Even bound and covered, books never stop releasing oxygen. Never stop planting seeds. Never stop taking root. They never stop trying to reach up and out. Never stop trying to branch and grow. They never stop trying to help us do the same.
"There are four kinds of people in this world", Umberto Eco says, "cretins, fools, morons, and lunatics.” But it could fewer than that. Or couldn't it be?. Some one like me is capable of being stupid, imprudent, half-witted, and mentally-ill. All in one day, all before noon. Four horseman of apocalyptic idiocy in one living being.
The negative space is essential. It is the art itself. The stillness. The staring. The wait. A nothingness that dictates everything. Padding fingers pressing keys. The jagged lines of scrawl. A phrase that finds a turn. A turn that phrases me...
“I thought of the deep, mysterious reserves of feeling we all carry around with us that are suddenly and inexplicably triggered by small recognitions of our common struggles.”
"Tomorrow" feels like a dirty word. At least, it does to me. It's repugnant. It's illicit. It elicits a certain kind of repulsion. It's one of the most vile parts of speech. Wash your mouth out with soap and it still won't rinse away clean.
No part of me wants to live forever. Take me to the top of the tallest mountain. Show me the kingdoms of the world. Offer me infinite time. Offer me an unfathomable number of years. No part of me would ever say anything other than “fuck that shit”. And, I’d be happy to take a flying leap off the edge.
Hope is the silent letter of our hearts, upholding the language of who we are. The small voice whispering the secret of water pouring over our desert parts. Hope is a seed sown in the damp and in the dark.
It’s because books are made of paper. Because they're made of trees. Made of something that was living, breathing thing. That it makes you think they still could be. That it makes you believe that they still do.
"We all think we know how we do things. We think we know how we write. We think we know how we tell stories. Over time we super-glue ourselves to our process, and in fact that process can become a part of us in a problematic way as we mythologize and even fetishize said process."