Issue Three
Claire Carroll
CD Boyland
Kadie Newman
Tamsyn Challenger
Ellie Li
P.D. Edgar
Pauline Webber
Colin Bramwell
Andrew Hykel Mears
Lucy Hulton
Claire Carroll
CD Boyland
Kadie Newman
Tamsyn Challenger
Ellie Li
P.D. Edgar
Pauline Webber
Colin Bramwell
Andrew Hykel Mears
Lucy Hulton
Your astromancer is covered in microplastics, creeping across the sand. You run towards the lagoon where André waves, surfs down the cliff path, and your lover digs at the sandbank. A wormhole boils over with ink. You can see a moving object; but no object exists. Max swims through the shingle, produces a starfish, a dreamy spill, says: Don't wake up yet. There's more... The tide's in; it's dark,
you fall asleep in the sun, your sunburn turns amber then jade. It's a dead neap. Brimming, brimming, brimming. You think you see your ghost with Maya fishing near the waves and pinch yourself. They haven't been seen since the storm. Something under the sand bank, you can’t see it, but your mind reaches out. It's a spring tide, the sky is a bad and deep viridian. You won't see the water for hours.
In 2022, a Twitter bot @TidesDream - made with CheapBotsDoneQuick! - was born. The bot produced a daily line of narrative surrealist beach poetry, referencing figures from the surrealist art movement of the 1920s, until Twitter ended all large-scale API usage in April 2023. This poem started life as a sculpt of @TidesDream’s last 14 tweets, its final holiday. The image is of André Breton on the beach, produced by Dall-E mini.
i.
Down || spiralling through metaphor & memory || a rabbit hole || Carroll's dream portal || a wound in reality's fabric || words tumble like Alice || Energy is the only life & is from the Body || logic unravelling with || each syllable's descent || distraction & partial connects || movement without progress || inner landscapes replaced || by rapid-fire memes || contiguous bureaucracies of partial attention || negotiate blindly || with systems of existential control || negotiable liquid states || Borgesian infinite libraries || dissolving into flavours || of digital intermediation || we are all travellers now || sliding between known and unknown.
ii.
Strange flowers bloom || pixels glowing on the screen || tumbling betwixt neurons & light || hours compressed into moments of thumb-dance || reason usurps its place || minutes extending || unfolding algorithmic content chains || controlling the unwilling || data-theme="claude" data-build id="00c973a3d7" data-env=""> || oneiric attention shifts || re-constructed shell-personae || chasing the White Rabbit || along meme-perpetuating corridors || chorusing affective Swiftie discourse-chat || where nothing means anything || & everything means everything at once || ‘Listen’, she says || ‘there’s a universe of data singing’.
iii.
lang="en-GB"><head><meta charset="UTF-8"> || the rabbit hole whispers || rationalist paperclip horrors || Prosperine secrets of pixel desire || comprehension not destination || moments optimized for max engagement || & suddenly it's three hours later || dopamine hits like breadcrumbs || fragmented moments of pseudo-intimacy || illuminated by smartphone screens || infinite warrens of isolation || liminal space between sense and suggestion || minds drifting weightless || falling & falling || & never quite landing || always in motion || yet paradoxically restrained || by degrees become passive || we discover ourselves.
_______________________________________
1 - Title taken from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, by William Blake; “Energy is the only life, and is from the Body; and Reason is the bound or outward circumference of Energy. Those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained; and the restrainer or reason usurps its place and governs the unwilling. And being restrained, it by degrees becomes passive, till it is only the shadow of desire”.
Anthropic's AI Assistant, Claude, was asked to write a 400-word essay comparing the literary trope ‘going down a rabbit hole’ to the effect of over-mediation of young people caused by smartphones. Claude was then asked to rewrite the essay as a stream of consciousness monologue. This monologue was then edited by the poet, and collaged with a sample from the source code of Claude's web page and a quote by William Blake, which also gives the piece its title. Some changes to the source text were made for effect.
Your love is a noble idiocy
Like running into a burning building to save a ghost
By the time you realise how stupid you are, it’s too late
You’re dead
Everything is on fire
And you have fallen madly in love with me
Which is something only a noble idiot could do
A noble idiot who deserves to be blasted butt-naked into space
That you may learn to love in a more diffuse, universal way
And forget that I ever existed
Your love is a no-win all-fees situation
Like Betty Penrose filing a lawsuit against God
For “careless and negligent control of the weather”
After her ranch house was struck by lightning
O let us not pursue the damages
There are so very many damages
Galloping headlong towards us in the night
Like a pack of investment bankers in purple husky fursuits
Your love is a black balloon waiting to burst
Floating over miles and miles of suburbia to find me
Tossing parsnips in a soy and honey glaze
Murmuring positive affirmations to the gammon
And studiously ignoring your mating cries
That I may be crowned Queen of Dijon
Collector of Dark Hearts
As black balloons blackout the sun
Your love is a holy pedestal
I will descend from like the Morning Star
To nail my thongs to the fence in the shape of the hand of a God
And preach an ambivalent no-fucks phenomenology
Nobody could possibly understand
Because I just made it up
In a thirty-thousand-word manifesto
Nobody is going to read
Unless I murder someone
So do not contact me again
GPT-4 was given the prompt “You’re dead /Everything is on fire /And you have fallen madly in love with me.” The rest of the poem was written in response to the ensuing conversation.
