244. Dream influences

So silly on paper, yet so deeply do they run.

243. Kaiba

What burns is a hideous quarantine, the encumbrance of isolation as an island, walled off by solid flesh rather than liquid water. Words and visions bubble underneath skin, with only so little that can manage to break through this prison of consciousness. How many of their brethren arise from within only to die, still trapped inside? Absorbed back into this torturous body, unspoken, unexpressed, forgotten by the limited mechanisms of the physical brain. Loneliness in the cold knowledge that no one could meet me here, know me here; loneliness that can't be satiated by simple company from other flesh-walled (but unaware of such) entities.

I want to pour forth. No more of this suspension in space.

Where are you?

That larger stream of consciousness, the fabled universal language.

Manifestation of physical memory in space, even if cyclically devoured by the monster known as kaiba. The loneliness of Warp is something Neiro can neither contain nor pierce through. Even then, she...

Mr. Yuasa, is this something you understand?

242. Distraction

Wiggling out of a real post for the second day in a row. But the excuse this time is...music. Of epic treasure trove proportions.

WHY CAN'T I HOLD
ALL THESE SOUNDTRACKS

I'VE EVER WANTED

241. Tonight, I relive 2008.

The only rappy song I've ever liked.

240. Cloudy eyes

How my world depends so heavily upon the assumed-functionality of this one pair of cameroid apparatus carved into my skull.

My cognition is visually-dominated in its entirety. Memory, learning, retrieval. Until the moment things break, we have a nasty tendency to assume that everything we take for granted is nigh invincible. Whereas...reality...was one of the first fragile occurrences I grew to learn, right alongside that other regular pounding inside my chest.

Accept no substitutes.

I feel weak in the knees from this early-knocking of the future. I was at peace, with the surety that you will come to pass in the far undistinguished distance, bearing little to no resemblance to a present past. But.

Cloudy thoughts beget cloudy eyes with cloudy anticipation. Is that how it works, in the small scale of things? Your colors haunt me, but not in the way of your ghosts.

239. Molecular tracing

I would pay serious money for a system that could tag and trace either a) organic molecules of my body as they get reused, or b) inorganic molecules that have passed through my body. In the end, I suppose both would undoubtedly simply resemble specific path examples of the carbon and precipitation cycles. Yet...

Yesterday, one mosquito mother-to-be (or five, or ten) was able to live 'til the next time she must risk her life to feed, thanks to the generous blood-meal I presented, unaware at the time. My DNA-less erythrocytes have since been broken down to release hemoglobins, of which two α-subunits, two β-subunits, and one iron atom were systematically disassembled and further disintegrated until individual amino acids were reached. Glucose and other nutrients submerged in my blood could have been reused as energy-source straight away. But my digested proteins, in amino acid form, will be rebuilt into essential functioning tissues for either mother mosquito or her progeny. They will continue to be reused, past mosquito and human lifetime, a step down the food chain and perhaps a bit more worn each time, until finally bacteria or plant life recycles them brand spanking-shiny new. And cycles them back to feed the consumers.

Catabolism, anabolism. On Energizer-bunny repeat.

It would be wrong to label them as "my" proteins or "my" amino acids. Aside from the original zygote that came to my possession as my future vessel of existence, which I generously received from mostly mom and a little (but very much essential bit) of dad (who got them from their parents, in turn, anyway), everything else I own have come from similarly recycled building blocks unceremoniously inherited from third innocent parties of the food chain. For some reason, however, a group of highly developed ganglia (though I should not call them that, per emergent property of large numbers) has developed this inconvenient sense of identity that follows the tendency to label things with "I" and "mine." For most of my (evolutionarily advantageous) body parts, they guard with an intricate system of surveillance. But for peripheral, non-essential expendables like overgrown keratin and flaking epithelium, they are free to let go with no more sense of loss than urine or feces that have traveled and exhausted their purpose through my inner tube. Even though they are just as much "me" as any other portion scrutinized by my nervous system, no tears are shed, no thought dedicated to, no spiritual identity is attached to their inconspicuous elimination. All spring forth from my endless (while I live) supply of marrow stem cells, yet all are far from raised equal.

Why does this enormous congregation of cells work as one? (How many laws against universe and entropy do we break by merely breathing?) Why does no single cell hold its own conscious identity? In our totalitarian body state, the nervous system, holder of identity, sits as our stoic Big Brother with not one hint of dissent from any cell confined in the name of survival and existence. Are autoimmune diseases the result of the body's proletariat crying Viva la Resistancia? Big Brother tells us to label those as 'illnesses' that must be cured. We go to fellow Big-Brother-run doctors to administer steroids to bribe those overactive guerrilla warriors of the immune system.

Death is the eventual victory against the dictatorship, where anarchy reigns and the bourgeoisie are lysed, freed to cycle the universe.

238. J.C. Raulston Arboretum

This gets surprisingly addicting. At this rate I will need a dSLR bag to replace purses.


