Monday 13/8/01. Its 5.

30 pm & I’m on what is probably my main escape route (Melbourne - Charlton -

Ouyen - Pinnaroo - Morgan – Burra) 5 ks short of Murrayville in Danyo reserve. First stop was Charlton for a
hamburger with the lot at Lou’s. Maria was smiling to herself as I entered as she knew what I was going to
order. I told her that she made the best hamburgers & I was hard to please. When I was eating it she came over
& said : “Have I not lost my touch?” I told her that she hadnt; I knew coz I go all around australia comparing.
When she brought the coffee it had a dollop of real cream in it. She wished me a good trip as I walked out.
Since the Ouyen turnoff these are some of the place names I’ve driven through : Galah, Walpeup, Underbool,
Linga, Boinka. Bought a couple of stubbies at Underbool for the road; wanted a beer & a stout but there was not
a single stubby of stout in the pub (she checked out back) nor a customer in the bar. When I got to Danyo
reserve I thought, fuck it, I’ll go on to Murrayville and get one. So I did & got a Southwark Old Stout &
discovered you can get Southwark Black Ale there too, one of my favourites. Now I’m back at the reserve for
the night. The big thrill is testing out the new sleeping bag that I bought at Target for $60. The old one had
frayed apart so that the stuffing inside was spilling out. Oh yes, the hamburger & coffee at Lou’s was $6 & I
recommend you stop there. Its on the right hand side of the main street as you enter Charlton going north. I can
tell there has been no serious rain here but the ground is covered with a green tinge. Its very springlike : no
cloud in the sky & I can hear the calls of at least a dozen varieties of birds. Am not putting up the mozzie nets :
its going to be a cold night & too dry for them here. A truck roars by occasionally on the highway a kilometre
away. The bible is on the dashboard of the van to deter thieves. A lady at litho house in Nth Melb yesterday
criticized me for using it for that. She said I should be reading it more instead. Along the way I ignored a dead
eastern rosella by the roadside as Helen no longer collects the feathers but I stopped to have a look at a barn owl
somewhere north of Sea Lake.

Tuesday 14/8/01. I’ve had breakfast & am a bit shivery as I write sitting on the back bumper with the
sun just clear of the scrub shining directly at me. The aim of the trip is to clarify a few trains of thought by
writing them down. I want to terminate these incessant discussions I’ve been having with myself for weeks now
– as I ride my bike, as I lie in bed; it doesnt stop even when I’m eating. My interest is not the truth (I leave that
to the owners) but what can be said clearly. The last thing I did before heading off yesterday was to take out the
maps of the Flinders Ranges I had put in the van a few days earlier to replace the maps of western N.S.W. I had
put in before that. Fact is I’m still not sure where I’m going (it could be a metaphor for my life – except that it is
my life). I’ll make up my mind definitely tonight though I reckon it will be Lake Gairdner & the Gawler Range.
I dont want to plan ahead as I want to be open to chance influences & hope that such an attitude helps me be
less structured in the writing. My birthday at the end of the week puts me in a mood to review habits, get rid of
excess baggage. (Kate gave me a stone inkwell & a calligraphy brush; Ben, Dan, and Joe who are all living at
home now wont know about it even though I’ll be giving them this piece of writing which they wont read; my
mum gave me a maroon jumper; Helen gave me the best present I’ve ever got or known anyone else to get : a
foldout booklet she made titled the A-Z of a …z listing all the attributes she claims me to possess which are so
extravagant that they would make a saint blush with embarrassment (I only smirked inwardly)); last week at the
monthly mail-artist meeting in a café in Richmond Lloyd Jones (6/9/01 who is putting on a production on
nothingness & loss of self with a cast of over 20) & Warren Burt (back from lecturing in the US of A and
traipsing around the entire world) sang an aria to a Guisseppe Verdi tune for which they improvised the words
along the lines “His birthday is coming soon; Your birthday is almost here (etc)”; the government of Victoria is
giving me a seniors card which allows me concession rates on trams & trains.) One habit I’ve already rid myself
of is going to galleries (not even the slightest disrespect intended to the two very fine ladies who own galleries
that are on my mailing list). I’ve been going to them because it seemed as good a way of mixing with friends as
any other & I also wanted to support some efforts but I’ve noticed that we always talk crap in that environment
& its influence is so pervasive that we still talk crap in the pub afterwards. However I’ll make an exception for
the show Kate says shes putting on in october. I’ve even considered getting rid of the reading habit but Basalt,
who is reading Montaigne, told me that Montaigne (who read a lot) says that Plato says that we shouldnt read
too much so as not to clutter ourselves up with the memories of others. Then he introduced me to Vasco Popa
who is truly a great poet. Here is an example (from memory hence maybe made up) :

1
 it was the poor who invented sex

so that men with their long iron keys

could open womens copper locks
without paying silver shillings

Then a book I had ordered through Borders ‘Count Julian’ by Juan Goytisolo (Juanita, have you read it?) which
had been recommended to me by Frank Lovece arrived & it turned out a really good read – I knew I was in the
presence of a sophisticated mediterranean. So I’ve brought a book with me on the trip in case of a rainy day :
‘The Shadow of the Sun’, latest by Ryszard Kapuscinski. I’ve read everything Kapuscinski has written (Gyrai!
how about returning my copy of ‘Soccer Wars’) & I take my hat off to him – he was a traveller. However I’ve
discarded (I here put on notice) my self appointed role as literary mentor to several people on the mailing list.
I’ve never met anyone whos read a book that I’ve mentioned but because of that role friends of mine are forever
recommending books for me to read. & I usually do. But I can’t keep up any longer. I quit the job but not
reading altogether. It would be unfair to expect anyone to read my handouts if I didnt read at least a bit (or
pretend to). Its 9.30 am, the sun has risen in the sky & warmed me up & I’m feeling better already. Just about
time for the road. First I have to eat a tomato because there is a fruit fly inspection point a bit further along a
few ks this side of Pinnaroo. Its usually manned during the day. Yair, I am feeling better. I am buoyed by the
thought that what I share in my DNA with the fruit fly & the worm is greater than how much I differ from the
chimp & the gorilla. Recently I read that 30% of my DNA coding is the same as a bananas (Helen who once
summed me up as a ‘low tech high maintenance sort of guy’ would agree). As the bushranger said : when you
live live in clover, coz when youre dead youre dead all over … 3.45. I’m at my spot near Worlds End for the
night. (7/9/01. Lance Morton of Morton Shoes in Ivanhoe is the only person who gets my stuff that knows the
area. He has camped at Worlds End Creek where it runs through Burra Gorge about 5ks from here). The fruit
fly station wasnt manned & there was discarded fruit spilling out of the bin. Bought oranges & tomatoes at
Waikerie the citrus centre of australia. Got 3 stubbies in Morgan where I was told there was real weather being
forecast to arrive tomorrow & last till the weekend. Thats serious because you can’t go into the Lake Gairdner
Gawler Range country in my van if its wet …. I write because I feel a pressure to write & if I succeed in saying
what I want to I feel a sense of physical release. These sensations are as tangible as seeing or hearing but not in
the precise way that can be measured (not yet anyway) so some may not value them. I do. Because of the
release I am inclined to believe that my task (should there be such a thing that I am meant to do) is completed
when I finish a piece of writing. I run off a small number of copies (100 or so) to mail & hand out because I
want at least one other person to hear me (the girl across the road in West Melb says she writes poetry for
herself) but I know that at least several people can hear what I have to say. Thats an enormous privilege for a
writer (for in the transaction the writer is always more privileged than the reader). I dont know if what I say is
of importance. I dont belong to any organization that pays me to lobby nor do I give allegiance to any
identifiable group. Readers of my stuff can be sure that what I write is unauthorized. I know that if anyone is
meant to hear what I say they will. The lack of effort I put into distribution (I enjoy it) & the ease with which it
can be ignored ensures that it can do no harm. If its not heard its not meant to be. With my obligations & my
limitations clearly determined I tread whatever path has been laid for me (if there is one) with a light step. That
its not signposted makes it easier.

