; or, a hero with a couple dozen or so faces

how alliances shifted from spongebob and jerry

to squidward and tom— a slide

from dionysian innocence to apollonian necessity.

when met with your own roadrunners

coyote became your spirit animal.

you bubbled into all the flat characters.

like dora the explorer, it's right in front of me

but i want others to find it for me. my backpack

has everything i need but i need others to choose

and when the beast steals my way i wish others

to fend it off. like aang from airbender the fate

arrowed on my forehead is downwards and blue.

this way up pointing down is my body

fragile handle with care is my heart.

pokemon is a symptom of combinatorial infinity—

there's a lot in the wild, you catch a few, battle

with some. the nature of the design of the game

forces your journey to be unique but yours is one

of those copies whose save file is easily corrupted.

you can always quit but you got the game so might

as well play on. after all, you gotta try to catch 'em all.

~ ajay

11/4/2022