Note
The following fragments were published online between November 2012 and April 2013 — That is, in the period between the conclusion of the first cycle of Minigrooves and the broadcasting of the second. Most of them revolve around Trent Havoc, Esq., the mysterious (and only) recurring character within Minigrooves.
— RM
“Well-preserved”
We are just containers. Everything — in its own way — bursts.
I locked the apocalypses in a chest. It’s on a chair in the cellar, well-preserved.
— Fragment from the Note-Book of Trent Havoc, Esq. dated September 2, 1666.
Excerpt from the Note-Book Found in a Bottle
September the Sixth
The formulas jotted down, scribbled hastily seem to float on a watery surface. There is no glow, the graphite appears old and smeary and forgotten. Passing, I catch a fragment of a conversation – What is the grand plan? –
The question creates a rumbling instant in my head, much like an approaching messenger on a horse, desperately galloping down the hills of last late August – But the message to deliver is not written, is complicated, has to be well described, well painted, possibly relived, expanded throughout a lifetime.
But then the conversation turns more mundane and I move on. There are days in which I don’t know where I’m going and days in which my going is un-
Known […]
Considering the condition of what appears to be page 206 (verso) of the Note-Book Found in a Bottle (abraded, with the bottom part missing almost entirely), it is not possible to establish with sufficient certainty whether the quoted text concludes here or continues on the following page. Page 207 summarises some astute reflections regarding the concept of daybreak, and stresses the importance of the never exhaustive, never extinguishing gamut of terms indicating an increase in light, which simultaneously means a decrease in darkness – the latter apparently passing less remarked-upon than the former.
“Just this face”
When the months of five years ago were over, I ripped the notes from the song
it was a chilly no-ember morning — the fireplace was clean
I was cold. But not because it wasn’t warm.
love: nails on a mirror, which returns no wounds and no joy
just this face
— Fragment from the Note-Book of Trent Havoc, Esq. dated November 11, 1771.
Revelations
(August 1995 / October 1998 / circa 2003 / etc.)
You reach the bottom, you go up again. You have to hit rock bottom to pick yourself up again. To want to go back, to want to return, to want to re-emerge, you let yourself reach the bottom.
You touch the loneliness around people. Everything goes wrong. It will be fine. All will be well as anything else. You do not hate nor love. The wire is broken again, this gizmo they call life jams constantly.
(We’ll never get away from here — You hope I’m joking — Dialogues, dialogues, ill-faced dice. Small talk, small writing, perhaps sometimes that is what hurts more. Those more or less assessments you liked so much.)
You take the wrong road, I carry bad news (or bad goods) for today, because while I was getting here the whole load went upside down and lots of boxes are damaged. There were times when my head was full of gas. Those were the times when I had friends who just shook it in a careless way I hated.
I always laughed at their so-called ‘changes’. I had been there, from train station to underground station, five-six years before. During those black winters.
You realise it’s hard to love when you’re drowning in days of isolation. When you almost enjoy noticing how everything around you reacts stupidly. The thrill of the nevermore, of the exhausted, of the extinguished. Nobody, no more. You do not know anybody, anymore. You do not recognise.
Those little poems, or songs without a music, were the psychobiology of your world. Most of the times it was a changeless inner side.
Long time has passed, then someone comes and asks you: Why have you locked the door upon yourself? — “Evidently you’ve found the key,” is your reply.
The light of dawn. The darkest ink. The unfulfilled silence. The yo-yo of the heart. Revelations gassed by pointlessness.
“Snow”
snow; because one by one the stations’ lights light it • through the window the lights of my return • there are no voices in the almost empty compartment, deserted • sounds. paper sounds. of words on paper. of words of paper. • something keeps on snowing, some thing
— Fragment from the Note-Book of Trent Havoc, Esq. dated January 24, 1863.
“Ash, then”
[After watching London burn]
if it transforms into rain, it’ll be mud. I shall walk that track backwards, very likely. daytime snow, even, perhaps. ash, then — under the horizon — white again in the dark of day.
— Fragment from the Note-Book of Trent Havoc, Esq. dated September 6, 1666.
“That black box”
[Havoc] … I open my eyes, and here they are, the prostheses: writing instruments, ink, pen, typewriter. The conservative levels. Still, inside it’s still night. … Inside? … I don’t know where. Inside of me, I believe. That is, inside that black box located in some fractal dimension I can only intuit.
…
Still a lot of stairs to climb, but I can almost smell the daylight. An abysmal tranquillity which you like to call inertia because it’s just what you see. And I’ve been observing you for a long long while and I’ve learnt that you’re content with what you see. Hopelessly.
[Other voice] What do you mean?
[Havoc] I mean, no wonder why things are what they are around here. You people wouldn’t go beyond the surface even if I provided you the right tool. You would just become enamoured of the tool.
…
— Fragment of a reel tape transcript dated 11/30/1977, titled “Conversation with T. Havoc”, signed “J. Martisson”