Wednesday 15/8/01. 7.50 am. Caught a cockroach in the back of the car. Hardly a trip goes by that I dont
but this was a beauty, a whopper. Turfed him out, lets see how he makes do in the outback. I’m retracing paths,
repeating the same sequence of stops I’ve done many times & described in my handouts at least twice. In the
piece titled ‘14/8/41’ I also bought a hamburger at Lou’s, oranges in Waikerie; later today I’ll be eating pies in
Wirrabara (& writing a letter to Kate (c/o) as I did on a trip earlier this year); tonight I’ll be in Port Germein,
tomorrow I’ll probably be shopping up in Port Augusta. We retrace paths & think that everything is the same as
before but things change by degrees. We reassure each other that we are still who we are, that the essentials are
the same, but we havent noticed that we have all changed together. The van has had its third set of rust holes
filled with fibreglass (by Joe Sayon of Ivanhoe panelbeaters; he did the first set for free). He had to put

2
fibreglass on top of other fibreglass, soon whole chunks of the body will be falling off. It feels good to drive &
has a gutsy, sporty sound : thats because there is a hole in the muffler that would take $200 to fix up.
The demented magpie that used to repeat a single repetitive phrase on the other nights I’ve been here was not in
evidence last night. More surprising is the change in the crows. This spot at Worlds End has always been
characterized by a large & vocal population of them (they can be heard in the background of a piece of
improvised music I did using an instrument put together for me by Graeme Leak that consisted of alto sax
mouthpiece, garden hose, & a plastic funnel.) but theyve been replaced by others that look identical but are a
different species. The ones I am used to & recorded on the tape (an audio account of a trip I did a couple of
years back, titled ‘Impossible Spaces’) were Australian Raven (Corvus coronoides), the ones with the dying call
on the last note, but the ones here now are the Little Crow (Corvus mellori). These are the birds with the very
short nasal note that sounds like a frog croaking & that I’m more used to seeing round the rubbish tips of inland
towns. As I said I’m making changes too. I’m not reading any more philosophers (but never say never as the
politicians say) with the possible exception of Wittgenstein. A few weeks ago I told someone that the purpose of
this trip was to explain in simple language why I’ve made the decision, why I reckon I’m better off at the end of
a pier drinking a stubby or in the outback walking the bush. I may still have a go at a fuller explanation but if I
dont here it is in a nutshell : I suppose philosophers have their purpose seeing as everything does. Probably its
to provide languages for institutions to be able to converse with each other. Institutions, being incorporeal,
cannot communicate by holding hands or looking into each others eyes, or having sex : language is all they
have. Hospitals have to have ethicists to give reasons why they give operating theatre priority to paying
patients; boards of prisons have charters to justify the practices of incarceration; governments have to have
constitutions & bills of rights to safeguard into the future the interests of those who wrote them. It is the job of
the philosophers to provide the jargon & the obscuranticisms to fool ordinary people into believing that the
practices of their institutions are meant to benefit them rather than that they are governed by systemic necessity.
In the increasingly verbal age that we are in they also have a role as social commentators to fill space in
newspapers & on telly. As we become less physical, dominated by our technologies & increasingly subjected to
the procedural requirements of the state that houses them we will babble more & the need for them to justify the
status quo will increase. Thats what they get paid for. & maybe it has to be like that but because I’m not
interested in exercising power I leave them behind. My interest is in who it is that is the subject of the exercise.
& why? You dont get paid for it if youre serious …. 3.50. Had to bypass Wirrabara & give the pies a miss & I
had really organized my stomach for a steak & kidney & had promised Helen to have one for her too, a steak &
pepper. I know the pastrycook is overweight & I thought I overheard mention of a heart condition last time. I’ll
keep my fingers crossed for him. What happened was that as I pulled off the road just past Jamestown to read
the map I stalled the engine & it wouldnt start again. The RAA got me going & suggested the bushes on the
starter motor were worn. The van has done 250,000 ks so anything could be wrong. Right now I’m in Port Pirie
at Coe’s Automotive Electrics while the motor, which has been taken out, is being inspected. I’ve been here
since about 1.30 while other possible causes were eliminated. Spent part of the time writing the letter to Kate
(c/o) : wanted to make clear why she shouldnt take what I say more seriously than it merits. I’ve been in Port
Pirie before & since then I always avoid it. Walking about round here confirms my prejudice. The change
predicted by the Morgan publican hasnt arrived but there is a strong northerly blowing & clouds are building up
…. Got to Port Germein at 6.00. The foreshore street was lit up by the sunset while the southern sky is dark with
clouds. Faced the back of the van into the setting sun for dinner. In the end I’m glad the electrical work got
done. I was very impressed with the guy doing it. It cost $145 & he gives a years warranty. He said he couldnt
find what was wrong so he checked & renewed everything he could. He says he doesnt get his jobs come back.
He suggested I might have tried to start it while it was still rolling after I stalled it. Something can jam & to
unjam it you put it into 4th gear & rock the car. I like to think that it happened so he got the opportunity to
thoroughly check the electrics before I got into station country. Had a pot of beer in the pub so as to watch the
weather on the news. Its not a good outlook at all. I might be forced to drive along the Eyre Peninsula so as to
stick to a sealed road which would take me into bigger rain in the south. Picked up a couple of stubbies before
ringing H. Ben answered the phone. Hes liking the driving lessons. Helen got her pay increment that she
thought she wouldnt. Dan was in a fashion spread in the weekend issue of the Herald Sun. He hadnt told her &
if she hadnt come across it by chance she would have missed it. Time to turn out the lights & crack a stubby of

3
Coopers. Not looking to bed tonight as its pretty warm & my new sleeping bag is much too hot. I will have to
get another lightweight one when I get back before we go off on H’s holidays.

Thursday 16/8/01. 11.30am. I’ve propped in Port Germein. The change still hasnt arrived. I wouldnt be
feeling good driving west (drinking a stubby bought at Iron Knob) into the Gawler Ranges with a big
northeasterly behind me into a threatening band of cloud on the horizon. Its very comfortable here. I’m in the
historic railway shed at the end of the pier on the corner of Esplanade & High st.. Not sure where the time has
gone, I seem to hardly have done anything. Read the paper, walked to the end of the pier. As I leant forward
sitting on the toilet across the road from the shed I was looking at the initials AZ carved on the back of the door
in front of my nose. So … there are others. The shed gives terrific protection from the wind whichever side it
blows from. I slept in my usual spot on the beach a couple of ks to the north.
Might as well launch into the big topic, the one I’ve been talking about to myself for weeks. It started
when Frank Lovece ran off chapters 11 & 12 from a book called ‘Potentialities’ by Giorgio Agamben for me to
read. It led me to buy two books of essays by Heidegger : ‘Poetry, Language, Thought’ & ‘The Question
Concerning Technology’ which I’ve since given to Frank to keep having read only the essay on Nietzsche &
half of ‘The Question …’ Perhaps they were meant for Frank from the start. The chapters by Agamben are a
discussion of Heideggers notion of facticity & together with the tiny amount that I’ve now read by Heidegger
himself (his combined works in english are going to run to 100 volumes) & some other commentary on his
thought by his translators they helped convince me that I’ve finished with philosophers. Exactly how I’m not
sure, especially as Heidegger broaches the same topics as I do. Perhaps its to do with his use of the capital when
he writes the word Being. You have to make your mind up on these things early otherwise, especially in his
case, you commit yourself to a lot of reading. More about the capital B later. Now I want to quote from the 1st
page of ch. 13 of Agambens book which I read only because it happened to be on the back of the end of the 12th.
(Its the Aby Warburg method who says first you go to the relevant section, locate the book youve been looking
for, but pick the one next to it). Agamben is quoting from the second chapter of the talmudic treatise Hagigah
(literally “Offering”) which considers those matters it is permitted to study & those that must not in any case
become objects of investigation. The Mishnah with which the chapter opens reads as follows :
“Forbidden relationships must not be explained in the presence of three (people); the work of creation
must not be explained in the presence of two (people); the Chariot (merkebah, the chariot of Ezekiel’s vision,
which is the symbol of mystical knowledge) must not be explained in the presence of one, unless he is a sage
who already knows it on his own. It is better never to be born than to be someone who investigates into the four
things. The four things are : what is above; what is below; what is first; and what is after (that is, the object of
mystical knowledge, but also metaphysical knowledge, which claims to study the supernatural origin of
things.)”
The bracketed comments in the quotation are Agambens. I sense that Heidegger breaches the above
injunction & guess that Agambens purpose in the rest of the chapter will be to show that he doesnt or is justified
in doing it. I want to explain why the injunction must not be disobeyed. My struggle in recent weeks has been to
come to a decision whether or not I am already violating it by making the explanation. It is only now that I am
convinced that I do not that I give it. The wind has turned cold & is blowing a gale from the southwest. I’ve
shifted into the lounge of the Port Germein Hotel where I make the comments with the aid of a stubby of
Coopers Sparkling Ale held in a holder made from silvered cardboard supplied by Nasco Broadacre Spraying
Service (ACSASA) PH : 0886672371 MOB : 0427 672 371.
It must be understood from the outset that every word we use (even the most abstract eg. human nature
etc.) is a set of instructions for actions to be performed. Plain simple actions performed by the hands, feet, eyes,
mouths of people. Its by agreeing from the outset which actions a word represents that we learn it. The same
word can represent different actions in different groups depending on how it was learnt. The great power of
science resides in an agreement by everyone how to use words in minute exactness. By rearranging very
precisely we can build wonderful structures to amuse ourselves with or serve our needs. In this I think
Heidegger is right : science is an extension of technology not the other way round. For a fuller commentary on
how words work see my story ‘14/8/41’. The written, spoken, imagined words, the codes stored in the neural
structures are only the algorithms for the complex actions they represent. There is a tendency to think of words
as having ghostly partners called meanings. Its easy to confuse the algorithm in our imagination with what it

