Shewstone:

Connectomes

2011-03-25T05:23:00.000-07:00

"What's in this picture? A cool and refreshing stream of water, you say. What else is in this picture? Do not forget that groove in the Earth called the stream bed. Without it, the water would not know in which direction to flow. And with the stream, I would like to propose a metaphor for the relationship between neural activity and connectivity. Neural activity is constantly changing. It's like the water of the stream; it never sits still. The connections of the brain's neural network determines the pathways along which neural activity flows. And so the connectome is like bed of the stream. But the metaphor is richer than that. Because it's true that the stream bed guides the flow of the water, but over long timescales, the water also reshapes the bed of the stream. And as I told you just now, neural activity can change the connectome. And if you'll allow me to ascend to metaphorical heights, I will remind you that neural activity is the physical basis -- or so neuroscientists think -- of thoughts, feelings and perceptions. And so we might even speak of the stream of consciousness. Neural activity is its water, and the connectome is its bed." -- Sebastian Seung

Freedom of Fascination

2009-11-29T19:16:00.000-08:00

Walking through the bazaar alley

through smoke of mid-day's roasts

and sting of spice

& droning of drum,

sweat of toil

He was struck by the desert imp

again, waves propagating, chiming

visions stirring before the eye

of Within;

Unfurling theatre of What-then;

a geni's carpet, reality-woven

to carry the gaze

unto her, mirror'd memory,

painting with light

shimmering representations

of the poets' own stirring

serpent of fortuitous fire:

that which falls into the infinite

plunging deeper, always deeper

into the heart,

Within descent

the interlock rising

unity of intent & vision

collide in the art, contradiction

become contrast

And the abiding vision

of symmetrical perfection

that did slay

and stir unto mockers

Did awaken and Push

the slumbering driver

as the coach near'd the cliff...

Thus was the tale of Hugo the Hypnogogic.

Cinematic Pleasures of Epiphany

2009-11-24T10:13:00.000-08:00

Washed upon the shores of past earth,
I came upon the low house in sand.
Therein, shelter, darkness.

Light within to see
the word written within bone
and nerve, breath moving
the frames, building
a charge of years.

Swelling with divided unions,
I came upon the sunrise afar.
Burnt star collapsing within
that low house, pulling everything

to the center,

focused, beaming,
emitting signals
not heard before.

Yet rotation of realms
about the fixed center (it too moved)

resolved the creativity of speakers
and painters upon the street, coming forth
to articulate

a genuine eidolon.

The Rune Reading in Autumn's Red

2009-11-24T09:33:00.000-08:00

Turning, light and rush
of liquid memory caught in
my summer's end, the glances of eye
brushing with gentle lash upon the skin
of the book's pages.

Color of wheat in autumn's rain
tinges the vision, the writer of listings
listing in the seat, in vibrato of the chanting, rolling

tongues and parting lips
meeting in permutational interlock
and release, spilling the icons of action
upon the skin

of the book's pages.

From leaves coiled in leather
arises word in thought's smoke,
turning, 'volving and slipping
in upon itself and out, spreading

into voids-between

Inhaled in the upshoot,
fitting key & lock in nerves'
endless branches, alighting fires
upon the grey-floor of the ancient bonework;

The air becomes electric laughter, rising.

The View of Earth & Sol from the ISS, Nov. 22

2009-11-24T08:51:00.000-08:00

On Navigation

2009-11-22T22:57:00.000-08:00

Over red-iron mountains of wrought age
through tangled weed of million-years,

the mover glides and falls some.

Looking at the span
of possible permutation,
experience of other
is of utmost sacrament, no time
or space for anything less;

Choosing the collection of ports,

there are Universal Gates
to consider... each
working in context
of the individual's
unique permutations,

And thus openings create

lines of chosen action,
bifurcating, exponential,

and very possibly
aligned with the free-fall of
stars.

The mover dips and glides,
leaps and looms,
gallops, dancing,

and falls some.

