My time on earth grows short. Generations will be born with no knowledge of the Great Ishmael. I cannot allow this to happen. The symphony must be completed.

I did not know when I began to compose that the work would include voices from the dead. Don't walk away because I said that. I am a skeptic, a cynic, and a well educated scientist; a few years ago I would have tossed the symphony in the laser shredder. Please pay attention; play one verse at a time.

I could have composed a family history like so many others have done, but something happened. I slowly became aware that my ancestors wanted to speak for themselves, through me, in a voice clothed in ambiguity and metaphor. The symphony came in waves: automatic; dreamlike; flowing into the mindscape; pushing images into the Mann Field; overpowering the usual googleverse garbage.

Ancestors spoke to me in image fragments through portals in the right brain. This I know because I was a professor for thirty years, an expert on human perception. I also attained the coveted black hood of Mensa Yoga; I am a Yoga Meister. After teaching, I worked the next eighty years for Mann NanoFab before retiring to compose Mann symphonies. The Ancient Ones used my vast knowledge of the human brain and my ability to code for Mann Symphonys to get their message across.

I should clarify something important. Most of the messages came as I was translating the brain damaged opus of the Great Ishmael. I have to believe that many of the images and verses came from Ishmael the Dead himself. I cannot be sure, of course, and it may be that many relatives spoke as separate voices in the mindfield. So let me apologize from the beginning; there are many confusing voices in this translation, some are mine, some are from the Ishmael Diaries, and some are the voices of the random dead (relatives, I assume).

By the way, Dr. Steven Mann was a real guy. He did invent Mann glasses. Look it up on the Googleverse. As for the religious stuff, well that's the meat of their message to the future. Take it or leave it, it's your funeral.

Although the full symphony is available through nanoflow implant, I chose to reproduce the work in the ancient manor in which our ancestor Steven Ishmael created his diaries. The modern reader will find this form of communication very strange. The language of the Ishmael diaries is filled with archaic concepts that will take a few bars to fully explain.

Our primitive ancestors used a form of communication called writing. This was a symbol based language system. Metallic fluid was sprayed in symbolic patterns onto an electronic media called smart paper. The paper could present symbols to the unaided vision system. It was a very cumbersome and unbelievably slow method of communication. There were no Mann Spectacles before the Collapse. Primitives had to interpret the symbols and store the memory in native brain tissues.

I spent fifteen years studying the Ishmael papers. This is my translation. I take full responsibility for any errors; and undoubtedly there are many. The diaries of the Great Ishmael were composed during a turbulent adolescence (lasting about eighty years). Much of it was composed after his war injuries. There are many ideas and sentiments that leave us hanging. I did my best to understand the archaic language, but much of the ancient data was damaged during the long period of storage.

Ishmael composed his work over a very brief life time; he lived to be only one hundred and fifty three. His exact birth date and location are unfortunately unknown. We do know that he lived from about 2050 to 2200. Data mining places his composition between about 2076 to 2184.

As I said, the language takes some getting used to. Ishmael frequently uses two terms that listeners will find unusual. The first is the term "asshole." Ishmael uses this word often to express frustration. It is a derogatory term that some primitives used to express displeasure. An "ass hole" was an anatomical opening between the legs of early humans. NanoBowel implants eventually made it unnecessary to employ the ass hole for excretion, as you know.

The other term was also derogatory. Ishmael uses the word "fuck", or "fuckers" to label those he dislikes. Most readers will be unfamiliar with this ancient expression. Human males used to have a strange appendage called a "penis" between their legs, just forward of the ass hole. Females did not have this appendage. Females had a hole between the legs called a vagina. The male penis was placed into the vagina and wriggled around until male fluid squirted into the female hole. This was, believe it or not, the ancient way that children were conceived. There was mild pleasure involved.

Now, of course, with the advent of the magneto, male and female pleasure can be enjoyed by either X chromos or Y chromatoids. NanoMagneto revolutionized total pleasure (the ancients called it "sex"). Why the term "fuck" became derogatory is beyond my knowledge; I will let the sociologists take up this irrelevant confusion.

Please do not be put off by the rambling beginning; it was written under severe duress shortly after his being committed. Stay for the commandments; they are real and have deep historical roots. The commandments are the reason that the Ishmael Diaries have endured.

Respectfully, Your ancestor

William "Bill" Heines Catsup Baldwin