The London Bridge Railer
51°18’35.11″N | 0°14’25.44″W
This was the year he rode the subway to the ends of the city, two hundred miles of track. He liked to stand at the front of the first car, hands flat against the glass. The train smashed through the dark. People stood on local platforms staring nowhere. His body fluttered in the fastest stretches. They went so fast sometimes he thought they were on the edge of no-control. The noise was pitched to a level of pain he absorbed as a personal test. Another crazy-ass curve. There was so much iron in the sound of those curves – he could almost taste it, like a toy you put in your mouth when you are little. Workmen carried lanterns along adjacent tracks. He kept a watch for sewer rats. A tenth of a second was all it took to see a thing complete. Then the express stations, the creaky brakes, people bunched like refugees…it did not seem odd to him that the subway held more compelling things than the famous city above. There was nothing important out there, in the broad afternoon, that he could not find in purer form in these tunnels beneath the streets.
So they sit there together. Penelope and Don. The Mixologist and the Subwayler. Brought together in a strange quanta, a distant whaling station, polarine sunset. I am riding a train in falling light back towards the edge of the city, 16 miles of track blazening stopstart into viridescence and some unnoticable height. On clear nights, teenagers watch ablaze in hotbox corsas the city and the distant lights of Heathrow, where planes drop in low sequence. Moved here in 2016, the winter after university when things fell apart [ ] , couldn’t find at first the house one late night [ ] crumpled in a hedge, still-flashed on bikes jarred across Vietnam, drunken Phillipine island wheelies, roughshod across Melbourne into the Auckland night, sleepless under a church spire, hopped Hawaiian to the missile silo Arizonan mountains of Uncle [ ]. The racecourse behind is often traversed by bands of geese at 1945hrs, overing the furlonged loop where Emily Davison was crushed equine and where the sudden drop to open sky is often mistaken for the edge of the world, a marina with a sole bandstand hotel like a watchman to oceanic nether. I remember late one night, returning from a night out in the city, the uberman, thinking we had reached the sea. This is not the sea. I thought it was the sea. Door slamming on 3am fox tampering across the yellow buslane.
The beady eyes at East Croydon’s gridlock loosen out by the time the sun has dropped and the southern is pitched into Tattenham Corner’s endline. In 2018 we railed a car into the caucasian night, the summer England reached the world cup semi final and football was coming home. The cars delirial in the streets, bit-picked instagram stories, Hyde Park drought-like yellow drunkening on a thousand plastic beercups launched blueward. We watched Kane bulwarking the Croats from a listless town in Kazakhstan, arriving by night late on a television winched impossibly high into the ceiling and grainy.
How do you write a history of leviathan, of concrete, glass, steel, cement, dreams, lies, traps, spies, name it, it all connects. I’d be lying to not disclose some vantage already, less from time than the return, a rushed thesis [insert link], a work opportunity out of the blue to New Cross Gate.
I am writing a history. A plot that ties us all in. What did Don say, Penelope now limp on his shoulderblade, after the planes smacked the towers and I was seven. The terrorist, planted in a Florida town, pushing his supermarket trolley, nodding to his neighbour, lives in a far narrower format. This is his edge, his strength. Plots reduce the world…All tactical, linked, layered. He knows who we are and what we mean in the world – an idea, a righteous fever in the brain. Everything happens at once. I read the FT online a week back, Generation Putin (https://www.ft.com/content/4006f332-31a8-11ea-a329-0bcf87a328f2), Maria from Taganrog on the Black Sea in a state of dissolve: ‘We were born in this system. This system is in our brains so it is very difficult to even begin to think about the possibility of changing it.’ Things are changing here, incrementally, until they reach that blip when all things go kinetic, madman Cummings, wielding a scabre to the civil service double-barrelleds stolen from the Bristolian night, spitting chai, as northern powerhouse rebooting like an old Dell in the basement, Gideon smiling over stacks and stacks of Evening Standards, claimant claims rottening deep below redwalls splashed blue in the bluest of nights. England has always been conservative. Forest and village. Namesake and door. It’s wired in the dark regions of our soul. Brendan is pulsing tidally against the evergreens that perimeter the school ground, where a sole motion sensitive outlight is flickering against the darks of an absent sky. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwXmxytqdRI
11 December 2019
[ ]
Application of [ ] to the part time fixed term Research Assistant Position at the [ ] for Military Health Research, [ ] ref: R5/2749/[ ] | Advert ref: [
Dear [ ]
Please find enclosed my application regarding the part-time fixed term Research Assistant position at the [ ] Centre for Military Health Research (ref: R5/2749[ ]). I would be greatly interested to learn more of the position and the project for which I have familiarised myself with your recent publications in the [ ] Journal of Psychotraumatology and International Review of Psychiatry. I have also familiarised myself with prior research examining the impact of moral injury on US veterans undertaken at the USA National Center for Veterans Studies, and with the recent work of Professor [ ] and Dr. [ ] in adaptive disclosure therapy as a novel treatment approach to war trauma and moral injury.
