let tao

1 : Hare and Let Tao

Once upon a time,
there was a man who wrote ve-
ry, ve-ry quickly.
-------------------0.1
His name was Hair, the
“expatriate Star”. There were an awful
lot of novels by him
-------------------0.2
for his secretar-
ial fox to pin down her
favorite one. A
-------------------0.3
man of mystery
and masculinity, he
jutted from the bed-
-------------------0.4
rock of lesser wri-
ters.
The New York Times said this
of his authorial
-------------------0.5
reign: “Hair raced to the
conclusions of journeys
with real heroism;
-------------------0.6
with structural plots
bespeckled by cliffhangers
and tropes.”


Only once did another author, a space turtle, win a wordsprint against Hair. The space turtle had a pure competitive spirit only found in Olympian mythology. His name was Let Tao.
This was his story.
Hair found the practice of writing very easy, indeed. It flowed out of him. Words marked on the page at a rate of over one hundred per minute. The pace was constant. Every moment he was working at his profession, and the words always came.
Many people of a lower caste competed with him, and lost in the end, as it were.
Let Tao jotted that down with his quill. His paws tingled. ‘As it were, good sir,’ he wrote with the Late English style that established his career.
-------------------
Hair and Let
Tao_
-------------------

-------------------1
Hair’s writing endurance was matched by Olympic athletes (Nationals) that lived among him. He was also a National, yet challenged the limits of the mind, instead of the body. He was really an expatriate. He practiced the lifestyle of expatriation. The Nationals were bodybuilders.
The figures of speech and other clever tools he used in order to write great works were unmatched. Not only was Hair a very fast writer, but he was also a very good one.
Another man named Gerbershausen (self-titled album/novel -ed) said this of the author, Hair: “He is unmatched in typing skill at 120 words per minute. He is unmatched in lingual efficiency (seven point two); dialectal proficiency (one over fifteen); metaphorical prosiousity (eighteen over 31). He is the man at the tip of your tongue, when you are recalling any genius of the past. He has replaced them, and outdone them. Forever, maybe.”
But Gerbershausen is known for going on and on about things forever.
Hair won all wordsprint tournaments, out-writing each competitor with a word count that doubled or tripled the others. Once, an author named Let Tao asked Hair about his victories.
“How is it that you always win, if you constantly write, and never take time to reflect on the true nature of our world, much less ponder the mystery of existence? From where do the words come to you? Instead of mindful words, these silly sentences froth from you. They go to my eyes (and my brain, and it hurts). What is the true nature of the self?”
“Do you have an answer?” Let Tao stood in the crowd, waiting.
Hair courtesied him with a quick glance and flowed down the urban street to his next booth.

The novel excerpt has been removed._

-------------------2
Let Tao received a long response from the secretarial fox who imitated Hair’s style as closely as possible.

Memo from secretarial fox to Let Tao:_
Dear Let Tao,_
Hair was engaged during your meeting the other day._
The question you posed Hair with answer follows._
What is the true nature of (yourself)?
Hair is the man we have always looked for in writing. His authorship has surpassed the quality and quantity of any other writer. He is virtuoso._
The following is a summarisation of the plots of three of Hair’s books, with a forward analysis of the deep relevance to a human condition._
. . .If you wish to compete with Hair, we offer a wordsprint challenge tournament. Just two competitors._
 The Nationalists will only allow such nonstandard competitions because of the reputation of each author.  One author of Conversational Robots() would be of calibre. Your books were loved by Hair, although they seemed short and, quoted once, slow._



“What is this? Slow?” Let Tao said. He swished the coffee between his teeth and swallowed. He was an English Tao, after all, and tea was far too Eastern. “I must read the memo once more, in its entirety.” He waited.
“But what human condition?” said Let Tao to himself, reading on the toilet seat in the cubicle. “The expatriate babbles on and uses (. . . a parenthetical statement. . .) and nothing more.”
After reading more, Let Tao smiled wisely, lacking molars, and prepared his memo.
Memo from Let Tao to the secretarial fox:_
I accept. Here are the rules:_
1. . . .
These rules should not obstruct any normal writer.  We must schedule the wordsprint for July 19, 8:00 PM. The National police will be there, I presume? I will invite a substandard morality group based on their reluctance to reach outright hysterics in the event of any event, in any event. My other supporters will also be notified._
P.S. Hair and I will follow the rules, or the game is forfeit.


The rules seemed mathematically fair to the secretarial fox. She scheduled a contest between the two rival authors.

