Art, as I have come to understand, is the means by which the dreamtime is carried across generations. The dreamtime is that from which “we” emerge/d, became something like what passes for self-aware, individually and as a species, some time ago; and, that to which we return, the same. Animals live mostly in the dreamtime. I debate it with a dog every day. The dreamtime is indivisible, unreflective, unreflected simple existence: doing, being, meaning, undifferentiated; the infinite big and small, space and time; and, the corollary or consequence of the infinite: the endless here and now.
Poetry – an art in words – like all art, is an expression of the dreamtime. [Other understandings of “art” are available.] A broken expression, none the less. Poetry – art – is visceral. I am trying to generate feeling, together with you, the reader/listener/hearer: the primal libidinal thrill and ache to be in flow, at one, at peace and together with public, political, pleasurable and compassionate empathies and sympathies: feeling together.
Poetry is to be heard and felt (but I am open to how). I write “out loud,” edit by reciting from memory, find rhythms or syllabics to cut lines. Ultimately, to own my own shit. There is trauma everywhere. I have, and (drawing comfort from and attempting to collude with you) I believe we all have – a/my/our “porn-buzz”, shoe fetish, addictions. And, there is healing. We are bodies of matter that bump and bruise and blush with pleasure; bleed and suffer pain. Keep doing the physio. Meditate. Breathe. Walk the dog.
In my poetry I want to connect public and personal. In poetry terms, to be both bardic and confessional. Face – the public: the audience, you, “our” history, elegy, myth, grief, warnings, broadsides, parodies, socials, weddings and beddings, praise and celebration. Face – the personal: “my” memory-experience- body in an attested timeline, evidentially “factual,” authentic, shown/revealed with consent and shared. There is truth in each. There is feeling in each. Each will return to the dream.
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