{Zero; 0}

[extant; expectation; encountered; ex nihilo]

Emery Carlson

My encounters with Zero have been long & fruitful but rarely conclusive. In the first instance, the question becomes (or became, it is difficult to ascertain who first admitted puzzlement): around what absence do we convene? From hence, an elaborate detour around several campfires, some of which were well-tended and cordial—burning only what had served its purpose, or faded into quiet obscurity & others which took on an excess of life, became impetuous, by which I mean excessively symbolic. Of course, I wish only to broach another capricious dissipation: true mark of the sign. So it was that I became obsessed with Zero as a kind of animus which takes in the marrow of life (those lonely nights, nostalgic sighs, forgotten initiations & poorly reconstructed memories) & produces that most aspirated of phenomena: significance—which must, of course, be overcome but for now let us relinquish our words to fire and smoke. To be sure, I insinuate nothing but a dance. Zero then asks (& maybe you as well), what of resonance? Fear not, for patience may be rewarded. After all, we must not forget: nihil ex alia. But I digress. For all of the adventures we went on, Zero was coy. The first face which they allowed me to glimpse (& recall that it has been proclaimed, on high, that from absence and (in) addition (which is to say, AND and NOT) alone all that can be said follows suit) was an additive identity. Forgive the jargon—do not mistake this for a mathematical game. In all honesty, it was Zero who first permitted me (along the faultlines of a broken mirror) to see the ways in which my identity, like my diaphragm in so many choruses, expands and contracts according to its own strange geology (awaits eruption). Have I strayed from Zero’s instruction? Certainly. But this was only another tantalizing paradox—& we have not even begun yet. Naturally (& here the tracks are firm, believe me, we left no stone unturned) we hit upon another rule: ex contradictione… Although… wishes are not to be shared idly. Anyways, I refuse to complete the formula—or to close the question. Bear in mind the lessons of algebra: we are always permitted to add Zero. So I hope you will forgive my bringing nothing to the table; I will not let my thoughts be dissected. Around what absence(s) do we convene? Here (& this was always going to be the tertiary step) we begin to crave the Real Zero—the origin who sits on a golden throne, having purged all emptiness & extracted from it an eternal unity, a supremely arbitrary mark, the essential jewel-set-in-stars guiding us on journeys through sundry infinities (& before us is Cantor like a modern Vergil). Do I seem evasive? Zero would have it so. I am only repaying a debt, which brings me to my next irrevocable (irrelevant) Truth: that Zero is the auger of emptiness, or what, in the final instance, will free us from its own clutches. Yet, through all of this impeccable reasoning, I sense a ghost. Have I betrayed my friend by trotting out such winged platitudes, such fanged noumena? To be clear, Zero was only ever an office (ante rem, obviously) & now I myself must fill it, for a new face looms, displaces the Zero whom I thought I knew, and announces a new signature: Grief. The logs for the fire have become heavy with moisture & will no longer ignite so easily. I used to imagine that I could read our conversations in the ashes of fires from nights past; reflections on mortality seemed to congregate around flames like lost souls to the Styx. And Zero, once conceived as a lack, now stands as concrete as lime and soda, tautological bearing echoes of Tartarus, that one-less-than-one whole life which spells catastrophe to anyandall dialectic. Every convenience, a word stretched to bursting as it stands, points to it. It was clear from the beginning that Zero was never the end & maybe at some point the raft must be abandoned & every designation stands as dead as lilac buds in errant April’s frost. All that/are remains (it seems to me) is/to/& ask (of myself that is –whether you are still here or not being immaterial): when will you learn to encounter Failure with as much love as you do Zero?