I am an artist
How can anyone forget such a basic thing about themselves? But I do. I forget it over and over. I forget that I am a creator, a wordsmith, a musician, a photographer, a magician, and a dreamer. I forget that I have power that extends beyond the realm of consensual reality and I forget that I can do miracles.
Perhaps I need a tattoo. But where would I put it? Writing on the inside of your wrist is so early 1940's Europe. That just won't do. And sticking a reminder on my forehead will only help if I remember to look in the mirror from time to time. So what to do?
It seems that I must, yes, absolutely must, make a religious commitment to myself to engage in the act of consuming other people's art on a regular basis to remind myself of who I am. Because when I hear their words, let their images wash over me, or wrap myself in the melodic flow of someone else's tunes I find that I am in-spired. I am breathed in by their work, and when they breathe out I find myself transformed by the chemical action of biology on spirit and then I know. I know that I have words inside of me, ideas that bubble and break themselves free from the bondage by internal combustion, mathematical eruption, illogical conjunctions that form themselves, like the big bang, into new universes where the strings in my theory are words on paper or floating in the air or splattered across a screen in pixilated wonder.
And that, in the end, is what makes me real, what makes me a person and not an automaton, wandering through life with a blank look and an ulcer and a future death by heart disease. Art is enlightenment. Creation is entheogenic. The birth that I give to your thoughts is what connects us both in a weaving of Mayan proportions. So when I exhale you will remember that you are an artist.
Click to viewPerhaps I need a tattoo. But where would I put it? Writing on the inside of your wrist is so early 1940's Europe. That just won't do. And sticking a reminder on my forehead will only help if I remember to look in the mirror from time to time. So what to do?
It seems that I must, yes, absolutely must, make a religious commitment to myself to engage in the act of consuming other people's art on a regular basis to remind myself of who I am. Because when I hear their words, let their images wash over me, or wrap myself in the melodic flow of someone else's tunes I find that I am in-spired. I am breathed in by their work, and when they breathe out I find myself transformed by the chemical action of biology on spirit and then I know. I know that I have words inside of me, ideas that bubble and break themselves free from the bondage by internal combustion, mathematical eruption, illogical conjunctions that form themselves, like the big bang, into new universes where the strings in my theory are words on paper or floating in the air or splattered across a screen in pixilated wonder.
And that, in the end, is what makes me real, what makes me a person and not an automaton, wandering through life with a blank look and an ulcer and a future death by heart disease. Art is enlightenment. Creation is entheogenic. The birth that I give to your thoughts is what connects us both in a weaving of Mayan proportions. So when I exhale you will remember that you are an artist.