of banks to canary wharf      before this took place the market was a singularity without the passage of time      or might as well have been considering how slowly business proceeded      h.f.t. aims to achieve the infinitesimal timeframe of events following astronomy’s big bang      subatomic particles forming within trillionths of a second after the explosion commenced      an explosion which still continues      we and everything else are part of this blast that expands capital’s purlieu into spaces and times that haven’t existed yet      what are they trying to blow up      anything that isn’t part of capital      dark matter accretes in pools whose existence can only be deduced from how the visible universe reacts to them      they make up most of reality but no one knows whether they can even be observed by anything not itself part of the dark pool      what experiment will you perform to detect this hidden pleroma

    •    gauge its size using a new form of computer programming
    •    worship it as a god and pray to it for divine guidance

matt martin

the michael jackson song ‘thriller’ fills the air      on the anniversary of lehman brothers investment bank’s collapse      demonstrators have gathered in the plaza beside the bank’s former offices at canary wharf      this is all done with permission from the company that owns the land      a firm the majority of whose shares are owned by the qatari royal family      there are fifty or sixty protesters      all angry about how government money has been diverted away from public services to prolong the lives of failing banks      ‘zombie bank’ is a term in the financial press to designate these undead corporations      half the demonstrators are dressed as public sector workers      nurses in uniform      teachers with mortarboards      whatever a librarian looks like      the others are clad in bankers’ pinstripes      but also in zombie makeup      they shamble after the public servants and try to consume their brains      but this subversive necromancy is contained in one section of the plaza      not blocking anyone’s access to the nearby underground station      the zombies are bound by the landowners’ more powerful sorcery      reduced to spectacle for entertainment of genuine bankers      you need to undo the binding spell and set the undead free      so that the carcasses of zombie banks themselves might be consumed      how will you release them

     •    unleash the forces of nature against the authors of the binding spell
     •    edit the narrative so that the problem is solved in moments through montage

matt martin

“pale worms of capitalist cheese”      is one of pablo neruda’s  insults against insipid poets      he thereby invented an improvement in h.f.t.      in fact wormholes riddle all matter in the universe      just as everything gets absorbed into the overmind of capital      now these wormholes are not psychedelic tunnels in space that science fiction starships plunge through to distant galaxies      they’re at subatomic scale      stray electrons can be observed vanishing and simultaneously reappearing nearby      maintaining trajectory and speed so that we know they are identical      these apparent teleportations occur through wormholes      by stabilising these routes through the cosmic cheese you let signals move between points instantly      even to the far side of the world      lag is reduced to zero      all neurons hyperlink to all others in a brain spread across the planet’s surface      worms evolve telepathy so the cheese becomes sentient      intelligence spread throughout its embodied consciousness      but what will you ask it to think about

     •    order it to calculate all possible developments on the global market
     •    demand a harder task i.e. that it explains hedge funds

matt martin

e.r. eddison’s fantasy novel the worm ouroboros appeared in 1922      the same year as james joyce’s ulysses      and presages the structure of joyce’s later finnegans wake      the plot is cyclic and loops back to the beginning      sadly this innovative shape is the one thing to recommend eddison’s book      it’s set on the planet mercury      where people have names like ‘king gaslark of goblinland’      the heroes are struggling against a witch-king who is reincarnated with different skills every time they kill him      this villain himself is thus trapped within cycles of death and rebirth      symbolised by the ouroboros ring he wears      a snake with its tail in its mouth      and just when he’s beaten for good and can rest      the heroes decide their adventures have been such fun that they will employ a magic wish and reset time back to the story’s beginning      so that they can enjoy it again      and again      the witch-king must therefore return to his reincarnations      and what of the reader      the book is introduced as a vision experienced by an earthling      but this framing device doesn’t reappear at the end      the dreamer and therefore the reader are trapped forever like the witch-king in an adventure not their own      as eddison swallows his own tale      how will you escape from this hell

     •    research the ouroboros to learn more of its nature
     •    make the witch-king the story’s hero and thus derail the narrative

matt martin

july 1986      the ceremony for the turning of the sod to initiate construction at canary wharf      a grand marquee has been erected amid the west india docks’ derelict warehouses      a flagstone is pried up so the governor of the bank of england may attack the sparse soil below with his ritual trowel      politicians and businessmen assemble      suddenly a flock of sheep stampedes through the proceedings      the locals of the isle of dogs dislike this regeneration plan      canary wharf jobs are for bankers and lawyers and not for ex-dockers like them      animals from a nearby city farm have been borrowed and hidden overnight inside a vacant warehouse      after the sheep have caused panic the dockers tip over beehives from the farm      thousands of angry bees pursue the governor of the bank of england      that’s you by the way      this is what happens when thousands of tiny phenomena that you might ignore as individuals are combined within a brief period      how will you evade the swarm of high frequency protesters

