A man walks into a man. He realizes it’s the same man … they’re … the same man. They merge. Naturally. Inviolably. A man walks into a man and a merger occurs.

   Who was I before I walked into myself? the man now wonders. Can I walk out on myself? The merger feels definite. Final. Inviolable.

   This man, having walked into himself, now walks into a woman. Naturally, they merge. The woman wonders if the man has become her, the woman wonders if there are now men inside her, how many, etc. The man wonders if the woman has become him, how many women, do they have names, where does woman leave off from man and become woman, or where does (the woman thinks) my thoughts remain my thoughts, are they man thoughts, are they many men thoughts … there is now a thorny gambit of beginnings and endings, and for those who don’t enjoy cryptograms this is not the most fun way to spend an afternoon or lifetime.

A man walks into a man … imitating a child. This is not unlike (the man-child thinks) opening your mouth wide and swallowing an entire miniature circus, and the circus in its zeal and kazoos and zaniness and mirthful mayhem affects you from the inside in … you are now a man who hosts a circus, that circus is the childhood you swallowed, and some might say inadvertently so … you were a man who walked into a man imitating a child and now you can kiss your business lunches and wingtips goodbye … say hello to pie in the face and running with scissors … roll up your trousers and skin your knees and then go out and find a mother made of women who walked into mothers who will peroxide your scraped and dirty knees … is that the destiny of men who walk into men imitating children?

A man walks into a bar. Ouch. The bar is metal. Unforgiving. I need a different kind of bar, the man says, rubbing his affronted nose. Let me try again…

A man walks into a bar. The bar is filled with all kinds of men and women who are walking into each other, lost, searching, fevered for the right merger, the absolute one. If the man walks further into the bar he will walk into becoming they, if he walks out of the bar he will walk into staying himself, alone … for a little while. The man clearly understands that as long as men and women are walking, mergers of infinite varieties are inevitable.