In particular, [ ] and [ ] write of the complexities of incorporating imaginal exposure exercises in cases of moral injury or traumatic loss, where the emotional processing of the experience and uncensored beliefs about the meaning and implications of an event may be more ambiguous or complex than a core life-threat based event. The authors propose the addition of ‘separate experiential “breakout” sessions, in which participants are encouraged to engage in imaginal conversations wih a key “relevant other” such as the deceased person being grieved or a respected, caring, compassionate, and forgiving moral authority.’ (Adaptive Disclosure: A New Treatment for Military Trauma, Loss, and Moral Injury, 2015, page 9).
In Moral Injury: An Intersection of Psychological and Spiritual Care (2015), Professor [ ] writes of an Afghanistan veteran experiencing prolonged exposure to moral injury concerning an incident of civilian loss of life during a military operation – ‘a sense of turning into a monster himself, his view of others as fundamentally immoral, his sense of being betrayed by the military, and his loss of the spiritual framework that had guided his sense of morality prior to service.’ Professor [ ] documents how the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Mental Health and Chaplaincy program has begun a broader dialogue on moral injury as a dimensional problem and aspect of trauma exposure distinct from posttraumatic stress disorder. Following from this, I have read more broadly into the 5 Eyes Mental Health Research and Innovation Collaborative (5 Eyes MHRIC) and with current research into evidence-based innovations in non-trauma focused treatments such as interpersonal therapy; novel pharmacotherapy; personalized medicine and the broader role of family and support networks in treating moral injury components in current and former military personnel suffering from mental health disorders.
As I understand it, the position advertised will require undertaking a literature review of open source evidence and current research on moral injury and what is known about the effect of individual differences (e.g. age, gender, ethnicity) on susceptibility and resilience to moral injury and the impact of moral injury on an individual’s beliefs and behaviours. In addition, the position will require supporting the broader project as it aims to bring together clinician perspectives with UK veterans’ perspectives toward the development of a standardised approach for treatment of moral injury and toward a framework that more closely supports clinicians’ assessments of the care they deliver to those affected by moral injury. With regards to undertaking research for the project, I bring a year of experience in undertaking open source research from my current part time (0.6FT) position as a Research Assistant to Professor [ ]. In this role, I have been required to undertake primary research and literature reviews toward [ ] forthcoming book with [ ]. The research has held a component of witness trauma and imaginal exposure literature, particularly in relation to [ ]’s investigation with [ ] into experiences of detention and torture among former detainees in [ ] Military Prison, Syria.
With regards to writing and collaborating with the broader research team to prepare final reports for funders and peer reviewed journals, I bring experience in coordinating and delivering research, most recently through an independent initiative set up with fellow students at [ ] and through an investigative human rights report presented in collaboration with [ ] at [ ] Netherlands in 2018. With regards to the administrative requirements of the position vis-a-vis liaising with the project’s funding body, stakeholders and PIs, I bring further professional experience from a 16 month role at [ ] as an Associate coordinating immigration applications for clients from India and the U.S to the UK. As I understand it, the position requires flexibility in terms of location of work, collaboration and input into other studies within the department. This mirrors much of the current arrangements in my position at [ ] I am also familiar with [ ]’s departments, particularly the Department of War [ ] through an affiliation with [ ] , a PhD candidate.
I am cognisant that I do not bring a formal degree in epidemiology or psychology however I hope that my candidacy might be considered initially on the merits of its energy placed into the open source evidence and research on moral injury. There are a number of broader sources I would like to bring in such as your [ ] 2019 paper in the Journal of the Royal Army Medical Corps and [ ] et. al’s [ ] 2019 paper in the Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences. I would be thrilled, if granted a panel interview, to prepare and present an example of the research I might more systematically bring to the project in the advertised position. Should my candidacy not fit the requirements of the position, I would be thrilled in lieu to explore a dialogue of other ways with which I might become involved in the project as it aligns directly with areas of my own research in cognitive inertia, perception and misperception in international relations that I have previously detailed to Dr. [ ] by email. I have enclosed my curriculum vitae, academic transcript and a former reference from Professor [ ] at the University of [ ] with further details in corroboration of the above. Thank you for your consideration and I look forward to hopefully establishing a dialogue with the project.
