Telesm

At the root of everything is a fantasy 1. The astronomical history of Eastern divination practices is evident in the development of instruments and techniques. The magnetic compass was first invented as a device for identifying the heaven arrangement. Its first iteration was an image of the cosmos which served as a means to assign distinct positions in time and space. The compass had two plates, known as the heaven dial and the earth plate. The heaven dial rotated freely on the earth plate. There is a symmetry to how we measure an arrangement, and in mathematics, every kind of structure will have its own kind of symmetry. 2. There is such a thing called a circumpolar star, which is a star that never sets below the horizon. It is visible for the entire night, every night of the year. According to the three laws of motion, under certain conditions, nothing can occur by happenstance. By the logic of this system, there is no such thing as noise. As Earth rotates daily on its axis, this star appears to move in circular paths. It continues to rotate in larger and larger circles, as a gesture for us to engage with its pattern and gain some kind of understanding. It is only a momentary event, where light is transposed into motion, geometry transfers from object to perception, and this becomes its own experience. 3. Mathematical symmetry may be significant when it comes to the passage of time and how one wishes to move through it. For example, you may keep a mirror at the top of your house, to reflect away any unwelcome spirits. Our relationship to the talismanic is deeply functional; we are designed to look for patterns and to stand under them for protection. And so everything becomes a kind of fantasy, or, as Bahar describes it, it is “the burden of everything being meaningful, we will be pinned under that rock.”