Parasite Vol 1

Parasite began as a series of increasingly wonderful and bizarre blog postings on MySpace several years ago. Later, the project evolved into book form. So, what is the story about? Well, it begins with a simple visit to the doctor’s office. From there, the book details either a dream, or a descent into madness, or a regular day (week? year?) in the life of an average bloke. You decide. After the book came together, David asked me to write the introduction. I was honored to do so, although I had reservations. I thought that there were others who were much better qualified than I was for this project. Dave thought otherwise. Thanks Dave!

Introduction

My Demon Brother and I have a little game. The goal is to see who can be the first to induce a psychotic break in the other. The first foray in this game was a performance of Abremelin’s ceremonial invocations over a 19-day period in a room lined with mirrors. In the end, there was no clear winner. So we continued, pushing ourselves further. And while this game has given our lives meaning, it’s not all shits and giggles. I have come close to having my identity dissolve into the black fog. Also, now when I look into any mirror, I see a large black beetle staring back. As a former hooligan, I am used to street violence and intimidation. I’m not easily shaken. But there were times my Demon Brother pushed me to the brink. Fortunately, each time I was able to claw my way back to the comfort of consensual reality.

During one session, as we trolled the Internet looking for lulz and seeking ways to manifest psychosis by recreating the singularity, we came across selections from Parasite. Here were a series of texts that achieved what we had been striving for. We were simultaneously elated with our discovery and hostile because we had not thought of this before. Someone had to pay; something had to give. We assumed the death pose and fired a sigil, our first volley in a renewed campaign of occult terrorism. Then we prepared to hit the streets hard, to produce a flash riot in downtown Vancouver, to tear the place apart. But the DMT hit at just the right moment and the elves talked us down. I self-administered various Reichian therapeutic techniques to deal with my jealousy. My Demon Brother opted for implementing Lacan’s theories instead. This was not the first time we have disagreed.

We grooved on what we read. Each new post united us. The deconstruction / reconstruction of one’s identity and history through literary experimentation paralleled our own experiments in life. Taken as a whole, Parasite is a derangement of the senses, an infiltration of one’s carefully constructed identity and its ultimate destruction from within; an invocation of one’s guardian demon; a letter to a secret lover; a hagiography of a disturbed saint; a dissolution of boundaries that follows contact with the meaningless; a manifestation of a cephalopod’s wet dream; a flower garden vibrating with bees and butterflies; an infected spider bite left to fester; a carefully placed left hook and the pleasure of that sickly thud where you know it hit the mark and that it hurt, bad; a dog telling you to read Shakespeare or to commit murder; a body without organs; a transmission from deep reality; a psychogeographical map of Swansea; a sense of doubt followed by flight from a near death experience; an awkward meeting with your doppelganger at an office party; a transcendental moment waiting at a truck stop glory hole; an outbreak of scabies across the scrotum; a snuff pantomime of a man being fucked to death by a horse; a manuscript tossed into the fire, and recovered only with great pain; a parade of royalty, their heads displayed on pikes; a mass shooting on a subway car during morning rush hour; a ritual dance performed by the shadow forms of distant Tyche; a desire for the zombie apocalypse and the ensuing thrill of the hunt; an anticipated session of autoerotic asphyxiation ending in death by misadventure; a clown committing suicide at a children’s party, everyone later agreeing that it was his best performance to date; a ward filled with mental patients writing a successful television show fueled by copious amounts of pills and pre-op transsexual hookers; a systematic destruction of autobiography, and narrative, and the commercial impulse; a funhouse mirror that disfigures the ideas of the dominant culture, displaying them in all their hideous truth and pathetic hilarity; a demonstration that the dominant culture is actually a psychotic projection from a small group of sociopaths; a journey into a sprawling world of vision and madness, and emerging from this madness, truth.

I corresponded with David many times about Parasite, among other things. He was always interesting, humble, and more than generous. Each conversation pushed me into new territories to explore; areas that I never knew existed. Even so, I really only know David as a literary construct, a simulacrum producing profane texts. At times, I believed he was created by my Demon Brother to undermine my sanity. Now, I know this is indeed the case. And Parasite is the proof.