4
stands for especially as algorithms can refer to other algorithms & so on. Nevertheless all words can be pared
down to the action they represent. That is their meaning & its as solid as sticks & stones. To find out the
meaning of a word you dont have to look for some ghostly double behind it – simply look at its usage. The
usage is the meaning. If you want to be a scientist remember that the usage consists of many precise moves &
busy arrangements (too many to be remembered so they have to be listed in books) so be prepared to put your
glasses on & devote the rest of your life to it. In literature, poetry & particularly religion its much easier – the
moves are bigger. (I’ve bought a 2nd stubby at $4.80 each. There has been no beer on tap as the power has been
out. Now even the power for the lights has gone so I have to shift next to the window. Outside it is raining.
There are two guys at the bar : a young koori who is also drinking a stubby & an old codger drinking port from
a beer glass. He recommends it at $2.10).
To answer the question why it is that we must not study (or investigate, or explain, or describe, or
examine) mystical knowledge we have to consider what it is that we do when we study – the action of the word.
If you study something you put it in the palm of your hand, knit your brows, & stare at it. Maybe you have to
put on your glasses. Or even use a microscope or an electron microscope. Or if its something big you break a
piece off & if its a rock you might crush it up to see what kind of powder it makes & if it tastes salty. Or you
divide it into sections & do a sampling exercise on each & record the results in a book for future reference. Or if
youre explaining it you take it apart & then reassemble it. Or you take it apart & show how it can be assembled
differently. If its to a child you do it very slowly, over & over while holding the kids hand. Or if you find it on
the ground you get a stick & spread it out & count the pips. Or if you examine you ask questions for the
required answers. When you study something you always (there are no exceptions) put it into a subordinate
relationship to yourself. (3/9/01. When we get around to cloning people we will be placing them in a
subordinate relationship to us too). (4/9/01. I am the result of a chance channelling of parental genes but if I was
a clone & was overwhelmed by lifes misfortunes I would know who to pay back for their calm calculation). You
push it far enough from your face to focus properly. You are the observer, the active party. What you study is
passive, it can be taken apart. If it were the case that we are a single creature (that individual people are
analogous to the cells of the creature humanity (see story ‘13/2/01 –26/2/01’)) & if the mystical knowledge
being referred to in the Hagigah is knowledge of it then it is obvious that we cannot study it. We can never bring
that of which we are only a part into the required relationship. The seeing eye cannot see itself. It may be,
friends, that some of you havent noticed that we are part of a single creature & so the issue doesnt arise for you.
But I know.
($4.80 for a stubby of Coopers to drink in the pub & $2.30 to take away ie. $2.50 for the privilege of
drinking it here = $5.00 extra to write it here than it would have been if I’d stayed in the shed) (6.30 Helen,
youll be interested to know that I got the mozzie nets up all by myself in a howling gale – but it took 10
minutes). (For the general reader : even in these conditions the inside of the car heats up from body heat & if the
wind drops overnight the mozzies zoom in guided by infra-red radar) (I love going to bed when the van is being
rocked by the wind.)

Friday 17/8/01. 7.50. Staying here. It didnt rain much yesterday & I’d be surprised if theres been
enough to settle the dust out west but its bloody cold, windy & cloudy so I might as well sit in the car writing.
As you would expect from someone whos written over 100 volumes (how did he and Hannah find time to do
it?) Heidegger would have us believe that language is our special compact with being with a capital B. The
bible seems to give support when it claims that the word with a capital W started it all. I dont know if Heidegger
draws on it. If it were so then those who dance, or labour in the fields, or carry heavy burdens, or are deaf &
dumb, or are less articulate, or stutter, or are insane, & all of those who suffer in silence would be relegated to
lesser roles in the grand design. & Heidegger did indeed see the world divided into a small inspired elite of
which he was an honorary member (Hannah Arendt must have bought all this for awhile) & the rest just making
up the numbers. In this he was like Nietzsche. I suggest that what we can certainly say about language is that it
is responsible for science, literature & religion. Increasingly, also, it is needed to regulate an overpopulated &
over exploited globe as institutions can communicate no other way. Hence it is the route to money & power. Its
with the above qualifications that I encumber my own efforts to write. I continue on.
If I were to fully answer the question who am I I would have to write down my DNA sequence, list the
books I’ve read, the friends I’ve talked to & what we said, the things I’ve written, describe the swamps I’ve

5
waded, rivers I’ve swum, the roads I’ve driven … and it goes on & on (you might get a better idea just from
seeing me because its all got written into the lines on my face – hence the photo on the cover). I would have to
tell you the things I’ve imagined & all the things I’ve forgotten. Its an awkward picture. It would fill more
books than you can fit in a library (unless it were Borges’ infinite one) & its still going on. To the state I am
simply known by my surname & two first names (though it has quite a bit of info in data banks of various
agencies & especially in a central one in Canberra). The name the state knows me by says hardly anything about
me but its purpose is to allow it to locate me so as to be able to punish me if I dont pay my taxes or if I betray its
secrets. In the future when we have chips implanted in us at birth it will no longer require us to register names.
Be patient, I’m getting around to making a comment on Heideggers being with a capital B. If I were to describe
the large animal (creature) humanity that I am a part of I would have to get each member to give a similar list
(unending) that I give. All the roads everyones travelled. Even Borges’ library might not fit it. But if it did it still
would not be an adequate description because its all in bits & the whole is different & greater (unimaginably
greater) than the sum of the parts. But Heidegger believes that he can put a label to the essence (a word he uses
a lot) not just of the human animal but to all things – the entirety. Then he spends a hundred books explaining
how the algorithm works. Its an ambitious project.
What is he doing when he uses the capital (capita : head in latin) & is it fair for me to comment on it
without having read him ? (a guy just drove out of the local caravan park in a van the size of a bus pulling a
trailer with a shiny city type 4x4 on it; a steady stream of tourists, Brits on Wheels etc. come through sometimes
doing the rounds of a block or two; I dont think there is much here for them).
Language is a sharing (coordination, synchronization) of actions. It has to be a sharing because it cant be
learnt otherwise. Thats why a private language is not possible. It may be Heidegger gives explanations (in terms
of shared meanings) for an unusual use of the capital but if that were the case he would not need to use it as the
reader would have to have read the explanation in the first place & that would make it redundant (esp. in
Heideggers case as you would have to read a lot). When we make use of conventions in language we are often
unaware of what we are doing. They are learnt from childhood & taught to us by the previous generation who
learnt them from theirs. Conventions are actions (practices) that were learnt so long ago that we perform them
on automatic. They are a physical memory (in the things we do), as is language itself, & only their abandonment
is a forgetting. So what do we do when we use a capital? The most important thing is that we particularize. We
locate it in space in relation to other things. Expect to see a capital letter at the start of a sentence. We write the
names of capital cities in upper case so when we instruct the cruise missile all we have to do is type it in & it
can retrieve the exact coordinates from its data bank. The state has my name on file as I’ve already explained to
be able to assert its power over me if necessary. We name things so we can hold them in the palm of our hand to
gloat over, to own, to buy & sell. You cannot trade in things that dont have names. To sum up, when he writes
being with a capital B Heidegger is attempting to commodify it. By naming it he asserts an ownership for which
he is the broker (the price of access being the reading of his books; he gains membership of a group called
philosophers; he is paid by the uni.) & in his case he nominates an extremely high value : for another use of
naming it is to be able to place it in a list or hierarchy. In a list where all the others are in a lower key the
capitalized one is placed at the top. I dont buy it – my job is to cut if off. To find gods secret name is to gain
power over him. When you are on first name terms with him you can converse with him. I think it would be
pretty scary. I am inclined to write the word god with a small g & look for him among (or reflected in) the
myriad lower case inhabitants of a strangely beautiful world. Tomorrow I’m heading for Lake Gairdner.

