speaking in playlist
It's a piece of plastic that has a ribbon of black protruding out of the slit in the bottom, akin to a sound wave. It allows for anything but the sound it mimics, should one put it into the player and press that clunky play button. Instead, a pencil is rammed into one of the twin holes, winding, winding, until everything is right and tight again. This is technology. This is the mix tape.
It's a silvery thing with a murky midriff, alcohol-swabbed clean. It's a bootlegger's best friend, the downloader of the virus, the carrier of songs found off of someone's Bandcamp that undoubtedly did not stand the test of time in the death of the modern internet. These songs are most often incredible, and will be rediscovered via YouTube algorithm some ten years later, where people will be taking turns commenting here first, who was born whenever, and other common greetings of the comment world. This is the internet age. This is the burned CD.
It's considerably less cool, it's a signifier of the convenience of the modern era. It's a couple clicks this way, a couple that way, add, add, add. It's an amalgamation of songs from friends, from that movie, from the generated shuffle made possible by listeners of yore. It'll be saved amongst ones of the same ilk, made for anyone who will listen, should they dig deep enough to find the profile. This is what we're left with. This is the playlist.
When I Tell My Man - Operelly
Electric organ, the compact kind that you plug in, the one with the little buttons for the chords. The lump in the throat, the quiet mumble of painful things to admit. Tt's shy, a shrug and a smile. It's said with closed, stinging eyes, turned away from the streetlight glaring in. Momentary suffering for the chance to wake up with the sun.
hEARTSPACE - World Space
Same hall, same old. Those fluorescent sabres of the modern renovation, of the clean slate to combat worn brutalism of sixties past. It's eerie, isn't it? Trade the brick for slathered medium gloss, lean against that metal wall and say that it warms the back in the same way the original one does.
First Journal - @
Writing is like a bike. If it sits too long in the garage, through a couple of winters, rainy days and lazy days, drip some oil and watch the wheels turn. Naturally, liquid gold can't be found in any of the nooks or crannies and it requires a stop to the hardware store, where two employees who couldn't be relied on to tell you the planet they stand on will point the wrong way. The trip back will be one of vindication for found WD40, and by the time the bike is carted out onto the street, night has gone from blue to black. The trick is to forget about the spiel of nonsense it took to get to the sodium-lit asphalt, to the chilly air that belongs to that time between almost-fall and almost-winter. The trick is not to listen to anything at all, and to do what comes naturally, to ride the bike.
Days Incomplete - Fine
There's something so pitiful about the tile of light people so often get trapped in this age. The age that's left, the age of convenience. A call away that only serves as a reminder of miles and miles between the hologram and the reference. How many people have longed for the mailman while sitting on the stoop, sat by the landline while toying with the rubbery coil, refreshed the inbox while blinking away the glass in their eyes to get to the point of the video call? It must have been a long line of love and longing tangled in code to inspire such technological genius. Yet still, it's not enough.
A myriad of sentiments channeled through every instalment of this mixtape made digital, ones that change with each play and deserve more justice than to be written in one sitting with a glass of wine on one side, neglected readings on the other.
Love In Passing - Adeorat Warfield
I want to write about you, but I don't know your name. I feel that our hearts are one and the same.