I never thought love could be uninspiring. I once thought I could touch life. Tease it. Embrace it. Rest its plumes at my breast. Outstretched I grasped at gulfs. Only to stare. Stare! What poetry in this moment! What restless poetry. Coalescing. Reaffirming. Disrobing. Gossamer. Glistening off into the gloaming.

Upon the banks of the Hudson. Train steaming north into disgrace. Wilted marigolds in the desert haze. Feeling in the words. All life and love in the words. The great granite heat of the beating day! Withered defeat to the gape of some mischievous, deceiving dawn. Say to me again. Tilt. Tilt.

Let this moment skip to the last.

Rapturous winds. Flagrant pleroma of the unity of now. Lightness of day. Purity of air. Convergence of east and west. Future and former. Blink. Desolate night. All gone. All away.

Away with them I said. And they have done away with me.

Until they show again.

Last night, as the thermostat in our apartment broke 80 as we were about to go to sleep, my girlfriend got me to cave and turn on the air. The cool manufactured air pouring through the vents onto my nude body, exposed because Erica had her nude body cocooned in the covers, resulted in my waking up this morning (well, technically yesterday morning) with a stuffy head and a swollen throat.

This lasted the day but I pushed through in order to satisfy the day’s demands. However, as these demands took their toll on my already weakened mind, the demands of the night grew to be daunting and then, eventually, defeating. I grew irritated and unfocused before collapsing agitatedly onto the bed around midnight. And yet, despite having gone to bed two hours ago, I sit here now, at my desk in the living room, cup of chamomile beside me, unable to sleep. I can’t even seem to envision sleep. It’s like the silenced darkness would prefer my waking company these hours. My mind is hazy, yet my perception is as vivid as the day, or, perhaps, the most vivid dream.

But there was something else that kept me from sleep. Yes, my throat feels as filled with glowing coals, but as I lie there buried deep in my pillow I could not make my mind darken. There is a wonderful line from “Calvin and Hobbes” (one of so many) in which Calvin declares the nighttime to be the most frightening time because all the fears seem more real. At least I think it was “Calvin and Hobbes.” I do not possess the desire to search at the moment. Nevertheless, the validity of that statement (in some variation) seems difficult to deny. In the bustle of the day we can easily distract our minds from that of which we wish not to think. But as the sun sets so does it take with it the very light which allows us to shade the unfavourable. In the comfort of bed, amidst the soothing silence of the dark, those shaded fears come to light, dancing in the helpless halls of our dreaming minds.

Maybe it was only that I am feeling sick, but tonight those fears jumped and jived (but did not wail) before me as on a theatre screen depicting a movie of myself. Each time I tried to cloak them in some other comforting thought, I failed; the worrisome images just jumped right through. The more I thought the worse my body felt, and so eventually I gave in and got up. The resiliency of my mind is no match this evening. It should follow, of course, that Monday is my “long” day. But I can’t worry of that now; there are too many others.

I do not mean to imply that I support insubordination or rebellion. Nor do I promote obduracy. I in fact believe in the tenants of established order, in acquiescence to circumstance, and in the power of authority. I believe granting due respect to those who are wise and admirable; I believe wise words should be considered and followed. I believe in the power of criticism to bring to light voids, inconsistencies, or observations. I believe that which moves into a territory of destructive or disruptive principle should be intervened upon with non-destructive means.

What I champion is enlightenment, thoughtfulness; reason. That is, any resistance must be informed, conscious, honest resistance. Opposition, hostile or otherwise, without logic or reason—that is, opposition on selfish, stubborn, sentimental principle alone—has no ground for validation. It is opaque and juvenile and stands as the bane of a mindful society. Not a soul is to be taken seriously when unable to take serious with consideration her own being. One cannot acquire and maintain the individual confidence we all seek without an openness to critique from others. But this openness must be wholly open, with humility but never mind-less subservience. The Self must be sure yet accommodating; never intransigent.

More lightly: Sometimes if enough people say enough times that you’re a cat, you might just be a cat. If you wish not to be cat than you may either refute those who call you a cat and go on declaring (believing) that you are not such, all-the-while remaining a cat to your own blinded, naive satisfaction. Or you can consider these claims, think deeply on them, accept them, and seek to change your nature as a cat. Seeking to change that who you are but don’t want to be forces one into deep meditation on those things we so freely disguise, thereby bringing about a better understanding of our Selves and the contexts in which our Selves subsist, thereby transforming character by the very action of seeing that character. A reflecting, maturing being in this way is worthy of respect and thereby earns the rights of resistance.

