Platform

Citation preview

platform by michel houellebecq the poems by dimitri karakostas

x

it’s not every day you have a death in the family the impression i get is that people are generally happy, which should make me feel happier, right? i’ve since stopped living like this all close-ups of piglets supplemented by pain compassion tinged with seriousness all witnesses are disappointing use this as a time to turn inward, set your vcr to record i could be a waitress i could return to my studies i could return to the one true faith in spite of everything in spite of everything i stand untroubled on the sidelines

me, an idiot as usual with my run-of-the-mill dreams regardless of my destination i expect to be treated like shit the entire route depriving myself of cigarettes and books goodnight, taliban good night, sweet dreams i, too, will sleep this one off

i missed my chance to integrate so i might as well catch a cold

you’re a civil servant on vacation and yes, we can all tell pure blue skies annoy everyone if i reply, i’ll do so without smiling satisfaction without romance unmistakably nasty what’s the point in trying we’re doomed there’s absolutely nothing we can do it’s a bestseller meaning one of the best

would i spend the rest of my days laying in the grass? something simple triumphant yet gentle an oblivion of pleasure before giving up a martyr to democracy convinced i could stop thinking

a machine gun is a metaphor when every bird stopped singing i’m just checking in making sure everything is ok how thoughtful the butcher can be in the kingdom of heaven i blow out the candle

should it be god’s will but not necessarily in those words i could be capable of writing an excellent edition an expression of understanding with no famine or epidemic this, being the first real tragedy

despite all this freedom i haven’t had my last word yet managing information as a moderate parasite it’s our relations with other people that make other people unbearable something said run i preferred a more conventional death as a writer that writes about what i’m interested in i feel nothing more than a sad sense of relief

there is nothing left to read my heartbeat accelerates as i recline in my seat tranquility as a goal wrong thoughts matched with wrong actions attached to a delusive existence we’re all the same we all head for the sun companions in an attitude of loving expectancy an index finger waving warning life can be seen as the process of gradually coming to a standstill

nature sometimes sometimes sometimes nothing of any significance in the end

from another point of view i am a resilient animal a questionnaire with boxes to be ticked a barcode waiting to be scanned a notepad with a torn off page

it’s nice to be woken by pleasure as though my life is important, too a source of irritations and problems shuddering violently i was lucky to meet you

total annihilation or maybe mortal kombat an easy decision to make with absolutely clarity standardized, to be precise in the meantime, showing a loss a complex issue even with a magnificent plan

tranquility and storms depend on me the age of speed lost in infinite silence the same passion is hardly surprising we’ll really be able to get back to work

i’m in the middle of the desert on a priceless carpet all endless magical moments and back to spreadsheets muffled by a curtain of fatigue we justify fresh fruit at breakfast from experience i would prefer if we didn’t pretend to be independent we remember our own lives a little better than a novel we once read

my fantasy is to suffer us, solitary beings surrounded by enemies a trash aesthetic sensed unbalance in ordinary sexual practice more warm handshakes and consequence i don’t like the world we live in

it didn’t seem natural pushed to the limit of doubt satisfied, checking the box marked ‘good’ in general, the results were usually disappointing anything can happen in life especially nothing

as a source of permanent, accessible pleasure i won’t get in the way of your work they call it ‘supply-side economics’ the entertainment designed to keep the beach deserted

the cigarette burns slowly into my fingers as i hold my breath as a member of the information age i realize i’m good for nothing draped in artificial fibers

the following is not a unique experience i look over my copy of a discourse on positive thinking an act of field research in liposuction, botox, and breast implants exercises in ultramodern disappointment and failure business as usual

i would have my revenge later at a point of complete indifference not that it was more intense when everything went well an intellectual vacuum an absolute void baudelaire in the public domain the secret is there is no secret

she crossed her legs everything disappeared again i observe, the violence was a cry for help her feet are fine gold her legs like the columns of the temple of jerusalem

topless in a skirt interpreted as the herald of the apocalypse something see-through in every photo a rise of tenderness for your harsh features you would never get away with something like this

my memory was constantly filling up with completely useless information i had never really paid serious attention

i had been given a second chance undoubtedly an isolated incident overwhelmed by a sudden desire to weep at the moment the first rocket exploded

counting blades of grass in the simple pleasure of being alive seeming endlessly identical endlessly splendid

we’re happy here we have everything we need in life as a predator it was then that i heard ‘she’s dead’

something was wrong but i couldn’t put it in words it was just a bad patch i had to get through under the circumstances i preferred to withdraw from the project

you have to look on the brightside these sufferings don’t belong to you they are not truly yours life goes by effortlessly as there is no specific treatment for denial

i ceased to have any interest in the news animated simply by a desire for vengeance the absence of the will to live is not sufficient to make me want to die

it had been bound to end this way combating the crushing boredom of life out in the open not that these comments have any meaning it just seems that they be made

my book is reaching its end i will remain a child of worry and shame nothing of me will survive i will have been mediocre in every possible sense

z

z

desire assistance summer 2020

thanks to call of duty: warzone thanks to one beer a day thanks to tennessee cat