Familiar objects absorb wayward thoughts and are transformed, reshaped, metastasized. A pandemic work.
YEAR: 2021 RUNTIME: 5:00
Script
Rake Pail Clip Books
- A rake that surpasses all understanding.
Nearby sit piles of grass cuttings and rotting leaves, which common understanding wants removed – a task for which a rake is ideally suited. Here is a rake, and this rake has a use, a use which corresponds to a need, a use to which it is not currently being put, and a need that is not currently being fulfilled.
We might think of this as a lazy rake, an indolent rake, a world-weary rake, not advocating for a 6-hour work day, not the victim of cost cutting, not concerned with the destruction of useful employment, not envisioning a different kind of life. This is a rake that surpasses all understanding. This is a rake that speaks to work. This rake requires no further explanation.
- An almost empty garbage pail, with plastic lining, finding itself.
Inside it has no shape that can be recognized by the human eye. It goes down and down, forever. It is a place of absolute time. All the regions of all the worlds, known and unknown, open up there.
Inside the pail there is feeling, within the emptiness there is joy, among the remains there is compassion. The pail seeks its distinctiveness beyond itself. Knowing that abstract things are neither created nor destroyed, it seeks its abstract nature.
It breaks up, it breaks down, it embodies apple cores and balls of crumpled paper. It’s our last frontier.
- A clip, attached to a table, serving no apparent purpose.
A clip, with a red handle, attached to a table, serving no apparent purpose – indifferent, self-important, aloof. Able to see at a glance the difference between words and things, the clip breaks with popular opinion, and accepts that ideas, properties, and numbers are not real. Things are joined, it seems to say, but they are not related; clamped together, but not connected.
There lies the consciousness of the clip.
We may well wonder if the clip has severed completely its links to the rhythms of daily life.
- Books, in a pile, whose titles cannot be seen.
We see. We do see. We perceive. We identify. We recognize. We discern. We keep in view. We catch sight of.
It’s distinct. It’s clear. It’s clear cut. It’s crystal clear. … It’s not a mystery. It’s not a secret. It’s not opaque. It’s not unknowable. It’s not undiscoverable. It’s not incalculable.
We’re not lost. We’re not adrift. We’re not at sea. We’re not out of our depths. We’re not going around in circles.
We know we’re close. We know we’re near. We know we’re nigh. We know it’s nearby. We know it’s within reach. We know it’s in range. We know it’s just around the corner. We know it’s just around the corner. It’s just a stone’s throw away. We know it’s just over the horizon.
But it’s murky. It’s dark. It’s shapeless. It’s opaque. It’s a tough nut to crack.
And it’s a gamble. It’s a toss-up. It’s a leap in the dark. It’s a throw of the dice.
But we can learn. We can keep informed. We can keep up. We can keep posted. We can keep abreast of. We can keep track of. We can keep tabs on. We can keep an eye on.
We can expose it. We can bring it to light. We can tear off the mask. We can draw back the curtain. We can show it in its true colours.
Because it’s not bunk. It’s not blather. It’s not bombast. It’s not drivel.
It’s just evidence. It’s just info. It’s just news. It’s just gossip. We’re just bearing witness. (fade out.)