Night Side of Nature

Ask if it is possible to believe in the existence of ghosts, even now, in the twenty-first century.

Ask, on the other hand, if the quality of our lives renders our awareness of such problematic things as wandering spirits possible.

If the natural world escapes our notice, the phases of the moon, the turning of the tides, the subtle dynamics of the progress of the seasons, such that most of our perceptions are attuned to artificial environments and representations of "reality", how likely is it that anything other than the mundane to which we are acclimated can even capture our attention?

Noise, blinding brightness and frenetic activity being the norm, who can see into the quiet, still shadows?

Shape-Shifting

There is always a distance between art and audience.

It is sometimes necessary to extend one's perspective beyond the limits of ones experience altogether and perceive from such an unexpected point of view.

In the deck of the Tarot, the card of The Hanged Man.

Choice

Life filled with mysteries.

No easy answers.

Many questions, many based on wrong ideas, beliefs or information.

Bad premises.

Many situations provide few opportunities for freedom to act with integrity and dignity.  One's only recourse is to extricate oneself in the due course of things.  If we cannot be free, we can at least act wisely and rightly.

Walk Through Walls

Unformed ideas flash momentarily and leave a long after-image.  A school room, a schoolhouse hall.  But there are unspoken ideas, fully formed yet buried beneath emotion and confusion.

Five years, ten years-- these are not lifetimes.  Live with intensity but the facts do not change.  Anything and nothing happens, as days are measured out.  Some live for attachments that will not be, grasp at pleasure, pain, joy, anger, resentments, truths, lies-- real or imagined-- as if these phantoms exist perpetually.

There are times when the only reasonable and appropriate act is condemnation of ignorance, apathy, imitation and self-indulgence.  People who have nothing, as well (and as likely) as those of material wealth, will choose to remain in darkness, as is their right.  The former will do everything possible to appear to be the latter, but it is an intolerable spectacle.

Lao Tsu, it is said, disappeared into mountain mists.

And Thus We Sleep

Fragmentary nature of perceptions.

Consciousness of heat, cold, scent, sound, emotion, idea, impulse, color, light, texture, mortal limits of time and space.  Sounds of wind in the trees: yours, mine, ours, belonging to none.  Passing thought, offered prayer, creative act. 

The idea, the fact, that some never transcend the narrow limits of self, or complete subjectivity, astonishes, and yet is prevalent.

Reuters News Service:  ...both survivors report the assailant said he meant to kill them because they appeared to be happy people, and there was "no room for happiness in his world".

Phantoms of the Living

In the world of ghosts, we never understand our true motivations, act only on the impulse of passion and selfish desire, and, ultimately, behave as though we are alone, not knowing we are dead.

We interact with others as though they are who we want them to be, never knowing who they really are, because we cannot know ourselves.  We exist in a netherworld of images and ideas that our failures of perception and understanding create for us.

Such a shift in individual and cultural consciousness, while readily apparent, appears to go unnoticed.  We do not speak of such things.

Invest meaning in words that are not understood.  Create, and haunt, an empty prison. 

Cast a Cold Eye

If everyone is an artist, only the exceptional and the very strange leave an impression.

Culturally, an intellectual fascination with the idea of chaos prevailed for many decades.  Naturally it became prevalent in popular culture and remains so, to the degree it is commercially viable.  And it remains an issue of academic or quasi-intellectual importance, particularly in the arts, in which the "transgressive" is viewed as having value for its own sake, or conferring value to the artist.  Such value is so rare as to be almost nonexistent, as the so-called transgressive has become no more than redundant repetition of the clichéd act of shocking the bourgeoisie.  It has committed the cardinal sin of becoming boring.

The idea of order evolves accordingly.