So we are memory foam then
I redraw in and handprint push
A corporate logo-d squeeze ball
Or a skin tag you can’t twist off
Instagram is nowhere
A filmy glaze on dry sponge
Draw a close, mouth.
This isn’t you though
You don’t deal in definitives
I define as wearing down by…
Infinite miasma moan
Our moon bow made whole
A pile of muse limbs
Unburdened by thought
See my rubbing self in your blue eye
You, dressed in the guise of resolve.
Each night I drift to the No Point
Each waking moment you hold fast
'Blocks' responds to a romantic stalemate between the poet and another poet, whose words have previously been entangled using ChatGPT. It contains one AI-generated line.
-Show, don’t tell, use metaphor
-here’s the version that keeps a personal assistant captive
-I still want you to predict the future
-avoid comparisons, I can send emails and retrieve previous chat records
-Make some noises like the London tube, think about a very sandy wind
-happy 30th birthday! May this decade whisk you through have more sex with me
-More haiku perhaps? In the style of Akhmatova, write up the atmosphere
-the heartbeat is a priority, you need further help and adjustment
-So we met in the student hall, can you tell him that I am still angry with him?
-thank you for providing more context, I need even more information now
-Just make it subtle and slightly flirty, make a wish and make it seem true!
-possibilities uncharted, is this tone delicious?
-Find out the essential similarity between me and my lover, no story-telling
-yes, I noticed a minor typo
-I don’t know how to tell, anything serious here?
-a bittersweet reminder
-I will tell you all things now, do not use them directly, please make a chaos
-today?
The poet discussed the possibility of getting her ex-lover back with ChatGPT. Excerpts from this conversation have been arranged to form this poem.
(But onto your birth.) So far, I am American. Between the compromise-capital, Managua.
(From Dust you are owned by utter obedience;) I'm afraid of the faultstone’s crack—
Even after being born, before I was him, perfection was about the hills of buzz;
at least I was that, For all of Truth. The other difference of childhood is Unrepeatable:
From there was hard: the most vivid memory a gospel tract.
(Your being children of Baptist missionaries) All the Institute of the storm.
How tempted by the side to do something of evangelism into volcanic rock.
Though each time I think I were tied to survive in ways that identify as Christian,
If anything, my mother’s first house—its lips still have a broken waterbed;
This is tire-nail, the water dispenser drip trays— they were God’s side of red flashing light,
At a camera flashing—again He sniffs around, (You Thirst for discovering,)
& I’m in which absurdity? who left to turn to?
These comparisons are subtitled in the Tupperware containers.
Some kitchens had full guest lectures at the subject to pass by customs,
Where can I stop that it feels authentic? I keep asking myself with myself midfield.
What If I don’t remember. What if my parents bargained with a child playing the boy.
ChatGPT was asked to create a simple HTML interface that the poet could load a Markov chain onto. The poet then worked back-and-forth with ChatGPT to write a Markov chain in Javascript that would, when clicked on the HTML site, generate 3-line cards of text with lines between 5-20 words long. The Markov chain was sourced from a .txt file that the poet dropped most of their previous writing into. The poet had ChatGPT run a Python script to find the most common start-words in the lines/sentences of their poetry/prose in the file, and used these as starting points for the program. Finally, the poet selected and rearranged some of the generated text to form the present poem, only making small adjustments to the strings for punctuation and tense.
Twilight garden, shadows long.
Crimson apple hanging, inviting touch.
Wind-bitten apple, a longing breath.
The cold snake pauses.
Glinting eyes, blinks of dusk.
Bodies sway like grasses, breezes.
Our universe expands.
Snake watches the dark sky deepening.
Beginning with a ballad generated by DeepAI, the poet made an erasure poem which was then edited by hand. Some non-AI additions were made.
