Galatea I) U (An Overture of Sorts) II) Forgive us What we Are, Love What we Wanted to be. All these hard lines that make us feel safe All these soft curves we want to set straight As I was walking to St. Ives I met a man with seven wives Brothers sisters have I none but that man's father's my father's son How sure of ourselves we are how full How certain we are the pinnacle Of consciousness and precious worth Inheritors by divine birth Masters of Geometry Inventors of Philosophy And words... All these hard lines that make us feel safe All these soft curves we want to set straight Nothing is the same as anything else Your parallels underwhelm Identity be but a fraud the charcoal wing of the black swan Groping metaphors for god To simplify is falsify, the blinking of the closing mind Narratives like fairy tales swallowed whole like candy whales Bedtime stories of a frightened child... All these hard lines that make us feel safe All these soft curves we want to set straight Bones in Denial All just to say that you're barely part way Stumbling down your dark hallway First in line in the monkey parade But clear in the rear of the light brigade Forgive us what we are Love what we wanted to be Who rise from flesh to spirit know the fall The word outleaps the world and light is all III) H IV) Engineer Oh Mother of Wisdom Oh Father of Light Lord of the Elements Master of Time Power and Vision and Fusion and Fission Bending cruel Nature to abject submission But deep underneath every rational beast The wellspring of sorrow sings The zealot the fascist the racist the freak The breeder the beater the cheater the priest The victim the rapist the sadist the greatest The one that you wish you could borrow their faces But deep underneath every frightened retreat The heart of loneliness beats Irony satire and alienation The protective mask of faux sophistication The gambler the shopper the slave to desire The junkie the puppet the man who starts fires But deep underneath every soul in the street The heart of a human still beats V) Graceful Degradation See everything for me VI) Marcel Another year has passed my love My brain's all scrambled today When they ask I say it's all fine I never know what to say I love you ultimate Ultimate love that's how it's always been A shadow girl following wispy invisible just knowing that you exist Locked in your temple Bring down the universe spread it out over the keys Shuffle through paper Love a sweet panther with no one watching but me Even if you didn't even know me, I'd love you with all my heart Even if you didn't even know me, I'd love you with all my heart

"Our life was a chest of maps self-assembling, fused into point-for-point feedback, each slice continuously rewriting itself to match the other layers' rewrites. In that thicket the soul existed." From "Galatea 2.2" by Richard Powers

Forgive us What we Are, Love What we Wanted to be. All these hard lines that make us feel safe All these soft curves we want to set straight As I was walking to St. Ives I met a man with seven wives Brothers sisters have I none but that man's father's my father's son How sure of ourselves we are how full How certain we are the pinnacle Of consciousness and precious worth Inheritors by divine birth Masters of Geometry Inventors of Philosophy And words... All these hard lines that make us feel safe All these soft curves we want to set straight Nothing is the same as anything else Your parallels underwhelm Identity be but a fraud the charcoal wing of the black swan Groping metaphors for god To simplify is falsify, the blinking of the closing mind Narratives like fairy tales swallowed whole like candy whales Bedtime stories of a frightened child... All these hard lines that make us feel safe All these soft curves we want to set straight Bones in Denial All just to say that you're barely part way Stumbling down your dark hallway First in line in the monkey parade But clear in the rear of the light brigade Forgive us what we are Love what we wanted to be Who rise from flesh to spirit know the fall The word outleaps the world and light is all

"You are the ones who can hear airs. Who can be frightened and encouraged. You can hold things and break them and fix them. I never felt at home here. This is an awful place to be dropped down halfway." -Implementation H From "Galatea 2.2" by Richard Powers

Engineer Oh Mother of Wisdom Oh Father of Light Lord of the Elements Master of Time Power and Vision and Fusion and Fission Bending cruel Nature to abject submission But deep underneath every rational beast The wellspring of sorrow sings The zealot the fascist the racist the freak The breeder the beater the cheater the priest The victim the rapist the sadist the greatest The one that you wish you could borrow their faces But deep underneath every frightened retreat The heart of loneliness beats Irony satire and alienation The protective mask of faux sophistication The gambler the shopper the slave to desire The junkie the puppet the man who starts fires But deep underneath every soul in the street The heart of a human still beats

Graceful Degradation See everything for me

Marcel Another year has passed my love My brain's all scrambled today When they ask I say it's all fine I never know what to say I love you ultimate Ultimate love that's how it's always been A shadow girl following wispy invisible just knowing that you exist Locked in your temple Bring down the universe spread it out over the keys Shuffle through paper Love a sweet panther with no one watching but me Even if you didn't even know me, I'd love you with all my heart Even if you didn't even know me, I'd love you with all my heart