This professor’s (whose own teaching tends towards the tragic) critique was, somewhat to my surprise, slightly scathing. And so, as I sat uncomfortably in one of her rather comfortable chairs I found myself (as I often do) trying to assert my self-consciousness, so as to convince her, seemingly, that indeed I am quite aware of both my actions and implications. Several of her “concerns” regarding my pedagogy, more technically-aimed, were indeed valid, and I acknowledged as much, citing once again my confidence in a greater scheme. Those concerns regarding method notwithstanding, it was almost as if she had no desire to recognize precisely what it was I was trying to do in that classroom. This has been one of the greater conflicts I’ve recognized during my time in graduate school: how academics cannot detach from the scope of their own distinction and interest and allow for—indeed encourage—work and growth as an individual within a system, and not as another name within their system.

I’ll be rather honest here when I say that I felt singled out, distinctly attacked because I’m the slightly reserved (see: cautious), slightly pompous (see: confident) “outsider,” the philosophic-literature guy in a world of ancient culture and language (all outsiders themselves, the inhabitants of this world). Indeed I was Medea herself, the passionate, stigmatized foreigner (though my children remain unharmed, indeed unborn). My dragon chariot awaits.

Normally I am able to allow criticism to slide down and off my back like children at the playground. I am open, aware and humble enough to accept what others say, and incorporate it if I feel it will help in maintaining and promoting the balance I seek, and not take away from it. Humility not withstanding, I am both confident and ambitious. I trust in my Self above all else and, though what I try to promote may not always project sufficiently, I know in my heart and in my soul what I am building. I know what I’m doing and there is not one cynical, self-righteous “man of the world” or “man of the word” out there who will deter that. We are all works in progress, but some unthinkably wield little control of the process. Why should we not control the forces of our own being?

That is not to say that I don’t have forlorn moments of doubt and wonder, moments where I question whether or not I actually know what I’m doing as I say I do; moments where I feel I have no control at all. As I left the professor’s office I had one of those moments, one that has carried through my day and into my bed where I now sit propped up against a paper-thin, white wall. What if she was right? What if, when she told me that she just didn’t see the point to my class, that it wasn’t just her pedantic blindness that missed it? What if it didn’t have a point? Or, perhaps worse, if it did and I’m simply unable to convey it?

Ubiquitous anxieties, which dissipate with humble reminders of my success and realignment, reassurance of the path on which I trod. But, like all other issues, it seems to speak to a larger concern which rests, nestled deep in the dark, dripping grotto of my soul. That is, point, purpose. Is it any good to keep on doing things the way I want to when no one else recognizes it, when they ignore it on their own selfish principles? Is the integrity of agency, autonomy, and steadfastness enough to overcome the poverty and isolation of self-containment and self-centeredness? I absolutely believe it is, and anyone who knows me well (if anyone actually did) knows that I cherish authenticity and loyalty to value, virtue and to the Self beyond anything else. The deeper question, however, that faces us all is what if I’m simply not good? Is anything ever good enough? What if everything I think I’m doing, everything I think I’m building towards, is just juvenile nonsense and Romantic delusion? How do I know? How will I know? And if I’m told, will I listen? What if, when I listen, it’s already too late? What if I’m just wasting my time? (And, again, anyone who knows me know how much I detest [see: fear] time wasted.) What if I’m just a nominal god?

But I’m not, of course. We are all gods in the powers of our own psychic selves. From Max Planck: “I regard consciousness as primary. I regard matter as derivative of consciousness.” Yet so often we shut our ears to this (in the words of Ghandi) “still, small voice.” We fear that force that is our conscious selves, that “power that…holds together, creates, dissolves, and re-creates” (again, Ghandi). We deflect the god that is our Selves onto other things. We let others bear the responsibility that we should innately bear for our selves. We waste time in this way, and in this way we train our kin and our kindred to be empty, devoid of values or responsibility. We make the world frightening in this way.

Ghandi said, “the purpose of education is to bring out the best in you” and, as an educator, I adhere to this. And in bringing out the best in my students I try to help them become aware of that “best,” aware of their own selves and what that constitutes. Why is this concept alarming? Why can I not be who I am? Why can’t my pupils strive to be who they are?