Saturday 18/8/01. This is how you get here : from Port Germein drive 66ks to Port Augusta where you
can shop up in the Coles supermarket (I had to throw out tomatoes I had bought in Waikerie); go out the other
side of Port Augusta & where the highway forks dont take the right hand one, thats the Stuart & it takes you to
Woomera & eventually Darwin & to the spots I’ve done a couple of articles about on the east side of Lake
Gairdner (see ‘14/8/41’ & ‘7/4/01 – 18/4/01’); take the left fork which is the Eyre Hwy & takes you across the
Nullarbor (nul arbor : no tree in latin) plain to Perth but dont go that far; instead stop at Iron Knob 68ks down
the road to make sure your tank is full of petrol coz youll need plenty, also dont expect to get a couple of
stubbies for the road at the petrol station as they no longer sell grog & if youre too early you wont get them at
the pub because it will be closed; just after Iron Knob take a dirt road to the right that goes to Kingoonia 350ks
away to the north & remember that Mt. Ive station, 130ks along is the only place you can get petrol in the

6
surrounding country; about 25ks past Mt Ive youll see the turnoff on the left to Yardea Station but keep going
for another 3ks till you cross over a salt creek; about ½ k further there is a track on the right that you might not
see if youre not paying attention except that at the moment its indicated by a muffler standing on end next to it
& tyre marks into it; turn into the track if you have permission from Yardea (about 60ks away) as youre crossing
their property for the next 3ks till you get to the edge of the lake which is national park. If youve done it right
your speedometer should show 161ks from Iron Knob. I was disappointed to see the muffler & the tyre marks &
half expected to find someone here. The push of vehicles into isolated spots is relentless. If you find a good spot
make quick use of it because I’ve known many beaut spots that were spoilt a few years later by being
discovered by tourists. For the first time here I find tyre marks on the salt of the lake surface. Its a fucken crime.
Anyway I’m under the same tree next to the shore that I was under last time when I wrote a series of 4 poems
called : Room, House, City, Masks, & the time before when I took the photos (200) & wrote the 7 short pieces
that went to make up an album called ‘Meditation on Lake Gairdner’. Incidentally , if youre one of the kind of
people that is prepared to drive hundreds of ks for the most fantastic sunsets youve ever seen (& you may not
get them if its not cloudy) this is the spot. Tomorrow is my birthday & I cant think of a better place to spend it. I
want to press on with the discussion. Solitude contributes to clarity. But heres one for the schoolkids first : my
daughter Kates birthday was 1 week ago. When I was 4 times as old as her she was 1/3 her present age. How
old will she be on my birthday if I live to be 3 times as old as she is? As for me I’m rather surprised to have
reached the age I have – I never expected it. I am not burdened by reputation or authority so I dont have to
maintain a dignified posture or proud demeanour. I dont have to cultivate a firm handshake or look into a
camera with a steely gaze like someone you would entrust to be the bearer of important truths or patriotic
virtues. I am what I am & I dont know what that is. I continue to report my observations. The value of what I
write is to be judged not by who endorses it but by its internal coherence. It has to stand on its own feet.
Continuing on with comments on the Mishnah quoted by Agamben. Though the circumstances in which
mystical knowledge cannot be discussed that I outlined a couple of days ago apply to the Mishnah I very much
doubt if Agamben is correct in using the term mystical knowledge, and even less so, metaphysical knowledge,
to characterize what is being said there. I suspect Agambens language is a later, even modern imposition on the
original much simpler meaning. My reading of it is that there are things that cannot be spoken about, that are
outside language, & therefore outside understanding or knowledge. To act as if we know everything is to
commit the sin of hubris. I have no trouble accepting it. But modern people who are infatuated by the
achievements of science may feel challenged or even outraged by it. They may find it necessary to deny
evidence of it in themselves by suppressing those parts of their nature which defy explanation. However I do
not believe that the unknowable (the unspeakable) is a species of knowledge called mystical knowledge that is
owned by a privileged minority. I have been told that I deal in mystical knowledge myself. The opposite is the
case. I describe things I know with my senses in plain language so others are made aware of them. The term
mystical is of greek origin where it referred to the occult or magical doings. These used to be the privileged
domain of the priestly caste that administered the temples. In egypt too (& perhaps in most religions then &
now) the knowledge of the temple priests was secret. There were statues in egyptian temples that were placed
against walls in such a way that a priest could go through a passage into the back of the statue & speak into a
hollow that led to its mouth that made it appear to be a talking statue. Tricks of the trade had to be guarded –
hence the origin of the modern notion of mystical knowledge. If we want to know what a word means we look
at what we do (the action) when we use it – that is its whole meaning. What we certainly do when we say
‘mystical knowledge’ is we divide into the few who know & the many who dont. Buddhists have a tradition of
masters & students. The student may ask a question like what is truth (admittedly a silly one) & the master
might then clap 3 times (with one hand) & slap him on the face & suddenly the student gets enlightened, so the
master gives him a certificate (the chinese are big on certificates). Thats mystical knowledge for you; and
metaphysical knowledge is worse.

When the student is ready the master arrives

(Zen saying)
A good student finds out that he was a student only afterwards
A good teacher never does
(Sayings of a…z)

7
The other thing we do when we use the term ‘mystical knowledge’ is encourage bowing by those who dont have
it & the wearing of fancy clothes (esp. drag) by those who do (magicians wore cloaks with stars & crescent
moon designs). I notice too that owners of it protect their knowledgeable heads with very ornate hats.

Sunday 19/8/01.
I am a flea in the fold of a camels ear. I listen to the talk of merchants & camel hands. We travel
by night guided by stars. We have stopped at a caravanserai called earth. The merchants exchange fine
carpets for jade, worked silver for gunpowder, incense for silks. They have been travelling so long that
some of them no longer remember the cities of their birth or the wives & children they left behind.
Rumour has it that the cities are buried in sand & the wives have aged or left. Some say that if we were to
return even if the cities were still there & the wives were washing at the same fountains the merchants
wouldnt recognize them because they themselves have changed. They have become used to dancing girls
with seductive glances, the soft music of eunuchs, plush carpets in sumptuous halls. One of their number
overcome by nostalgia turned around his camels laden with the rewards of his enterprise determined to
return to the hanging gardens of his youth. We never saw him again but a beggar at the gate tells a story
that he says he heard from the mouth of one of the brigands that caught up with him in a bleak desert &
cut him down. He says (some say the beggar was one of the ones standing around) that as the merchant
sat on the ground leaning forward among the rolls of silk & spices scattered about from a fallen camel,
supporting himself with a jewelled hand in the sand while the other clutched his neck to staunch the
blood gushing through his fingers, his last words were : “In this desolation these silks & these jewelled
hands look strangely beautiful.”