The sense of 'this is nice' continues. However, I can already feel the beginning of being able to relate with that sentiment. Despite however much I verb, it never does feel enough, does it? You see it as an incentive to explore and expand even more...while I take the opposite approach. Yet at the end of the day, deeper inside, we are still just as bored and unfulfilled. To which you say, 'Maybe I'm just an unhappy person,' and I say, 'I should detach myself a bit more.'

These subtle nuances. Why are you?

237. Rodin

The first sculpture I learned by name, albeit as '大教堂' instead of 'The Cathedral.' Meeting face-to-face today culminated in a savagely nostalgic moment...the effect of which I'd rather leave uncaptured by words.

This guy was also a ferocious presence to behold.

236. Noodler's Ink

235. Immensity

Something different about how I sense the world. The subtle feeling of lessening fluid pressure overhead, anticipation for that instant my open mouth can break surface to drink in cold drenched air.

What is it?

Like Helianthus tracing the sun overhead, my disjointed face trails this forever-approaching future. Streak through me, rain me down. Threading endless water in free-fall.

234. Different Sense, trans-translated

HIDE OUT
Nothing but revenge and PARADOX before descent into bliss and freedom
Lacking identity and raison d'etre to the death RIGHT NOW
The charismatic godkiller, by means of maladjusted brainwash,
Recklessly assailing the moonlit night?
OUR BLACKENED SUN

Desire regurgitated until satisfaction peaks[1]
A populace of mutual blame and mutual conspiration
Aching for euthanasia
BAD TASTE
Is it simplicity that's wantonly wasted?
OUR BLACKENED SUN

Even the sky impassive to human subjectivity
shuts off along with the light
Unnoticed even after it's gone
Deliberate self abandon in greedy pursuit of that dream
Drink to the bottom while hidden in smiles

HIDE OUT
Before falling into happiness and freedom, nothing but revenge and PARADOX
Lacking identity and raison d'etre to the death RIGHT NOW
The charismatic godkiller, by means of maladjusted brainwash,
Recklessly assailing the moonlit night?
OUR BLACKENED SUN

Pity and grief on a mask
LIVE THROUGH THIS WORLD
LIVE THROUGH THIS WORLD
LIVE THROUGH THIS WORLD

A chest pulled and torn
A wound that cannot be made to stay
Love
is an ideal sought by those who yearn to imitate[2]

Even the sky impassive to human subjectivity
shuts off along with the light
Unnoticed even after it's gone
Deliberate self abandon in greedy pursuit of that dream
Drink to the bottom while hidden in smiles

Grasping with death-grip onto that unatonable answer
No longer dependable
Let it end
Persist with leftover regret[3]

Yet only now do I notice
this future that bluntly strikes
Yes...what is implied by that "blue sky?"


-

[1] Desire (almost personified) that keeps vomiting until gratified. By the amount vomitted, I guess.
[2] Love is an unattainable ideal. People simply seek to recreate an image as close to it as possible.
[3] With all else gone, regret is what's left. Now, to stay with/become companions/have a relationship with this Regret. I almost wanted to use the word "cuddle" here.

Awkward song to translate due to lack of any pronouns, which simply doesn't work in English as it does in Japanese and Chinese. As is, English makes the lyrics sound like a series of commands, while in actuality, Kyo simply left out all implications of a subject in the sentence structure. Since that's clearly not how Romance languages in general work, it's a bit of a difficult concept to explain. I tried to keep everything transparent and literal.

Basis Chinese translation found here.

Kyo Goldmine

Selected Q&A

19. A couple of days ago, the band had reached 12 year anniversary since major debut, but is there any conviction you have carried out during those 12 years? If so, please tell us.
Do not fawn upon people.

52. I think life has been treated so lightly or taken away, but what does Kyo-san think life is?
Something that is an equivalent of you in the most possible way.

57. If you were to give one thing you think is missing from you what would it be?
Everything else other than conviction.

65. When I am about to waver, what should I depend on?
Waver. I think you need to figure out what you should do from that point on.

77. What is Kyo-san’s motto?
Don’t fawn.

81. Recently, I am not in the mood to do anything and I do not feel anything will go well. How would Kyo-san handle this?
I would just feel down. Then I would constantly struggle and endure.

88. Throughout your life, how did you digest something that you could not accept?
I don’t digest it. That’s why I get annoyed every time I recall it.

89. Are there any rules you impose upon yourself? Also, what would they be?
Don’t fawn, don’t compromise, and don’t give in.

92. What is your strength and weakness?
Awkwardness

102. How does Kyo-san calm down when you feel more hurt?
I don’t calm down.


Just like everything else...
So I came to a decision.

What is this hole

in my chest?

Contour

This reminded me of a moment of random unfounded hysteria back in 2005, when I contemplated the what-if of a Kyo's sudden death, with Zhu. Did some permanent change occur to his voice post-surgery? No one would know until winter.

Dir en grey. The only band who makes announcements seasons ahead to hype for singles, which serve as isolated islands of once-a-year-if-lucky hope to confirm they still live. With a vague assumption of some album to come x years down the line.


Unrelatedly, Kaoru makes an extremely convincing cosplay of Hellsing-Alucard in Dracula mode. Nice fucking mustache and all.