Yours sincerely,
[ ]
51° 18′ 32.4″ N, 0° 14′ 34.8″ W
The letter arrives, written on the front in smudged black font – V.S.R. He takes the dog out to the hill, a mother sits on a bench glaring into the sunset, glints off of the lambrini bottle, saw kids lastweek mock from sons school, her marriage, loss, rolling out into the downs shade, shapes come pouring out of the endline, cross the road to the Texaco, turning corners, sits a distance, searches the initials before opening – claim the suspense for that moment of sundip, coolness, VSR, VSR, little like USSR, VHS, old video cassettes, VSR: it occurs the V could be an F, smudged out of coherence.. Verein für Raumschiffahrt, visual flight rules…
Вооружённые Си́лы России (Vooruzhonnie Síli Rossii), the Armed Forces of Russia
VSR sniper rifles by Tokyo Marui
The VR6 family of internal combustion engines, also known as the variable geometry intake (VGI)
VSR V8 Trophy, a stock car racing series
V&S Railway, Kansas, USA
Voltage-sensitive relay, used for automotive, truck, and marine applications
Variable shunt reactor, equipment used in high voltage energy transmission systems to stabilize voltage during load variations
Very Special Relativity, a concept in theoretical physics
Very short patch repair (VSP repair/VSR), a DNA repair system that removes GT mismatches created by the deamination of 5-methylcytosine to thymine
Victorian Scottish Regiment, Australia
Virtual Super Resolution, a feature of AMD’s Graphics Core Next-based graphics cards
The initials for Viva San Rocco (Long Live St. Rocco), a phrase above doorways in 14th-century Europe intended to ward off the Black Death
Visual Flight Rules, a set of regulations under which a pilot operates an aircraft in weather conditions generally clear enough to allow the pilot to see where the aircraft is going.
1° 18′ 32.4″ N, 0° 14′ 34.8″ W
The letter arrives, written on the front in bold black font – V.S.R. He takes the dog out to the hill, a mother sits on a bench glaring into the sunset, glints off of the lambrini bottle, saw kids lastweek mock from sons school, her marriage, loss, rolling out into the downs shade, shapes come pouring out of the endline, cross the road to the Texaco, turning corners, sits a distance, searches the initials before opening – claim the suspense for that moment of sundip, coolness, VSR, VSR, little like USSR, VHS, old video cassettes, VSR:
Вооружённые Си́лы России (Vooruzhonnie Síli Rossii), the Armed Forces of Russia
VSR sniper rifles by Tokyo Marui
The VR6 family of internal combustion engines, also known as the variable geometry intake (VGI)
VSR V8 Trophy, a stock car racing series
V&S Railway, Kansas, USA
Voltage-sensitive relay, used for automotive, truck, and marine applications
Variable shunt reactor, equipment used in high voltage energy transmission systems to stabilize voltage during load variations
Very Special Relativity, a concept in theoretical physics
Very short patch repair (VSP repair/VSR), a DNA repair system that removes GT mismatches created by the deamination of 5-methylcytosine to thymine
Victorian Scottish Regiment, Australia
Virtual Super Resolution, a feature of AMD’s Graphics Core Next-based graphics cards
The initials for Viva San Rocco (Long Live St. Rocco), a phrase above doorways in 14th-century Europe intended to ward off the Black Death
Visual Flight Rules, a set of regulations under which a pilot operates an aircraft in weather conditions generally clear enough to allow the pilot to see where the aircraft is going.
VFR. “The Army Weapons Department was showing an ever-quickening interest in the amateur rocketeers of the Verein für Raumschiffahrt, and the VfR had recently begun making available to the Army records of their experiments. The corporations and the universities—the Army said—didn’t want to risk capital or manpower on developing anything as fantastic as a rocket. The Army had nowhere to turn but to private inventors and clubs like the VfR.” “Shit,” said Leni. “They’re all in on it together. You really can’t see that, can you.”… At the rocket field they talked continents, encirclements—seeing years before the General Staff the need for a weapon to break ententes, to leap like a chess knight over Panzers, infantry, even the Luftwaffe. Plutocratic nations to the west, communists to the east. Spaces, models, game-strategies. Not much passion or ideology. Practical men. While the military wallowed in victories not yet won, the rocket engineers had to think non-fanatically, about German reverses, German defeat—the attrition of the Luftwaffe and its decline in power, the withdrawals of fronts, the need for weapons with longer ranges. . . . But others had the money, others gave the orders—trying to superimpose their lusts and bickerings on something that had its own vitality, on a technologique they’d never begin to understand. “As long as the Rocket was in research and development, there was no need for them to believe in it. Later, as the A4 was going operational, as they found themselves with a real rocket-in-being, the struggles for power would begin in earnest. Pokier could see that. They were athletic, brainless men without vision, without imagination. But they had power, and it was hard for him not to think of them as superior, even while holding them in a certain contempt.