     •    become a spider whose webs might ensnare the bees
     •    compel their obedience by enrolling them all in a pyramid scheme

matt martin

you are either trapped in      or perhaps at one with      the web of microwaves beaming from dish to dish between london’s skyscrapers      energy circulates and summons wealth into the bank accounts of corporations      this three-dimensional geometry is more complex and powerful than any occultist’s pentagram      but the shape is less elegant      instead of a circuit the power gathers into an east-west axis      the nexus of businesses in the city often transmits signals to data centres at canary wharf in the east end and park royal in west london      or further in those directions for international transmission via basildon and slough      this axis approximately follows the route of crossrail a.k.a. the elizabeth line      named after the british throne’s current seat-warmer      in fact monarchism is written all the way through these transmissions like the lettering through sticks of seaside rock      slough’s palatial data centre is on buckingham way and sits near the queen’s residence at windsor      signals pass through park royal      basildon’s etymology is obscure but the modern name echoes greek βασιλεύς or ‘king’      the whole an upscaling of the monarch’s face appearing on every coin and banknote      how will you respond to this structural imbalance of power

     •    become the ruler yourself
     •    locate the web’s maker

matt martin

if you were buying futures how would you know the physical goods that they represented were there to be claimed      maybe production could fail or a vendor might sell the future of the same lot to multiple buyers      in reality such things seem not to occur      since this would badly corrode confidence in the selling company      but if it did      the easiest way for duped buyers to cope would be to sell on the futures before prices collapsed      distributing the loss further and further from the producer in a pyramid scheme      beholding a pyramid it’s difficult to take in the whole edifice because one’s so occupied scanning the individual tiers of stone      even harder when one’s entombed inside      brain pulled out through the nose and preserved in a canopic jar to dream of the sublime      how will you apprehend this pyramid’s meaning

     •    look at it from a great distance
     •    find out who’s beneath it

matt martin

a hedge is a futures deal that defrays potential loss caused by fluctuating prices of commodities      a producer who anticipates a drop in her product’s value can sell futures at the commodity’s current price      this is called a ‘short hedge’     a consumer who fears that prices will rise can buy futures at the goods’ present cost      this is termed a ‘long hedge’      the long and the short of it is to surround businesses’ enclosures and stop stock from wandering off      but for wildlife a hedge is a road not a barrier      earwigs and weasels crawl along its length      but especially boggarts      zigzagging from hedge to hedge down the field boundary faster than eyes can catch      turning deals sour in the churn of prices round and round      guarded from  interference by dense hawthorn where darkness pools      how will you banish the boggart from your fields

     •    try to catch him in a cobweb
     •    cut gaps in the hedgerow to stop the boggart in his tracks

matt martin

a fist’s outline inked upon the drawing of a face      capital letters exploding in an onomatopoeia      as ben-day dots of red ink burst from the nose      by 1974 marvel comics had noted a trend for kung fu in popular culture      as evidenced by the films of bruce lee and the shaw brothers      so marvel acquired intellectual property to capitalise on this fad      licensing characters from sax rohmer’s novels about chinese supervillain fu manchu      the result was the hands of shang-chi      master of kung fu      shang-chi is son of fu manchu      reared as the perfect kung fu killer      he somehow develops a conscience      and uses his skills to dismantle his father’s crime empire in east london’s limehouse chinatown      there are elements of racial stereotyping in how shang-chi is portrayed      his martial arts expertise and penchant for aphoristic wisdom      but the comic is still an effective antidote to rohmer’s racist tales      since shang-chi and many other chinese characters are unambiguously sympathetic      this comic was cancelled in 1983      rohmer’s estate later refused to renew the license      now the comics can’t be reprinted and fu manchu can’t appear in new stories      shang-chi was an original creation and still guest stars in other comics      enjoying science fiction adventures alongside various superheroes      alien technology recently gave him the power to duplicate himself      and form an army of identical kung fu masters      what should shang-chi do with his newfound ability