Said the Diary

2009-11-01T09:04:00.000-08:00

Cast aside the torn books of tattered thought!
said the diary as it called me from the table.
Pick me up! and etch memory for nerves of 'morrow,
fill the wide air with black birds of scrawl,
come mounting in heav'd haunch of jaw and throat,
for I am your mistress!
said the diary.

Petting her leather dress, a cover to veil
the pages of loving stroke where pens have danced,
I slip the hand between, and lift to reveal
her treasured secrets.

More! more to give, always from this lover,
I am forver bound to her... into her pages
I shall dissolve. Come to me!
said the diary.

Iris Unfurl

2009-11-01T00:10:00.000-07:00

Allure through open windows drew
forth the eyes,
heavy with sand and rain
from the nights' storms;

scented wind, of dew and ion
washed within and over,
revealing
spaces without four walls.

Time, passage
through rough hewn tunnels
of memory and motion, accumulated
gestures soon called the heavy eyes

with shade
and echoes,
wordless
and primal.

To the symposium to be supposed
were not all present, but suggested;
suggestive of the internal
where union is clean, well adjusted;

An old scribe notes
and compiles, sure and ready
in communion with the regency
of enacted trials.

The work proceeds
with letters to write
and temples to quarry;
Beloved to be honoured!

Aura of Change

2009-10-26T08:17:00.000-07:00

I sought the remedy,
and it came without sound.

Quickly, presenting a picture
of what needed
to be done.

Overwhelming tasks
are accomplished in
steps.

One, then two,
then infinitely more
to come and
go;

each step, dissolution
and reformulation.

I let the shades drop
one by two, allowance
of new form
through and
through,

edging closer
to the crowning acheivement,
a new grave being dug for passing
fragements of what I could have
been.

Letting them flow,
letting them go,
letting them fly
unto clouds of thought
which change in the wind.

I am blown away.

Mortality of Thought

2009-10-26T08:14:00.000-07:00

smooth mountain rising in my dream,
what tales do you bring?

Removed of fir, creatre, and spring,
your stone rises without life.

I dreamt of bulging earth tonight,
without life within or without;

There are few days left to count...

Last of the Day's Shimmer

2009-08-31T16:19:00.000-07:00

Further afoot, the gatherer
covers ground, searching fields
of market and niche for the kill

Or seeding to till, fresh sprout
or tender shoot to guard.

No birds in the yard,
and the oven's nearly burnt.

Simmering, shimmering fumes
bedeck the haze of sunset
through the screen.

It's now coming forth in song -- move!

Ursa Soi

2009-08-27T20:20:00.000-07:00

i.

Land of grown form
beneath softened feet,

breathing mist of
soil and green,
a haze past noon.

Tilling, revealing, churning,
and sifting soil from root,
I came upon the treasure
of time, the golden royal fruit.

ii.

A coiling dancer, matter darkened
and damp, eased lithe and curved;

brain and bone, the sinew bending
in pump and blood, sweat, the work of action.
Steam, and cooling salts to sink the heat
bathe the shadow-screen witness in kinetic vapours.

iii.

The gases of proportional thought
crsytalize in the alembic, faithfully
prepared for dissolution. Again,
and still further -

the eyes open
in nested wonder -
fourwise, then up.

See! Seeing
the hawk see,

Listen.

Compression

2009-08-23T10:59:00.000-07:00

Echoes, returning visitors of nerve's traffic,
children of body's past empires
greet the dawning mind;

the moment of repeated wheels afresh
bubbling up in ecstatic union,

these memories dissolving,

Wake me to new visions.
A moment's hostage of condition
quakes the grip of sight,

saturated in the flood of
singing scrolls, the ear cannot cleave.

The array'd pallet of scenery calls the mover to motion.

Arts of an Arrow

2009-08-17T13:36:00.000-07:00

A.

Familiar friends through a veiled door,
I'm set to waking
through slumber.

No sense of exact measures,
the teapot is humming with vague whistle.

Time is cleaving the air.

B.

Trace -- silhouette of former image
luring the eye in a torus-dance, by
degree, resolution snaps in.

Webbed currents of pathways past,
leaping forth with harvest and feast;

budding deep in singular action.