“But Leni was wrong: no one was using him. Pokier was an extension of the Rocket, long before it was ever built. She’d seen to that. When she left him, he fell apart. Pieces spilled into the Hinterhof, down the drains, away in the wind. He couldn’t even go to the movies. Only rarely did he go out after work and try to fish lumps of coal from the Spree. He drank beer and sat in the cold room, autumn light reaching him after impoverishments and fadings, from gray clouds, off courtyard walls and drainpipes, through grease-darkened curtains, bled of all hope by the time it reached where he sat shivering and crying. He cried every day, some hour of the day, for a month, till a sinus got infected. He went to bed and sweated the fever out. Then he moved to Kummersdorf, outside Berlin, to help his friend Mondaugen at the rocket field. Temperatures, velocities, pressures, fin and body configurations, stabilities and turbulences began to slip in, to replace what Leni had run away from. There were pine and fir forests out the windows in the morning, instead of a sorrowful city courtyard. Was he giving up the world, entering a monastic order? One night he set fire to twenty pages of calculations. Integral signs weaved like charmed cobras, comical curly ds marched along like hunchbacks through the fire-edge into billows of lace ash. But that was his only relapse.
The drunk woman cannot feel the cold, he senses – Channel Blue of forgetting – London is Ethanolia awash – dogmarlan loosened on the scraps of undefined aside her bench, in memoriam, to, the setting sun it seems, bonebag names etched silver, cool metal running up the spine, VSR, VSR – come away marlan, not there, izzok, clink of bottle, laugh faint, fading across the senescent down – the lightlevel drops a tone leaving him asquint at the now open letter that is post triptych card black, three images an ocean liner, a rocket, a desert of pylons, stretch out, minute font above – blue oceanic deep unconscious – red fast conscious escape velocity – grey, everday dreamsend treadmill. More shadows have come streaming out of the enplane. He turns the postcard, a note in handwritten smudged black:
Veterans of the Silk Roads… Discovery of the New Silk Soul
Splitting Is Eternis; Fissionable Are You.
51.5045° N, 0.0865° W | 01.03.2020 | Dusk
I.F.
Barks now, come apull at the lead, threaten the arrival of another – sorrymut too late for scraps, a plane maps a streak of white entrails against the darkened vista, clink, lambrini, down sorrows gullet, engines carlights now dopplering the sole road that loops below – Veterans of the Silk Roads, Veterans? He stands to leave, marlan sniffing, plants opening, the strange resolve of sunset vigil repeating – minds held to the benches wandering somewhere else, her in them, he in the images, the strange triptych black images, so he slips past the endline and the Texaco, climbs the road, opens the door unawares of him doing with summerlast, on a rooftop in Almaty, watching the sun drop into Kazakh smog billowing his mind. Coordinates. 01 march. Dusk. Splitting. I.F., the New Silk Soul? [Googles: New Silk Soul Bi-stretch silk shorts S$ 146.25 Part of the New Silk Soul collection these light grey shorts have been expertly crafted from an ultra smooth silk-elastane knit, made especially for La Perla in Italy. The perfect blend of lingerie and ready-to-wear these curve-embracing shorts promise both a luxurious skin-feel and superior fit wear after wear. Easy care, wear dawn through dusk and beyond without compromising your comfort or style. Made in Italy. CFILPD0023356_GR0004] What? But a veteran? He is 25.
The sinolarity (https://www.ft.com/content/296b90a6-07b9-11ea-9afa-d9e2401fa7ca) and the singularity of the bomb are one and the same, a movement toward Sole | Paul Klee – The Limits of Understanding | Two parallel lines – they are waiting for them in their separate worlds – the arrival For some thinkers cold was the ideal modern condition; others yearned for heat” (332). Similarly, one mightsay that Gabriel experiences something like what Peter Sloterdijk, in Spheres I, describes as “the cosmic frost infiltrating the human sphere through the open windows of the Enlightenment”(24) (Sloterdijk is referring to the destruction of a longstanding belief in protective celestial domes, “spherical forms like warming heavenly mantles” (Spheres I 23).) Sloterdijk describes the trajectory of modernity as leading “from the caves of human illusion into the nonhuman world outside…[with increasing awareness of] the inhumanly remote galaxies and the most ghostly components of matter. The cold new breath from outside was sensed early on” (Spheres I 20). To compensate, we all devise our own forms of comforting climate control, he suggests, constructing artificial shells of security both large and small.
