$25.00
OAK OWNS "Icy Got a Raz" C40
Nobody remembers if this begins on Pluto or in the backwards forest or inside the humming box called **"No Limit" C90**, because somebody dropped the timeline into a bucket labeled **NIE SAND**, and all the pages stuck together. The crude poet named **OAK OWNS** insisted this was better writing anyway. Every poem he wrote looked unfinished, and every unfinished thing claimed it was finished first.
He carried a notebook tied shut with frozen string. On the front was written:
> **"Icy Got a Raz" C40**
Nobody knew what it meant. OAK OWNS refused to explain. He said explanations only made poems colder.
So the story wandered.
RED ALL was still trying to become a shorter light year. The lovers from Pluto were still walking across endless frozen plains where kisses crystallized into tiny stars before floating away. The strange machine **C90** still buzzed:
> brrrr... clunk... brrrp... maybe...
Meanwhile the backwards forest kept speaking in reverse, and the insects kept ignoring grammar. An ant argued with a beetle over who owned Thursday. A roach claimed to be the mayor of a snowdrift. Somebody shouted "TO STOP!" and someone else heard "POTS OT!" and everyone applauded because nobody wanted to admit they were confused.
Then the sea appeared where no sea had been before.
The poet described it simply as
**drowning in salt**
which he claimed was both a weather report and a love letter.
He drew terrible illustrations in the margins.
```
PLUTO
*
* *
_________
/ \
| C40 ? |
\_________/
cold
```
Another page had a graph that wasn't really a graph.
```
LOVE
bad
^
|
| X
| X
| X
+-------------------->
more confused
```
Then another.
```
LIGHT YEAR
===============================
later
=========================
"probably shorter"
```
OAK OWNS was very proud of these.
Halfway through the notebook, without warning, someone had pasted a practical paragraph from somewhere entirely different:
> You need to figure out how they’re getting in, which is difficult to do with a photo tour. And it’s even harder, if you (the picture taker) don’t know what kinds of lines of evidence to look for. Bugs are small and they have crafty ways of getting in. Sometimes it’s not even your fault – some beetles might be living in the flour or chili powder you picked up from the grocery store.
Nobody questioned why it was there. The lovers read it aloud while crossing frozen craters. The beetles nodded approvingly. One of them quietly stepped out of a sack of flour just to prove the paragraph correct.
The machine buzzed louder.
```
C90
[#####-----]
status:
????
```
The poet crossed it out.
He crossed out the crossing out.
Then he forgot why.
The bugs continued holding meetings that lasted longer than centuries. RED ALL kept insisting it had definitely become shorter, although nobody could find the original ruler. NIE SAND wandered backwards into tomorrow. "No Limit" C90 declared victory over absolutely nothing. The frozen stars reflected across Pluto while the notebook slowly filled with crooked arrows, coffee stains, half-finished verses, and maps leading everywhere except where anyone wanted to go.
The final page contained only one sentence:
*"If the road is tangled enough, maybe the ending has been walking beside the beginning the whole time."*
Underneath it, OAK OWNS drew one last masterpiece.
```
EVERYTHING
love #######
bugs ##########
pluto ########
backwards ###########
C90 ######
sense #
```
Original edition of 1.