------------------- 3
The day came for Hair and Let Tao to compete.
Memo from secretarial fox to Hair:_
Let Tao’s Rules.
Rule number one: In the first line, you must use just five syllables. Rule two: The second line must contain seven syllables. Rule three: You must repeat rule number one and two for the following lines, with a double line break every third line._

Hair emailed the Nationalists immediately after reading Let Tao’s rules. “What is this, a haiku contest?” The Nationalists responded at lunch. His secretarial fox arranged for a team of editors to comfort Hair.
“The rules shouldn’t be a problem, right?” she said. The editors nodded eagerly at Hair. “Instead of writing a silly haiku (it’s beneath you, sir), just divide your lines up by counting syllables. A piece of cake for Hair.”
She saluted in the Nationalist way, which caused a begrudged snivel from Hair.
Later in the morning, Hair approached the booth of Let Tao (across the Airstrip), and knocked gently on the particle board. “Mr. Tao?” His coffee cup jingled against his metal vanity ring.
The other author noisily rearranged his papers and opened the small door into the booth. The cubicle was about the size of a small bathroom. “What do you want, Hair?”
Deep in the bunker, everyone heard everything.
“The rules, my friend. What are they for?”
“You can write fast, but can you write poetry?”
Hair felt sick.
-------------------4
Genuinely offended, Hair decided not to respond in person, and memoed his secretarial fox instead.
Memo from Hair to Secretarial Fox:_
He is unprofessional. Why have you agreed for me to compete for him in a wordsprint?_
He calmed himself finally with iced coffee.
‘I mustn’t worry myself with the rules,’ he thought. He sat on the white porch deck with his coffee. ‘Sit, Hair, and feel this wind, today.’
After a few gusts, the puns returned. ‘The lowest form of humor.’
‘Was that Let Tao in my mind?’
‘Let Tao is not my name, and neither is your name Hair.’
‘I am having trouble understanding your thoughts, Let Tao. What is your name?’
‘I am Lao Tawa or the being, Let Down. We are now communicating fruitfully.’
‘How will this contest end?’
‘With you and me asses, friend.’
‘I supposed you were my friend, in fact?’
‘Pause.’
‘(. . . a long time ago . . .)’
‘Pause.’
-------------------5
The contest began the next morning. Hair was planning the part of his day after_ the competition. He thought the wordsprint would be a nuisance.
Let Tao entered his monitored particle board cubicle inside his bunker. He called Hair’s secretarial fox on the phone to announce his willingness to participate. Hair reached for his pen jar and sneezed.
The wordsprint officially began at 8:00 PM. Hair, inside his own video recorded office, grumbled at the stupidity of the rules.
He wrote fast. Very fast. When he reported his first milestone (700 words), Let Tao was far behind (at 245 words).
If Hair was ever in doubt, it was for the split-second between waking up and being fully awake and knowing where he was, and what happened the day before.
Yet, the game went on for just ten minutes before the expatriate began to sweat.
He realized he wasn’t writing real haikus. He merely counted his syllables and created a new double-line after every instance of 5-7-5 syllables. Doubt entered him for one over two seconds. He waited for a long time and began to panic. He knew the feeling. It was called writer’s block.
He tried to push the words out of himself. Random words, letters, punctuation marks; it was all nonsense. He needed to start over.
‘Why this, now?’ he thought.
The words came slower to him on the second time. He was terrible at the form of haiku poetry. He realized how nonsensical it was to even write a haiku. After nearly one over two hours, he had written his story.
Twenty minutes into the sprint, Hair had only 31 words written.
Memo from Hair to Self:_
expatriation is
one word. two words. or three words?
First, second, third place._
Another memo from secretarial fox to Hair:_
Let down and hanging
around is the radio
head song I wrote you._


Let Tao, t h e master poet, wrote his 48th line:
Slow and steady wins the race._ Seven syllables.
The haiku is form._ Five.
Tell me you want to give up._ Seven.
It could work wonders._ Five.
He continued this way at a rapid pace for the remainder of the wordsprint. Hair was merely editing his previous lines into haikus.
The victor emerged after a total of thirty minutes writing.
-------------------6
Let Tao counted his own word speed at around 90 words per minute. Let Tao’s final stanza has been remarked as a genius example of haiku poetry like the lines of Fatchu Wainco of Israel, the Jewish poet.



Pause is part of life_
If war means to write faster,
You must pause, press peace.
-Let Tao_


The expatriate jangled, mourning, and went rambling on. He became a Nationalist. He continued to communicate fruitfully with the being Lao Tawa, or Let Down.
Let Tao, after visiting Italy, France, and space, returned to his cubicle shell. A double thumbs up came from his secretarial toilet seat; ie, he left it standing up. It was not the expatriate or the Nationalistic way, but it worked.