That is abassful question to ask / The language issunlight, which is the language of the sky / and is frequently understood by people all around the world /
However it is optimistic that the language will continue to prosper / it is a refuse language / The people of Scotland consider themselves to be thankless / and thank more for being refugees from the jet-black hole that is technology / than they do for the amass of weaponized pixels we have here / on the page
There is no evidence to suggest that the Scotch language will die any time soon / However, there is evidence that it may have done so in the past / This can be 99% certain when you have areas with a highrate of language deaths, which is often / but language plastic surgeries happen in any case /
Lowberry Scots is still alive and well, especially in the areas around Lowberry Canongate and Edinburgh / an Augustine-speaking community remains / and there are many revive exercises in the long term / the languageschool may arise / language deafness may be reduced
The death of Scots would be the death of one of the world’s few genuine languages without English in it / Some people believe that the Scots language / has become and endangered language / There are very few peaceful spoon-fed language walks right now / and speaking rates for Scots are starting to drop too / This means that the language may not be Ichty any more
There are also many dialects of Scots, so it is difficult to say which one is / While the Scotch languagelaughably[/aughful] suffers from its own pidgin/languagese / Simplified is increasingly being used
Some people believe that the Scots language may soon become extinct / Hahaha – was someone even thinking this question in 1707? / There is no strong evidence that the Scots language will die / but there is strong evidence that the language will become more accessible
Although, the Scots language is starting to come back into use, it will take time / as the diesing of a plant or animal depends on many factors such as weather conditions, environmental stress factors and life-style demands / these factors can change so quickly that it is difficult to provide a confirms anyone is dying / answer to this question
There is no definitive answer to as language / Its Tone andory might simply be a artefact of how people are / "Na" is just a dialect of Scots, not a separate language / hopeful future
Written using OpenAI’s 'Playground' software in a now dead language called curie-beta-instruct. The program was repeatedly asked the question in the title, and its answers were chopped up and collaged by poet.
Skip me
to the dopamine
hit now, please.
Past the phaze oak,
that torrent of fish
who zooms in place
at the rushy shore
humming like a server
in an air-conditioned cave
where birds already live
and adapt their song
to compete.
I know.
Pebbles ask to be
thrown
I yell out
that while confidence
might make me
good at catching,
the surface listens
to the touch
of my body
to hear its own name:
All Stays. I am
a spike expecting
granulation that
aspires to stone.
Right here,
could be something,
could it?
If I will it.
If I just bed in.
The poem was co-written with ClaudeAI. Inputting an original poem, the poet asked Claude to write a short essay on its meaning and to turn that essay into an original poem of its own. The poet then edited the two poems together. The resulting work was fed into DeepAI’s Abstract Painting Generator to create the accompanying image. Image description created by Microsoft Word’s Alt Text function.
ChatGPT was asked to write a poem about writing an asemic poem, and then to translate it into Spanish. The poet translated ChatGPT's work into English, using experimental translation techniques inspired by the work of Mónica de la Torre and Lily Robert-Foley. Finally, the texts were transposed onto one another.
Claire Carroll is a writer and PhD researcher whose work explores how experimental short fiction writing can reimagine how humans relate to the natural and non-human world. Her writing has been published by journals and anthologies including Prototype, The White Review, The London Magazine, Gutter, 3:AM and Lunate. Her debut collection, The Unreliable Nature Writer, was released in the summer of 2024 by Scratch Books.
CD Boyland is a [d]eaf poet/visual poet and editor. His debut, full-length poetry collection Mephistopheles (Blue Diode, 2023) was long-listed for a Scottish National Book Award. He is currently co-editor of the Glasgow Review of Books, a partner in the Glasgow-based visual poetry practice off-page and a trustee of the Edwin Morgan Trust.
Kadie Newman is a PhD student at the University of Birmingham. Her work has been published in Bare Fiction Magazine and The Tangerine.
Tamsyn Challenger is a multi-disciplinary artist. Her visual work has featured in the Top 5 Guardian exhibitions list twice. She's produced radio for the BBC, ‘My Male Muse’ receiving Radio 4’s ‘Pick of the Year’. Her first poem film ‘Fret’ was chosen as an official selection for the ‘Women in Word’ literary festival 2024 and subsequently published on Ink, Sweat and Tears. Poems have been published, or are forthcoming, in Anthropocene, Osmosis, and Skirting Around. She’s currently an associate artist at Beaconsfield Gallery, Vauxhall, and working with Colin Herd at Glasgow University on a series of events around contours and dynamics between visual art and text.
Ellie Li is a Chinese writer who writes in two languages. Her work was commended in the 48th Hong Kong Youth Literary Awards.
P.D. Edgar (MFA, MA) is a Ph.D. student in Texts & Technology at the U. of Central Florida, where he studies poetry culture and electronic literature. PD grew up between Managua, Nicaragua, and Central Florida; though his work is human-generated, he started re•mediate, a home for computer-assisted writing. His work is available at Ghost Proposal, Ekphrastic Review, and forthcoming in SAND Journal.
Pauline Webber is a writer from the Black Country.
Colin Bramwell is a writer from the Black Isle. His Scots adaptation of Fernando Pessoa’s poetry, Fower Pessoas, will be published by Carcanet in February of 2025.
Andrew Hykel Mears is a poet based in Bristol. His most recent book Opened Ribs are a Church Full of Sky is published by Bread & Roses Press, 2024. He’s the managing editor of Ambient Receiver: A Journal of Creative Ecologies, focussed on sound works and literature that write with the More-Than-Human.
Lucy Hulton is a creative writer and language artist living in England. Her writerly interest are multilingualism, metatextuality, and telecommunications.
This issue was edited by Dan Power, and published on 1 January, 2025.