1
I often
scribble with a soft pencil on a piece of paper. My scribbling always takes the form of little loops, with each loop looping out in a slightly different direction, so that the series of little loops forms a larger loop. These loops then loop round and turn and cross and cover one another, darkening and darkening the paper until it is nearly black.
I sometimes think about these scribbles as a chart of my heartbeat, each little loop a beat, the larger loops the earth turning, so that each heartbeat is spaced around it evenly.
My life is describable, can be mapped, with a scribble map. I wake up, I go to work, I return. Next day the same, but turned a bit. I go to the bookstore after work. I return home. Around and around!
The qabalists believe that the tree of life is the map of the universe, of the universe at any scale. “As above, so below.” Each tree containing smaller trees, each tree part of a larger tree. I think my scribbling might be a more accurate map. Loops of loops of loops. My blood circulating around my body as the earth goes around the sun and the sun around the galaxy and the galaxy turns…
There is no panic to my scribbling. Evenly, around and around, patiently. Little loops looping and looping, the paper grows darker and darker, and eventually it is nothing but black lead.
2
The scribble of the
chromosomes, scribbled around inside the cell, the little scribble sperms scribble outside to find another scribble, scribble each other together into a new scribble.
Scribblings on the page, all writing is just a well-ordered series of scribbles, scribble scribble.
3
A nightmare where everyone who turns towards me has a wriggling scribble for a
face. They raise their hands, in greeting, or in self-defence, or what I don't know, and their hands are nothing but wriggling scribbles. The way film looks when it's been scribbled on. There is no decoding these faces. They might as well be blank, but the horror is that they clearly mean something, but
meanings wriggle past before I can get a hold on the slippery scribbles.
4
When does scribbling become text? When does text become scribbling? The scribbles of
graffiti in the
subway, like something organic, like a mold growing in the corners, meanings superscribed over themselves until they become a mute mass of dark loops.