This was meant to be your day of resisting temptation, but more important than money is generosity. You will make this quick. You begin in the large sale section, circling a sea of racks, but the large t-shirts are stained with trendy brand names and stupid slogans and none of the pants appeal to you. You descend to the men’s department. One plywood surface is full of sweatshirts in tan, grey, and pink hues, on sale for $29. One of these might do, but the collar is just a bit too high, and that logo. You find a separate sale section. Hats, boxers, ugly shirts, polyester and rayon. At the end of the shirt rack, in the farthest corner of the store, you find a black terrycloth short-sleeve shirt. $14.99. The material is cotton and cheap. You can see through it. But it would do as an extra gift to round out the package. You walk by the sweatshirts again but the small logo is still there. You find the two lanes for checkout, one to the right for the human cashier and one straight ahead for self-checkout. The cashier looks bored and you are tired. You move forward and scan the tag yourself. It rings up as ten cents. The two employees standing behind you are still exchanging jokes, maybe flirting. Can they see the massive screen of your register? Should you say something? You decide not to say anything. You stand there and wait for the machine to roll out a disproportionately long receipt. At the door, someone says something. You turn to them with fear, and they repeat it: Goodnight. Good night. You get away feeling like you have gotten away with something and descend into the subway. Home again. You eagerly pull out the shirt and feel a hard lump. The security tag is still attached. Google tells you that the tags are full of ink, so that if you try to steal, you will have blood on your hands, plus the goods will be ruined. You could return the item to the store and ask them to remove the tag, but then you would have to show them your disproportionately long receipt to prove that the item is in fact yours, and then they might see that you had only paid ten cents for it. No, you’ll have to pry it open. YouTubers show you how to do it—strong magnets can convince the devices to open—and end with disclaimers that they did not in fact steal the items. Another method involves the use of two forks in a rocking motion. You opt for the screwdriver instead. Your leverage is good, and you manage to yield a nice margin on one side and then the other, but you have to keep circling the central prong because widening one side causes the other to close up. Your clearance is now half an inch wide, just enough to slip in the metal shears. But the metal shears are dull, and your cuts become increasingly violent in your impatience. There. The deed is done. You remove the round black lump and its bent plug from the shoulder. But now the t-shirt has a hole in it from your blind probing. With your needle and your black thread, the last length on the spool, you sew up the hole just like your mother taught you, first circling the event with small stitches in and out through the intact perimeter and then closing it up with one cinch.
"The poet is of no party." BaudelaireOur manifesto is an act of substantiation.
We reject all forms of futilitarianism, in whatever disguise.
We believe that comedy is the song of the village and tragedy the song of the goat.
We believe what is written in the books, but now we want to see for ourselves.
The single idea, beating on the same doors in vain.
The analogue and the invention.
The death cell.
The first permission.
Though we watch the stage for things to happen, though our minds wander.
By ourselves in the green field, playing our diversion.
Though the story begins with the loss of a home.
Out of the machine, we shift restlessly in our seats.