2.10. I wrote that in Port Germein the day before yesterday & liked it so much that I wanted to have it as
the only entry for today to highlight it. My writing is not normally that contrived. But its early arvo & I’ve
returned from a 4 ½ hour walk so I’m back into it. Last night I listened to the Collingwood/Essendon match on
a station with a lot of interference while I finished off the ½ dozen stubbies of Coopers I had brought with me.
After the game I stood outside craning my neck back as far as I could with my mouth open staring at a typically
brilliant outback sky, palms facing up, exclaiming : I am nothing! I am abject! I worship you! I have no will!
There is nothing I want! There is nothing I ask! I dont even ask for guidance there is nowhere I want to go! I
dont exist, I am sand, I am grass! I am yours! … I was drunk of course but I behave that way anyway. A starry
desert sky affects me. Those whove read my other pieces know that already. Why do I make a point of giving an
account? The reason is that I felt some reluctance to in case readers thought I was crazy. Whenever I detect an
internal censor I make a point of disregarding it. I do that because I suspect that the internalised censors are my
knowledge that there are actually real people out there, arbiters of social & moral codes , who would stop me
speaking if they could. I suspect that these real censors patrol the boundaries of what is & what is not allowed to
be said between people with the purpose of widening the distances so that they can profit by brokering silence.
If people think that they are alone in what they perceive & do they can be intimidated. (27/8/01. Tumby Bay.
The internal censors, each of which is a representative of an external lobby group, sit in session in the house of
conscience which is essential in social creatures. Some of the internal censors may need to be retired due to old
age, incompetence, or corruption of the external lobbies they represent. The lobby groups are easy to examine
because they are our neighbours. Attentive readers will know that the internal & external are not separate – you
can’t reject one without the other; they are inextricably joined in that they are wired into our nervous system
through practices : admonitions & rewards). I know that the thought crossed my mind : who was I talking to? :
the great being, the universe, the night, destiny, the stars? I was looking at the stars & left it at that. Do I give
comfort to others who behave likewise? Well no you might say, we dont carry on like you do. But I’m not so
sure. If you were here entirely by yourself with the nearest homestead a days walk away, you just might. If youd
done the things I’ve done & had the experiences I’ve had you certainly would. But then youd be me. Come to
think if it there used to be a song to the words : “I talk to the stars but they dont answer me” – See! I dont get
answered either.
An extraordinary thing happened this morning. I casually glanced at the lake as I was having a piss to
start the day & realized I was by an inland sea. It had filled! Crept up silently overnight from where I could see

8
water in the far distance yesterday to within 25 metres of the shore just nearby. Now its receding again. Strange
things happen when youre alone. It means I wont be doing much walking on the salt surface except very close
to shore & that can be soggy too. I left for a stroll at 9.00 heading for a range of hills that would give me a
comprehensive view. Got caught by a rain front coming through that looked mighty impressive in the distance
when I saw it approaching over hills & plains from the top of the bare mountain I was on but all it brought was
light drizzle & I had my rainshell. Heard a few desert bellbirds. Passed a couple of quondong trees laden with
unripe green berries. Followed a creek bed out of the hills through plain into the lake & came back along the
shore. Saw trail bike tyre marks crisscrossing. Quite a few in parts. Thats new. I havent got the powers of
expression to say how sorry & deflated I feel to see it. There must have been a whole party of people here. What
is gained by damaging the surface like that? I predicted over a year ago to the Andrews (at Mt. Ive) that in the
very near future a trail bike enthusiast will discover the two most convenient access routes on this side of the
lake & if that info gets into the printed material that circulates among the clubs theyll be down here in droves
overnight. To ride on the surface of the lake isnt even a test of skill. I feel the same about tyre marks on beaches.
I go a long way to avoid it. But the triumphal march of technology is relentless. The sight of tyre marks made
me wonder if I do share similar experiences & sensibilities with others as I like to imagine that I do. I feel a
physical change, a generalized discomfort, when I see natural beauty needlessly spoilt. I get a huge lift (am
adrenalized) by the sight of unspoilt rolling hills in evening sunlight. It makes a very big difference to me if a
road cuts straight through a landscape or follows the contours. If its bitumen or gravel. If its overhung by trees
or flanked by powerlines. These are senses clearly felt in the body. They are the vague senses which are all the
more pervasive for not being measurable. There are many of them including dreams. There are senses in the
joints(some people detect falling air pressure), in the groin, in the belly (irritable bowel). There are the ones
which we report with words like unease, disquiet, uncanny, premonition, déjà vu. The words we use to describe
the normal emotional life like guilt, apprehension, elation, ecstasy are also the reporting of what we sense.
Many of the vague senses are felt in the stomach & chest region but also across the shoulders & elsewhere. I
know that in sexual & certain trance like experiences I can detect a distinct, what feels like, chemical flooding
(or in stages) taking place in the brain. In other experiences the whole nervous system seems to get involved.
What I am wondering when I see the disregard for beauty that the tyre marks demonstrate is whether some of us
are suppressing or losing our generalized senses. Is it that because we dont know how to measure them but we
do think we can accurately measure (though its not true) seeing, hearing, taste (ie. the 6 or whatever senses that
can be specifically accounted for by individual organs) we are increasingly favouring the precise (narrow band)
senses? Have we become so impressed with what number can do that we are devaluing & losing what we
cannot add up? Are we losing our sense of beauty?

Monday 20/8/01. 8.15. By sunset yesterday the water had receded to the horizon almost out of sight.
This morning the sea is back. Here is my theory : the salt surface of the lake is almost dead flat (many years ago
Donald Cambell snr. made an attempt on the world land speed record here) but there must be a slight gradient,
maybe only a couple of centimetres in this direction ie. it is the lower end. The sea is quite illusory as the water
only just covers the surface. Weve been having continuous strong south westerlies the entire two days I’ve been
here but at night the wind drops (wind is powered by solar energy) right away. During the day the water is
blown to the other side of the lake, at night it flows back …. Its drizzling as it did during the night so I am going
to wait awhile hoping the clouds break up. Its an opportunity to respond to comments that have been made to
me by a couple of people whove felt that I’ve been disrespectful to philosophers. Their point is that we need
specialists in the same way that a mechanic needs specialist knowledge to understand the inside of cars. I agree
provided the specialists stick to their specialities which in the case of philosophers is usually to provide the
jargon to fool the people so that society can run smoothly (I think from memory Lao Tzu/Te Ching corroborates
the need for it). But the areas I write about are common to everyone. It doesnt take a specialist to be born, to
die, to be amazed by the night sky, to make love, to be lonely, to pray. I write about areas that are the exact
opposite to specialties, that are shared property. I want to be understood by the butcher, the baker & the
candlestick maker more than by philosophers. I would like to be able to talk in large metaphors that speak to
anyone & are easily translatable into other languages. And example would be the language of the bible (& other
books) for instance. When the great prophet says “in my fathers mansion there are many rooms” it translates
easily into any language where there are some large houses. But even in africa where the grass huts have only a