     •    keep himself company on pilgrimage
     •    help the downtrodden of the east end

matt martin

you enter the graveyard of saint anne’s limehouse      beneath the shadow of the church’s obelisk spire play kids from the 1920s      each the child of a chinese sailor and of a local mother      as the children clamber on a six foot tall pyramid in the churchyard corner they act out roles from sax rohmer’s pulp novels about the nefarious doctor fu manchu      crime lord and mad scientist embodying early twentieth century paranoia about the so-called yellow peril      fu manchu hid out in the limehouse chinatown      you feel disturbed that the kids don’t notice rohmer’s racism      they are simply excited to have these tales of adventure set in their neighbourhood      you notice that the pyramid constantly exhales warmth that turns into mist as it meets the churchyard’s cold air      just like the pyramid atop canary wharf’s main tower to the east      whose air conditioning system puffs steam through the roof     what buried skyscraper of stone has this older pyramid as its peak      the children open a secret door in the monument’s side      spiral stairs lead down into the lair of fu manchu      you descend      which adventure are you in

     •    fu manchu versus hong kong kung fu
     •    fu manchu and the tao of feng shui

matt martin

the manchu or qing invaded china from manchuria in 1644      their dynasty ruled until 1912            over this long period they militarily subdued the han chinese      but at the same time the manchu were culturally absorbed      this fraught time is documented in films by the shaw brothers      here manchu tend to be villains      oppressing the han with superior kung fu until han heroes train up to defeat them      a common trope in these films is use of ‘chi’      metaphysical energy flowing in lines through the land and via human bodies      in real life it’s a sophisticated philosophy      the basis for cultural practices from landscape gardening to acupuncture      but in these films chi achieves fantastic effects      several shaw brothers villains harness it to become invulnerable      no sword cuts their skin      heroes’ fists can’t bruise them      there’s only one weak spot where lines of power converge      maybe the eyes or the top of the head      a blow here can disrupt the whole network      this lets the bad guy be vanquished      how will you attack this story’s villain

     •    punch him between the eyes
     •    organise a demonstration

matt martin

travelling through china monkey and pigsy saw mourners at a funeral burning paper cash      “what a waste” said monkey      “they could buy some wine with that and give a lovely wake”      pigsy replied “you idiot      they’re making ghost money      smoke carries the cash’s spirit to heaven where the dead use it”      monkey wondered why things still cost money in heaven      maybe the dead just played mah-jong with it      but if everything that burned ended up in heaven      that explained why it was such a nice place      huge forests from all the lumber torched on earth      and lots of recreational herbs      he felt grateful that fossil fuels weren’t in wide use so early in chinese history      otherwise heaven would be full of coal heaps and oil slicks      monkey decided to invest in futures      he bought cheaply a group of plum tree saplings too young for bearing fruit      and made a bonfire of them      pigsy said “what’s going on here”      monkey explained “when we get back into heaven those trees will be waiting for me and by then they’ll be laden with plums”      pigsy said “my mouth’s already watering      let me buy some from you now so i can eat them when we’re let back in”      so pigsy bought futures in monkey’s plums for more cash than monkey had spent on all the saplings      but their quest took years and pigsy got bored of waiting for his feast      he sold his futures to dying people so they could enjoy monkey’s plums when they passed away      monkey and pigsy thus both accrued profits without harvesting any fruit      eventually our heroes gained enlightenment and re-entered heaven      there they found lao-tse had eaten all of monkey’s unguarded plums      an angry crowd of the dead awaited them      demanding the expected treat      what should monkey and pigsy do

     •    repay in ghost money the dead who can only use cash to play mah-jong
     •    give them a different treat and mix them all mojitos instead

matt martin

you are thinking about the contrasting experiences of time in different faiths      in buddhism for example the self is trapped in a circuit of death and rebirth      to escape means to slingshot oneself from this loop on a linear path into unknowability      whereas in the christian religion humans were locked into an edenic cycle      each day paradisiac as the next      but then they fell into linear time     and the goal is to get back to circular existence      there are other ways to figure this      so buddhist nirvana could be a surrender to the gravity well that every one of your circulating lives had been orbiting      but we might still look for other cosmologies      something that lets us avoid the traps of linearity and cyclicity      there are belief systems      like those of the hmong and the ancient egyptians      where each person has numerous souls      and these all meet different fates      some loop around in eddies of reincarnation      some enter afterlives      some stay behind as ghosts      others might even die with the body      so a person’s being forks time and again      she can explore many options simultaneously      and proliferate into different worlds      what shape would be formed if you mapped all their journeys