Untitled 160809

2009-08-16T09:47:00.000-07:00

0.

Folded waves of evening heat
gild the eye and hand
in a glow of scintillation,

walking, moving
through paper razors of
shadowed faux,

Dismissed, and set to motion.

I.

Choked opening, the strayed light
returns a flood, mirrors tremoring in
their load.

The tiny vessels burst, dissolved
in their bond with a lover unending;

Splashes of the foam in which it sings,

II.

Emerge!

Tangled Weed of Noon

2009-08-03T23:29:00.000-07:00

The coffers of gleaned coin
hover in clouds
of my expectant glory.

This is a vision
only trolls could enjoy,

For I am too busy beating a Path.

Prudence in Sunset

2009-08-02T10:06:00.000-07:00

The fields of memory
are yielding up fruit;

First signs of Summer's
scorched crop.

Waiting, while
cow-hands rush
to aid the harvesters.

"Storm's a'comin!"

She calls to me from afar, Sweet Ovation!

2009-08-01T21:23:00.001-07:00

'Fraid Not

2009-08-01T15:08:00.000-07:00

Magic carpets
can take you high

so high, I think I can fly,

with wind of change
and blazing rays
the seams of fog won't stay.

Drifting thought, my greying clouds
still in rolling
thunder bound.

With clenching mind and easing bleed,
my soaring floor comes crashing down.

Ignition-systems

2009-07-26T11:44:00.000-07:00

Streaming light
and colour to the day

wrapping me in
feathered clips
of memory;

Tracking an elusive
species, catagory
of experience

Frozen,
for animation.

Are the tracks True?

Drumming Gazes

2009-07-25T20:19:00.000-07:00

Mobilizing mass
swift to crash
in the lonely hiss of dusk,

What comes of mice
to throw themselves in
swift mud?

To gaze with
open eyes
all
coming far to claim their homes,

Seeing true
what the Reserve has been
covering.

With calling songs,
the people raise a pen,
and set a glass;

Let us see what the
New Storm Exposes!

Bubbling choked charms...

2009-07-21T15:49:00.001-07:00

As I write
within the skull of this frame

I can't escape the
draughts of flesh.

Only, coming into
light,
beholding tasks which
call me forth,

I etch these realms of dawn
with gates to the Coin.

Deliver me now, traffic!

Crystalline Quiver

2009-03-14T22:57:00.001-07:00

Silver ebb, herald of coming lux,
shimmering drafts upon me

Indigo seeds planted by Moon
ripened by Holly, an' goatweed
in bloom.

I tasted of the moonstone's wine,
and it brought forth the Dawn.

Saturn's Guffaw

2009-03-14T22:55:00.000-07:00

Hematite drips from my pen
In close quarters of symmetry

The eye catches rough,
Rough shades of charring
Paste

Through a paper, caught
Momentarily dry, with sunspots
The words finally come.

Vulcan Inspiration

2009-03-04T13:40:00.000-08:00

Coiled dances unfurl in the twilight's drift; the sediment
of being, layered pressures of the ages coalesced in nerve & bone,
spinning
spinning, spinning about the gyr;
a stone that is loosened mineral
and water, the body of me
a burning stone in the moonlight.

Such a stoney-thick mantle, my thoughts!
The echoes of cavern & fold, crushed in accumulation,
fulfilling necessity above. But O! I drift,

at least on the surface. Below the sea of fire dips and dives
anon, wiley rivers of liquid light, carving the serpent-tunnels
of brain & heart (ever ever between)

And the hum,
sweet drum! Curving rains in the spiced air, thrown
from high, that which was rushing below. And two were coiled in one,

for the depths ran quick with the rubbing of bodies,
plates of personae above, vibrating as they slid upon & below
one another, tectonic

pressure released,
healing forth, energetics of suns
anointing the air with ash and ember,

and I am touched with sky,
wavicles of charge, awaiting,
accumulating;

Though worlds be tossed in my birth,
mine own is but the buddling of one more
dawn of lightning... to the west, mine eye,
the heart, imagination sails --

letting the eruption-azure rain its
blessings upon the land.