9
single room you could translate : “in my fathers village there are many huts” or in the arctic : “in my fathers
hunting camp there are many igloos”. It applies to the ‘poems’ I put out which I think of more as statements or
observations not as traditional poetry. People that we call poets are usually infatuated with the beauty of their
particular language & are happy to embroider nuances of feeling or esoteric & very individual perceptions.
Hence they dont translate well. My admiration for Vasco Popa is that he often breaks the stereotype. When he
gets right into the serb mythologising though he loses me. I think the reason why some people believe that
knowledge should take a specialized effort is because science, which is a very precise & complex arranging &
rearranging, works that way. We tend to use it as a measure of all things because of its success in achieving
particular kinds of outcomes. My interest is the opposite. I am interested in things that shimmer, that are born,
that flow & swirl, that join together & dance, that disintegrate & disperse, that die. I am interested in the large
actions that underlie the particularities of language. I think Bertrand Russell couldnt understand Wittgenstein
because his imagination could only cope with complexity. Its quite easy to reduce language to basic usage, just
look around, but for complicated minds the simplest things can be the hardest to see. Its 9.45, putting on the
neck muff, putting in the 3 oranges, going for a stroll – south west…. 2.15. Got back at 1.30. Followed the creek
then came back in a direct line. As I was crossing the road a van drove by; mention it because apart from a truck
that I passed parked on the road it is the only vehicle I’ve seen since turning off at Iron Knob. I notice in the
small memo notebook I keep in the glovebox Helens written a few poems. She must have done it on our last trip
& forgotten - she doesnt value what she does :

the stones speak

of the immensity of time
the long stately dance
of continents
convulsive fire
water’s patience
the gnawing teeth
of ice and wind
of being born and born
and born again
into this pebble in the creek
this glinting grain
of sand

and heres a beauty :

galah
not a good name
for a bird so
pink and grey and
bright
and beautiful

Returning to the topic. What are we doing when we say good/bad? The thing I know for certain that we
always do is divide into two. Since it can be applied to almost any situation its a very basic distinction important
in discussion of moral issues. We tip out the apples & put all the shiny ones in one pile & the wormy ones in
another. Then we throw out or push away the bad ones & draw the good ones into our sack. Thats the action of
it – its basic meaning. We do the same with people : surround ourselves with the good ones & push away or
avoid the bad. Love/hate are refinements of the basic move but when we love we try to get right inside or we try
to eat up or consume (get the other inside), to digest each other. (Melbournes very own philosopher, Raymond
Gaita can do much finer distinctions eg. distinguish between authentic & inauthentic love) (While on
philosophers, Peter Singer is of course perfectly correct in the paper that he has written arguing that you cannot
logically (logos : word in greek) show that people shouldnt copulate with animals. Thats because you can’t

10
show hardly anything is necessarily so in language except in mathematics ( and I doubt that too for if they are
systems of tautologies how come the end of a string of statements is different to the start ie. wherein lies the
difference?) We know (& it can change) not to copulate with animals for reasons outside language (where most
of our activity is) in exactly the same way a dog knows not to screw a wombat or bandicoot or person (unless its
a drovers dog)) ( 28/8/01. Lucky Bay. Putting it another way : anyone who needs logical reasons is in serious
trouble even if he does find them). The division I’ve described is about all that I personally feel confident I
know.

We can know what is good for us

But we cannot know what we are good for
(Sayings of a…z)

When we say it with the emphasis we do as in good/evil it means we hand over the decision of who goes into
which pile to priests. When we say criminal/lawful its to the state. When weekend tabloids write articles with
titles like ‘The Face of Evil’ & I see a photo of some old man who is said to have raped & murdered children I
look real hard as I would like to know how to recognize the type so as to keep them away from children (or on
highways maybe from waving me down & shooting me) but all I see is the face of an ordinary looking old man.
But it makes good copy as religious people see something like the eyes of a demon peering out. & if the article
is ‘The Face of Charity’ they probably see hints of an angelic glow (Raymond Gaita claims he can) in the nuns
features. I get about in my travels & I’ve never seen an angel or a demon so I dont know how to recognize the
look. What I do know is that I want to push away those who hurt others to where they can’t. In the lords prayer I
interpret the sentence protect us from evil to mean simply protect us from all those things we try to push away.
(I have my own interpretation of the word god in the commandment too). I feel uncomfortable about the way
priests say good/evil. I suspect they are bullshitting. I bet there are any numbers of rabbis who advocate blowing
up palestinians because they are evil terrorists & any number of mullahs who rejoice when children get blown
up in restaurants because they are jewish devils. I am not good at devils & my literary career as hagiographer is
also over. I find it difficult to give advice on moral issues to my own kids (& in fact dont) as I have trouble
finding guiding principles : everything is so complicated, & each case is unique. In those cases where I know
the answer its so obvious that everyone else also does. Usually it is dont hurt people & try to answer cries for
help. (The water is gone again. Theory 2 : the salt crust expands a bit & lifts with the warmth of the day leaving
a gap between it & the mud underneath into which the water drains through tiny holes) (6.00. Walked for a
couple of hours to a point where I could better investigate whats with the water – back to the first theory. Picked
up an old but intact .303 bullet on the track that would have been quite easy to drive over or step on in the dark)

Tuesday 21/8/01. I am sitting on the box on a still morning (9.00) warmed by the sun. What a difference
it makes! I’ve been forced to do most of the writing inside the car. Earlier I examined the edge of the water in
the lake which unlike the previous mornings was still over 100 yards away, but creeping in silently. The reason
for the difference is that the wind was stronger yesterday & didnt drop till well into the night. I’ve set alight my
rubbish in a hole in the ground. Later when its cooled down I’ll pick out the sardine tins & silver paper to take
out of the area. I’ll be moving to a new spot when I stop writing. Tonight in Melbourne at the Make It Up Club
John Grant will do one of his improvisations on the keyboard for my birthday which gives me an excuse to give
it a plug. Yes! At the Make It Up Club. The best in freeformance-improvised music. Local, national &
international new & old school, electro & acoustic, rock & turntable counter-revolutionary-extreme-noise-
pleasure. Every Tuesday Night @ 8.30 PM !! Upstairs @ The Planet Café 386-388 Brunswick St. Fitzroy. Ph
9417 – 1389. Enquiries : Ph/Fax 039480 – 0056. Makeitupclub @ yahoo.co. uk.http://go.to/makeitupclub and
guess what, so you wouldnt get the impression its behind the times the Make It Up Club has a brand spanking
new website. Includes : Artist info, Video, and Chat. Wow. & more … www.makeitupclub.com But seriously
folks, it is the very best venue for improvised music that you can hear played on a regular basis in Melbourne.
Great musicians some with international reputations and even better ones without can be regularly heard
playing to tiny but discerning audiences which they sometimes outnumber for only $7/$5. For this negligible
price in surroundings exuding ambience you can take in names like Tim O’Dwyer, Ren Walters, Dave Tolley
(who one day may do an improvisation in memory of Joseph EPE Jamhambon), Mark Shepherd, David Brown

11
(my favourite) (6/9/01. CD launch tomorrow), Mark (can’t remember your other name, mate) (6/9/01.
Finsterer), Warren Burt (who has not yet promised to do a major composition dedicated to Joseph EPE
Jamhambon), Unamunos Quorum (watch for their new CD), the inimitable & sometimes hugely loud Tom Fryer
(6/9/01. off to europe again : Amsterdam, Berlin, sweden & those kind of places), including of course John
Grant himself, who is FRAZZLE (synth threesome) & whom I wont be able to hear do his thing for me tonight
because I am right here & I had to make do on my birthday & the other mornings I’ve been here with a couple
of very minor twitterings well before dawn by a pair of singing honeyeaters (Lichenostomus virescens) one of
whom came to the acacia that overhangs the van while I was lying in bed & gave the old rust heap a very
careful inspection. I had better tell you who Joseph EPE Jamhambon is. He is the man who signed the dozen or
so etchings in the sandstone on the shore of Iron Cove just outside the walls of what used to be the Asylum for
the insane in Rozelle, Sydney. That is the name under several of the etchings, which range in width from 3 – 6
ft., some of which are dated 1889. No one knows who the name belongs to & presumably it is made up by a
former inmate of the Asylum. The etchings are of ships, what looks like an air balloon, pentagrams & various
other symbols. They resonated more deeply than anything I’ve seen in a gallery. No one values them, people
walk on them, one day theyll wear away. But it will take a while as theyve been there over 100 years already.
There is no border erected to protect them or plaque explaining their significance because they were carved by a
madman. Maybe its best like that. Members of asylums dont belong to the same world as the lobby groups do.
They belong in its reverse, if anywhere. I have photographed the etchings & Helen made up an album-book of
the photos & five poems she wrote in honour of asylums & their inmates. I would like to fix his name in the
joint memory & encourage others to contribute to the project. Not because Joseph EPE Jamhambon asked for it
(but he did give the name) but because we should. Here is Helens keynote poem from the album :

In 1889
Joseph EPE Jamhambon,
stranded on the shores of Bedlam,
carved himself a graceful ship of stone
and intricate stars
to navigate by,
and in his spiralling mind
launched himself away from the iron cove
into the boundless sea

pray for him

that he found a true course,
a clean wind
and a landfall somewhere that he felt was home.

