So, to example: There was a tramp both in and out of time, an iconic tramp who is now and always, he is not old never old, not new never new, he is ever and now and always this tramp shuffling splay-footed making a cakewalk of his hesitant ambling, this tramp full of pluck and vim who she heard of, how she heard of him she doesn’t know, legends have a way of snaking in, he this tramp is coming, once upon a time and coming soon are one and the same wedded to symmetry and cocoons, he is coming, he has come, how soon is now, when will he be here, remember when, all these terms stitches in the prevailing symmetry, symmetry being beyond time, 1844 and 2066 are completely and utterly irrelevant terms—you who have died have yet to be born—which brings me back round to the iconic tramp, his wiggly black fish of a moustache, his dusty bowler and too tight vest corseting his girlish frame, torn baggy trousers and spindly cane, this tramp is one of us, one of the children of the dust, when I woke up and knew I was in a world of dust, when the screens and typeset had melted away, I was left with more or less dust and a sense of the moon, plus imperturbable calm, which enables me to wander without ambition or regret or purpose, I am, just like the tramp, cakewalking through dust, on and on-going with the innate claim tramp-born that all is about how you walk in this world and how you fall, all walking and falling and going on always going on, therein lies the tramp’s guidelines for existential flaning.

Artwork by Chua Ek Kay