Indignantly dispersed luminosity: transfixed, transpired, traversed. Words march in triumphant rhythm, lame and dumb soldiers towards expansive nothingness. Negation is movement, too. The befallen mass does not belie the natural truth, the omnipresent, prescient cogito. Sapere aude. Unnatural to those who pervert and shit upon nature with their plastic gods. Transfiguration murmurs in my dream; the poetry of the vision and movement that is mine. And yours, if you placed your ears to the air, souls to vibrated voice of all natural space.

I laid out upon the stones, sprawled and naked to bathe in silver light. I was not alone. Kate, open and free and dying, beside. June in the air, on a star, in a slithered beam. Elisabeth drowned in the distance. And so I was alone after all. God in all things. Not alone.

All washed out in black waves. Redeeming light now dim, dead. Kate and June together, alive, within. All chaos. All love. There is present another. All alone now, again. All god away in the dusk, night. Opal opaque night. Redemption drowned with Elisabeth without sound, or motion, or attempt. Alone, alone. All present; alone.

And so I wrote the words.

But life is all-inclusive and art is all-encompassing. There is no distinguishing hierarchy but only experiences and judgment. There is no unique experience, only unique judgment. Novelty lies in the unconscious. Our movements, our feelings, our visions are shared. Archetypes of the collective unconscious. My life is your life but your life is my life.

Such is the artist. The one who captures our lives. The one who makes us say, I didn’t think anyone else felt/saw/thought this. The one who sacrifices his life, the one who pains and sleeps and screams in solitude all to make us see that we’re not alone. We share existence; it’s the one who is not scared of it, who recites it who is the artist.

Reflecting against the settled, gray fog the candle flame flickering on my coffee table seems split. Dancing twin ghosts in a slow, calm dark. Stillness. Still life. Life is art. People ruin it, ignore it, mock it; artists capture it. Our mirror. When the world is quiet its image whispers poems.

The artist understands. So when others inevitably disappoint, let existence speak to you, comfort you. Existence is art, frameless.

Sometime during my teenage years I started a semi-regular baseball column which I gave the title “Fearless Baseball Ramblings.” This column, which I emailed to assorted family and fellow baseball enthusiasts (eventually I put it on a website), was usually long and sectioned. The first part covered something or other I felt warranted attention. This was the feature and usually took up most of the column. The rest of the column had assorted one- or two-line thoughts or quips or rumors (which I probably stole from some other column), and I always segued the two sections with “Ramble On!” (this is when Zeppelin was a regular sound in my headphones). At the start of the baseball season I wrote a special “Fearless Baseball Predictions” column, the contents of which I’m sure you can figure out. It was fun.

The column had no regular schedule. I simply wrote whenever I wrote. Overall, it lasted a few years, and people usually enjoyed it. One day, during one of my semi-regular teenage temper tantrums, I wrote to everyone that I would be discontinuing the column because I was smothered beneath massive writer’s block and I would never write again. It was a big boo-hoo moment and I wish I could see again what I wrote so I can grimace pitifully at how little has changed. Nevertheless, after my throwing in of the keyboard, I received an email from one of my uncles who not so surprisingly told me, in so many words, to cut the crap and just write the damn thing. One line from his email that I to this day remember (and incorporate) explicitly: A writer only gets better by writing. So just write. And write. And write.

In the almost decade or so since that email I haven’t quite followed his to-the-point advice. I write a lot, of course, in various mediums (and my profession, after all, does require it). I’ve maintained several blogs (including this one for longer than I care to remember at this point), filled countless notebooks and sheets of paper. In this interstice I’ve also written two books of poetry and various columns and articles, so I can’t say I’ve followed through on my I-quit-writing declaration either. I write, I think, I write some more, I think too much, I write less. Thing is, as much as I write I probably don’t write enough.

When someone asks me what I do I tell them I’m a writer and a teacher, and this is only partially correct depending on who’s analyzing it. I am a teacher, so that’s not at all incorrect. But am I a writer? What are the qualifying characteristics of such a label? I often maintain that being a poet and being someone who writes poetry are two completely separate things. Does this apply for writing in general? Is it a profession? Is it a state of mind? Must writing be read in order for it to be writing at all? Must a writer write well? What is “well”?