3.15. The meter is reading 210ks since leaving Iron Knob. I’m on the road that goes past Yardea station, about
10ks west of the homestead. Its a nice spot behind some scrub only a couple of hundred yards off the road.
There is a rocky fold in the hill nearby from which a creek starts. Like all creeks here if flows only during heavy
rain. I climbed up the hill & walked along the top from where I could see the station track me & H went up for
about 5ks to spend the night (& guess what, honey, I could even see the dam I took a foto of you in) after
getting permission at the homestead. That was a few years ago. As I knocked on the door of what was a kitchen
or living room I could hear the radio going & the ball was just about to be bounced for the A.F.L. grand final. It
was the year the Crows beat the Kangaroos for their first grand final victory ever. The owner came out looking
flustered & when I asked for permission to drive off the road onto his station tracks he waved his hand & said :
“anywhere, anywhere” & ducked back inside. If he ever catches me on his property I’ll remind him…. 4.50. the
gauge reads 251. That includes a few ks inspecting side tracks off the road. There are heaps of good places to
camp. I’m parked for the night at a spot next to a creek I’ve stopped at before for several days with H. (thats
where you were knackered from walking all day & we found the only water right on top of a rocky outcrop). A
few assorted notes : There are a lot of ‘28’ parrots (Barnardius zonarius) in the area. On top of the hill back

12
along the road there is an attractive metre high grevillea in flower; also saw Mulga parrots (Psephotus varius) up
there. Looking down saw a two trailer cattle truck going east – the third vehicle I’ve seen since Iron Knob. The
shoes you got for me, honey, (Naot brand polyurethane sole, thick cork inset to accommodate shape of the sole
of the foot, plenty of air room around the toes, double gauge leather without layers of synthetic lining, $175) are
great, havent worn anything else.(7/9/01. Lance has ordered in another pair for me. Cost price? mate) Saw a
hairy-nosed wombat. I’m on Mt. Everard Pty. Ltd. lands – they own a string of stations here; a couple of years
back the manager gave me permission to drive around on the tracks. The good start to the day didnt last - its
windy, cold & cloudy.

Wednesday 22/8/01. I read a story by Borges of a story told about the buddha. This is it from memory
(or lying) so I may be inventing it. During his stay in the 7th heaven of enlightenment the buddha sent a disciple
to the world of men to find out what lesson was to be learnt from the 4 attributes : birth, illness & suffering, old
age, & death. When on his return the disciple reported that though he did indeed find these attributes in
abundance he was unable to discern their lesson he was sentenced to be burnt alive for the rest of eternity. I dont
know if the story can be put simpler. As with the commandment thou shalt not kill any comment may be already
to undermine it with qualification. Perhaps I am allowed to make some parallel remarks or which refer to it
obliquely. All opposites demand each other. You cannot conceive of good without evil or evil without good. Not
even the words would exist without each other. Before you sort the apples into the two piles there is only one.
Before you learn the action to separate (the first division) you are part of the one. You cannot know the joy of
good health if you have no knowledge also of illness, in your past or in others or potentially. You do not know
what it is to feel safe if you havent faced danger or felt fear. We celebrate only because we remember when we
grieved. The sweetness of honey is the bodys memory of hunger. Life is not imaginable without death anymore
than death without life. Ecstasy is close to agony – they touch each other. Money would be worthless if
everyone was wealthy. To wield power would be meaningless if we were all kings. We will always have the
poor so that others can be rich. There will always be those that suffer for others to enjoy. We must die to be
born. Perhaps it is for such reasons that the nazarene said those who suffer will be rewarded but the rich already
are. I wish that it were true. There is a buddhist saying that we should not pity the poor as they already have
more than we do. I agree. They do not deserve our pity only that we give them what we owe. People do not
choose to suffer. No credit accrues to us when we discharge a debt. Those that receive charity know the
indignity of it – they should know not to be grateful. A welfare society is not a benign society as we like to
imagine. It is a failed society. It is an institutionalisation of indignity. It hurts to discover that we can only get
assistance from someone who has to be paid to give it. When we give we should take no pride in it nor should
we let anyone know, especially not the recipient. If it were possible we shouldnt know ourselves … 3.20. In the
final analyses there are no reasons why we help. People cry out; if they cry loud enough we hear them. If we
need reasons its probably already too late for those who require them can also make excuses. In my experience
people are always crying out, very close by, clamouring to be heard. If we practice at not hearing we become the
sort of people with gaps in their hearing & seeing, almost deaf & blind sometimes. If enough of us have the
habit we become a society where people dont hear each other. It may suit those who are busy, or preoccupied
with enterprise or themselves, or those who are rich enough to surround their houses with high walls ….
Strolled about for 3 ½ hours in the middle of the day getting a bit depressed. The weather is never good. There
are a few showers about, enough to get the gear wet but not enough to be of any use to the countryside. Its been
like that for days. Mainly though its the topic thats getting me down. Tomorrow I’m heading for Wirrulla about
70ks to the west on the Eyre Highway & from there to the coast another 28ks away at Haslam. On the walk
found a good pool of water so I washed my hands to get rid of the orange juice that has dried on them over
several days. But then I ate another orange. The habit of not using the water I carry for washing when I’m in the
inland is too deeply ingrained to break. Stupid really as I havent used up even the first of my three containers &
have a lot of milk too. In fact I’ve got heaps of food that I’ll be taking back as I can tell that the writing is
coming to a conclusion & I’ll be anxious for H to type it….6.10 . Climbed up a mountain for a huge 360 view.
The mountain was bare red rock as the spinifex had been burnt down, probably last summer. Crept up on a
wombat; they have poor eyesight so its easy. Found a rams head for Frank Osowski. He asked me to keep an
eye out for that kind of thing. This has a magnificent set of horns, perfect really. I’ll have trouble parting with it.