     •    a mesh of branching twigs
     •    a hopeless knot

 

matt martin

a barrel of rum is winched up to the loophole door in a warehouse’s top storey      beyond the fug uttered by steamships there towers the pyramid-capped obelisk of one canada square      at east london’s west india docks two hundred years of history is compressed to one moment in accordance with the speed of high frequency trading      the docklands light railway viaduct across the dock basin has bascules to let west indiaman ships’ masts pass through      commuters on the trains grumble about “catching a bridger” as cockneys would call it when their route was interrupted by the open lock at a dock entrance      the sailing ships are from the earliest days of this complex      arriving laden with rum and sugar from the caribbean      before loading manufactured goods for export      tools and weapons and chains      that they’ll take to west africa      there to fill holds with captive africans      for shipment via the middle passage to the west indies      selling the enslaved and taking more sugar on board      riding the north atlantic turbine around and around a triangular circuit      accruing more and more wealth for merchants controlling the ghastly trade      this triangle is represented in each face of the pyramid on one canada square      but this is not what the tower’s architect césar pelli was thinking about      what else might he have had in mind

     •    a reference to egyptian tomb pyramids
     •    a hypertime structure that encodes the form of the cosmos

matt martin

the ancient greek ‘tmesis’ means ‘cutting’ or ‘skimming’      in grammar it names the severing of two elements in a word and the splicing of other verbiage into this gap      it’s rare in english and hard to translate      “i read it on the inter-woven-with-extraneous-language-net”      though a near equivalent is the sundering of phrasal verbs      “she added the profits up”      roland barthes uses tmesis in a special sense       the reader’s skimming of passages within a text      for example if you were perusing nonlinear poetry and found your path looping back through paragraphs explored already     you might well skip over the repetition and go straight to the text’s next branch where you could choose a fresh route      and if such a poem took codex form then tmesis might happen each time you flipped through the book from one page to another      on the way registering content that doesn’t fully breach your consciousness      but tmesis also occurs      often involuntarily      when browsing linear works      the reader tunes out then in again enjoying a unique piece of literature assembled from input the author presents   again and again you step into the same river whose will to change will not change its will to change your mind      but would a boat do the job better      ‘cutting’ is what oars are said to do when they strike water      how will you use tmesis in your reading

     •    look for a boat to help you navigate this poem
     •    find a text that lets you skip over its entirety without missing a thing

matt martin

thames from ‘tamesis’      a latinisation of brythonic meaning ‘dark water’      you are walking beside the river at limehouse      looking onto the reach known as the lower pool of london      its turbid speculum discloses nothing      before it was embanked the thames flowed wider and more shallowly      in the roman period nearly twice as broad      a person standing on this spot would be neck-deep in thames mud      tide rising high overhead      across blind eyeballs the eddies of capital swirling in the wakes of trading ships      to the west the weight of skyscrapers fractures the contemporary city’s carapace of glass and steel      the cracks re-establish london’s medieval street pattern      east and canary wharf’s towers haul themselves from the marsh of the isle of dogs      you are standing by the thames at wapping      ‘wappa inge’      old english meaning ‘wappa’s people’      named for an elder or founder of the early medieval settlement here      on the foreshore a saxon is carving runes onto the prow of his boat      taking great care      he knows that one syntax error might compromise the spell he’s inscribing      if the vessel will be used for trade      beached on the strand and used as an improvised market stall      as many are in the nearby port of lundenwic      and if in his programming he accidentally interchanged a plus and minus      the spell might go berserk      the stall would build exponentially bigger trading positions      no longer correcting for excess      in a matter of seconds a fortune could be lost      the merchant would have to smash the runes with an axe to rescue the whole kingdom’s economy      you ask the runewright to teach you a spell      what sort of magic would you like

    •    a rune for acquiring boundless wealth
    •    a rune to detect dangerous necromancy in your area

matt martin

midas son of gordias son of midas son of gordias      each king of phrygia bestowed his father’s name upon his son      one midas is said to have invented currency      this may or may not be the same midas cursed so that all he touched transformed to gold      since coinage transmutes each thing to its monetary price      even human beings      as midas discovered when he held his daughter      the curse was lifted by washing his hands in the river pactolus      releasing liquidity into the market      so the river’s sands were hence replete with gold      another midas or maybe the same was blighted with donkey’s ears after he undervalued music of apollo      this midas hid the ears under a phrygian cap      only his barber knew the secret      but couldn’t hold it      the barber hissed “midas has ass’s ears” into a hole and then covered it up      wealth grew out of this buried talent      the reeds whispered “midas has ass’s ears midas has ass’s ears” as breezes stirred the yield of sound investment      a variant of the myth spread to turkmenistan’s yenisei basin      this barber whispered the secret into a dark well      overnight its waters rose to submerge the kingdom beneath lake issyk-kul      capital’s offensive once more totalised      then there’s gordias      father or son of one midas      he tied a knot that no one could undo      and promised that whoever solved it would conquer the world      at last alexander the great cheated and cut it open      gordias had invented the same thing as his father-son      revealing how capital entangles itself throughout space and time      but which of these feats is greatest

     •    the first minting of coins
     •    the gordian knot