None of these questions I can answer here, and so I won’t even attempt. It doesn’t even matter; I’m not trying to define what is a writer. Or am I? Who knows. Maybe the writer does. Anyway, my point (must writers have points?): I have always thought myself, despite whatever other personal zeitgeist I was in, to be a writer. This is not simply because I have always written “well” (there’s that damned word again…whatever it means) but because it’s always been my mindset. There, maybe I just answered my own question from before. But my (apparently outdated) line of phenomenological thinking tells me that all things metaphysical (ie, having the “mindset,” however nebulous that is, of a writer) must actually be dualistically attached to the physical of which it is meta. Or something. So, at what point must I actually write and craft and publish consistently in order to in fact be a writer? At what point must my mindset become manifest? At what point am I just playing pretend?

My problem, dare I say it, is not necessarily talent but consistency. I ebb and flow. I start projects but don’t finish them. I come up with great things; I come up with crap, or something that’s been said already. I write a lot; I don’t write at all. There is nothing in this list that separates me from any other writer (or any artist, for that matter), but I like to think myself distinct. What, perhaps, may distinguish me from others is that I like to chalk things up to flow and fate. It’ll happen when it happens, I say. But this, as I see it, is too passive. It ignores a certain level of reality that says in order to distinguish oneself (the goal of any artist) one must actually do the distinguishing, or the work that goes into the distinguishing. Talent alone is seldom enough. What my passivity ignores are those very words my uncle wrote to me those years ago. I need to shut up and do it. If I want to be great, if I want to overcome the piercing daggers of inferiority which have stabbed me all my life, I must do it. The longer one sits on something, the more opportunity he gives to another. I’m sick of watching other people be me.

If you have spoken to me sometime in the last year, or if you’ve paid attention to things I’ve written here, then you know well at my attempts towards wholeness. From August 2008 until roughly two months ago I thought, naively, that I had attained it. It is only in these last two months that I’ve been torn open, completely exposed, and I’ve come to realize just how much more I need to do. The thing with seeing yourself so nakedly in the mirror is that you’re often startled into non-movement, which eventually becomes regression because we try to seek comfort so as to ignore what we’ve just seen. Falling in love is easy; it’s in making love work where the trouble lies. The same applies to life and the self. I’m the process of making the self work so that I can make love work and then make life work. I’ve taken several measures in this, many of which I plan on sharing with you. And so here is the next: from here on out I will be posting to this blog on a semi-regular basis. My goal is a minimum of five posts per week on various subjects. This is not all, of course, but merely a space for open exercise. As this semester whittles down, I will also be picking up several projects I’ve let become buried under dust as well as explore some ideas for new movement. I will try to maintain some level of openness about my intents and my progress and just my doings, but I can’t promise immediately complete transparency. The focus of my coming work, I will say, is more creative and less academic. The techniques I’ve explored in order to do this all will not be easy, and the results will not always be pretty. One thing I’m fairly confident of, however, is that it will be me. Purely. Wholly. (Though not Holy…)

When we want someone to see something in ourselves, but that person simply doesn’t see it, the disillusionment and the sadness which comes can be paralyzing. For me, this time, it is galvanizing. In all my sadness and glory, here I come.

This particular friend of mine once held the rank of significance for me and many others; despite her quiet, infinitely humble, innocuous demeanor she was at once a voice and presence in the church, a leader, a Sunday School teacher, an elementary school teacher, a store-owner, a wife and mother, a friend to many, and a mentor and guardian for me at a time when despair seemed all I had.

It was over a year since I last saw her, a year that saw her endure more than any good person should, and a year that saw me grow into new realms of faith, awareness and appreciation. It makes me sad to think that I will never see her again, and that I never got to share with her my newfound love and appreciation for peace, sunlight and life. I never got to ease her as she eased me so many times. I never got to tell her how much she did for me and so many others, how much she was appreciated, how important she actually was.

There is no more fitting description of her I could give other than that she was a paradigm of peace. She promoted it through her serenity and compassion, and she maintained in the face of constant dissonance. How she maintained her peace is both astonishing and inspiring to me and, though I’m sad she is no longer on this earth and concerned for her young son, part of me is relieved to know she will no longer have to face such dissonance, such trial. Her peace, always constant during her life, is now eternal.