13
 Thursday 23/8/01. Returning to the comments about the passage from the talmudic treatise I quoted last
week. The processes that take place when we study or explain are only more intense expressions, more
concentrated procedures, of what takes place in language in general. All language is a kind of placing in front of
us (creatures with hands that manipulate; both eyes facing forward; attentive to detail), a drawing of borders,
attaching of labels. In some cases we point very accurately but we also have words to describe what we do
when we make a sweeping gesture. We have a tendency to think of our ability as consciousness. The more we
are in language, & we are increasingly so, the more conscious we think we are. Fish being without hands can’t
hold things in front of their eyes to scrutinize so we are happy to eat them. A human foetus goes through a stage
like a fish – we are happy to abort it. Foucault, an honorary member of the folie a Sorbonne, would have us
believe that man is entirely in the statements that he makes about himself (as I did last week in my comments on
Heidegger). There is no centre, as he puts it. Preoccupied as he was with systems of thought & fascinated by the
way language can loop back in self referential structures it was natural for him to do so. French academics
(stereotyped as not knowing how to open an umbrella) have a tendency to live in the head, neglecting the body
(Foucault was an enigmatic example). But before language, before we place in front of our eyes to attach the
label, is the intention to do it. The intention is embedded in the body & its fascinating to meditate on it. I am
inclined to the point of view that nearly everything is in the body, outside language. I had a lecturer once who
tried to convince me that because an eskimo has 30 or so words for snow he sees it differently than I would who
has only one. I rather think he sees it differently only because hes been there longer not because of the words.
The words allow him to join with others in the hunt, to give & follow instructions, to build igloos. They are his
joint enterprise to conquer. An arctic hare has not even one word for snow but it sees it alright. A dog has no
words for smell but knows every bitch in the street by her scent. A fish has no knowledge of water (except when
it is hauled out flapping onto sand gasping for air – then it knows) but every vibration goes through it.
Worshipping language is like worshipping statues : you bow to them because you see them before you. It may
be that the judeo-christian god, the god of the word, is only a minor god. The buddhists give their allegiance to a
realm that precedes language & includes the dumb animals. Theirs is a mute deity. And there are more ancient
gods still….3.30. I’m at Cactus Beach 20ks south of Penola. I’m drunk. I could piss myself with happiness. I’ve
been to a lot of beaches (walked the Victorian coast more or less in entirety) & I know a good one when I see it
– this is a great beach. As I was driving in even the corrugations felt right. (It was first recommended to me by
Peter Saniga.Thanks.) I could die here. Back at Wirrulla (about 180 klicks) I rang Helen at school & used up a
$10 phone card. Everyone is fine. Ben is getting good in the car. Dan is again talking about going to London
with a $4000 advance from F.R.M. (the bastards!). She had dinner with Joe & Kate who is dating a new guy;
her & Jock are definitely finished. Joe is his usual genial self. On the way to meet Kate she & Joe met Sandra.
Sandra is distressed because the play she was in, about self-mutilation, which was ready to start showing was
cancelled when the director spotted the scars on her arms. It will be something to do with legal liability. The
state knows how to prevent you talking when you really want to be heard. If youre going to be serious talk in
the lunatic asylum where no one will listen. Or talk art as long as its quite clear that you dont really mean it. The
biggest single component (instruction) in the meaning of the word is : not to be taken seriously. Say anything
you like as long as people know its art. Ceduna is 95 klicks further west of Wirrulla. I bought a couple of
stubbies at a fancy pub besieged by kooris. It must be their cultural centre. When I was driving out I went past
the Adult Activity Centre & didnt see a soul in the vicinity. I’m with them. There are things that can only be said
by what you do – all the talk in the world counts for nothing. The suicide bomber speaks with the same
emphasis as christ did. While I was there I pulled into a car park by the beach for a leak. Checked out the
message bank on the mobile. There was one from Helen, a singing one left last sunday. It went : “happy
birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday my president, happy birthday to you – with love from
your Monica.” 60 klicks further west at Penola I bought two more stubbies which I drank driving into here.
(Darling! One day we will walk naked along these shark infested (bronze whalers) beaches of clear water over
white sand.)

Friday 24/8/01. This is the penultimate entry of the piece of writing I will be handing out.
It is the heart of the matter I’ve been tending towards. Last night I realized I probably dont know how to say it.
The aim of the trip was to quell an incessant internal chatter by finding out what degree of clarity I was capable
of. I have a heading on my clipboard – “consequences”, and hardly anything else. Normally I have comments,

14
underlinings, asterisks, arrows going everywhere. Perhaps, since I want to write about the solidness of them,
how they are in the body & in the world of objects around us, it may help to bring the problem into relief to
imagine how we would design a world that would have no consequences. Here goes. Firstly we would ensure
that language was not rooted in the physical world but that words fluttered around like butterflies so we could
sit in front of our newspapers & tellies in a never ending wash of meaningless burble. We would have to invent
souls, ghostly doubles, to provide spaces where battles between good & evil could be waged, where credits &
demerits could be tallied on imaginary scales. The world of wrists cut with razors & heads smashed on brick
walls, of sordid betrayals & yes, of sexual ecstasies is too real to bear. It would be even better if we were
actually ghosts, sort of airy & flexible, so that we could go right through walls ; & doors. We would need to
have another life after this one so that if we got it wrong we could get it right the next time. As it is if we screw
up & we die its forever. If there were another, very long life preferably in a resort it wouldnt matter what we
did, or even if we lived in a pile of shit, as long as we qualified in the end (early christians used to get baptised
on their deathbed because they believed baptism took away their sins.) Decision making should not be forced on
us, its too burdensome & exposes us to blame. We have to invent a system of authorities with direct access to
god himself so that they can tell us how things should be done & if the world gets blown up by all these
contraptions weve made – then we’ll blame them, or god. (& it will happen, thats what we’ll do). What I’m
saying in a reverse way by the experiment is that you dont have to look on the face of god as paul did to go
blind, its enough to look at the sun.
But there is a problem & its in what it is that we do when we say we believe. I’m not talking about
specific beliefs : the migrating souls, the angels blowing trumpets, god on his throne or for that matter that the
sun will rise tomorrow (it wont always) or that right now I’m not on the moon. What we actually do is that in
every case we are saying that we will act as if it were so. The differences are in the amount of evidence that is
available to us but we will act anyway. In the case of souls & angels there is not a skerrick, in the case of the
sun well its happened every other time & I have to make a decision whether to stock up with food, & in the case
of knowing that I wasnt on the moon I would otherwise have to believe I was on a very large film set there or
that my brain had been rewired (there are movies about it). Nothing is certain though : things that have always
happened can cease & what we experienced can change. William James observes that if you believe in the
invisible world it may be you help to form it. Act as if it is & it will be. Christ said it was enough to believe. But
its true not only of the invisible world. Our cities, our machines, our medicines, all the things weve invented did
not exist once & were so far outside the wildest imaginings of ape men that they were justified in acting as if
they never could. And if they had continued acting that way they never would. Things didnt appear out of
nowhere. They were invented (acted out) step by step by people who believed. Before they became visible they
were part of the invisible world. The first ape that peeled a banana made a huge step. It acted as if it would
make a difference to divide into two (the first division) (chimps do peel bananas though some eat the skin
throwing away the inside while others do the reverse.) It acted against all evidence on faith alone. It turned out
to be a big habit – with many consequences.
What frightens me is the realization that jesus of nazareth must have known that language works like
this. He must have known that words become worthless when they are separated from the action which is their
only meaning. He must have known that to believe in everlasting life was to act as if it were true. I dont think he
believed in it or in angels & god & all those things but it had to be said that way because it was the only
language of the times. I think he really knew that he was a man, like you & me, & that he was going to his final
death. His problem was that people cried out with their pain & their death (awful pain & death in youth) & he
had to relieve their suffering. He knew that the only way was for them to believe in another, better life. He had
told them that if they came to him he would comfort them. How else can you comfort the sick & the dying?
Unless of course you make them well & then there would have been no problem if he were god because he
could have done it with the flick of a wrist. If he were god there is no sorrow at his death either for it would
only have been a step into the next glorious life. Gods dont really die (not the one god). I think he could see
how brilliant & beautiful the world was just as you & I can (more so) which made the misery of the destitute
unbearable for him. The paradox is that to feel pity for others to the extent that you die for them can only come
from the knowledge of the beauty that is denied them & to save them he had to abandon it. And he had to die
for otherwise they wouldnt have believed. For even as we wallow in words that can be meaningless we know
that it is only actions that count. He didnt die to gain everlasting life as the suicide bomber does (& to avenge)

15
or for god (the japanese one) & glory as the kamikaze pilot did. It seems that jesus knew that his death would
achieve the desired results for he was correct in predicting that his words would last. There is no doubt that no
other single action has had greater consequences. You can call it the opium of the people but the relief of
suffering for those without hope over two thousand years has been beyond measure. Perhaps that is what is
meant by - “in the beginning was the word”.

Saturday 25/8/01.
I am a flea in the fold of a camels ear. I listen to the talk of merchants & camel hands. I ask
questions. We travel at night guided by stars. We have stopped at a caravanserai called earth. I ask what
is language? why death? who? I dont receive answers. We have been travelling forever. The merchants
have retired to the seraglios with girls that wear ringlets & laugh. The camel hands are standing about
fires cooking & arguing. They are boastful & tell lies. Everything seems as it always is but this time I
sense that we are nearing the end of the journey. That we are about to turn around. I sense it through my
feet in the camels sweat. I note the twitch in its ear. I dont know if we will find our way back. The gods
who hide their faces from me in the questions that I ask know that I serve their obscure purpose. I am
loyal. I am ready. I know that they love me.

words
are swords and shields
hessian and velvet
acid and balm
but truth is
in glance
and touch
small movements of body
yea or nay
and the shouting singing
silences between
words

helenz

16
if the word
is the womb
of god

let my tomb
be made
from echoes

17
 13/8/01 – 25/8/01

13/8/01 – 25/8/01

13/8/01 – 25/8/01

18