No, my wish this morning was to be more like my mother. Each day, regardless of weather or circumstance, I hear in the frail, dripping, distant traps of my psychic caverns my mother’s powerful, perfectly pitched voice in song: This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it! There are days when I curse her for this, for being so excruciatingly naive. But it is when I curse her that I realize I am only being defensive and cynical. It is when I curse her that I see myself as that sad, lost one who sleeps until noon and then wastes the remainder of the day in the glow of a living room screen; it is when I curse her that I see myself as the bitter, scornful one who proceeds in his day without civility or compassion, the one who need project his own anger at himself outwards so as to only justify his sorrow. But this is not her and so as her blood, and a piece of her spirit, this should not be me.

But how easy it is to be this, to allow the negative forces of daily life to impede upon the one central truth, the light which should shine bright through all dark days: we are alive! I do not believe that the, or any, Lord has bestowed upon us this day, this life, but that has no bearing on my appreciation for it. On this day in particular the sky is infinite gray, a cold drizzle seems not to fall but merely hang in every inch of the air, of the gray space. Because of this rain and this cold the bitter and sad are even more bitter and sad, some become even (a strange use of that word in this context, I admit) enraged or depressed. This leads to traffic, or traffic leads to this, or they each flow into the other. Regardless, what results is increased negativity and decreased love for that beautiful thing which we all share.  And all of this before punch-in time.

When I wake with my wish I need only to glance at the sunlight sleeping beside me, or think of my all-loving, all-compassionate mother and I can move on in grace. I face that same rain but I kiss that moisture, let it revive my heavy eyes. Some days, as I implied above, are more difficult than others, of course. And how quickly comes the jaded disillusionment and disappointment with the failure of others to walk in this same light. But no one, not Jesus nor Ghandi nor Lennon nor Jung, said that Unity and Peace come easy, nor do they come once and stay forever. To love is to commit, and I love life enough to persist in learning and light through ignorance and shadow. To do this I need constantly to remind myself of the glory of each day, and of what I am here to do. If only I could hand out post-it notes to the others.

Each one of us affixes ourselves to something else in order to proceed with our selves. I can’t condemn this, of course, because clearly I follow a certain doctrine in my own life which was not originated by me. But to allow the golden thumb of the miller to tip the scales towards the other is to create an unbalanced self. We take these outside forces (say, for instance, religious doctrine) and toss everything into its greedy arms. In this we are no longer a self, or a Self, but the Other. We find false peace and not a shred of unity. I thank my mother each and every day for presenting me with an example of love and faith, but I do not pass off my life onto her. She is my reminder of the Goodness I wish to be. If only we took these tokens of Love as reminders, as examples, and used them to restore a faith in our selves we could create a unified, peaceful, loving Self which does not drown in the floods but kisses that refreshing water in rejoicing and gladness.

But what is the reason for this form of masochism? Why can I, upon approaching those I trust, analyze my own situation perfectly, draw out with eloquence and epiphany what the missing piece is before advice from the other has even been suggested, but then proceed in spite of myself in what would be assumed as the wrong direction? Some call this passivity. Some (for instance, me when discussing the situations of others) call it fear.

The reason is because I believe in the power and course of chaos. I believe situations work themselves out (not exactly towards the point of final rectification, however; the nature of Truth may be implied from statements below) and that from the winds of chaos blow the breeze of order. I believe in the forms (forever shifting) of the abstract. I believe in the inherent, and hidden, purity and goodness of things. I believe in Love and Self. I believe in consciousness, both personally and collectively. I believe in the unconscious. I believe in the limitless strata of this very existence which are always flowing, always forming and coming apart again only to intertwine in harmonious difference. I believe in the flowing river which both drowns and directs home. I believe in Poetry.

These are not conceptions easily grasped by others, especially in this western world of modern science, of politicians, of exploitation, and social degradation. These conceptions are brushed off as too conservative, too vague, too essentialist, too formulaic, too indirect; too “unreal.” These people are often those you’ll find at church on Sundays. Nevertheless, you’ll notice in the above paragraph my belief in consciousness. And so therefore I can present my awareness (again, as indicated above) of the finite, fragile stick on which the flame flickers. I can declare with humility my shortcomings and follies. The strength of my consciousness grounds me in situations, and, as you say, we should always be in the moment. But moments exist not as they are, but in context and concept. We exist outside of physicality, outside of the body, of the room, of tangible conflict. We are out of our control…though we exist, and we say, and we do, and we move. And when the elements converge, when physical and non-physical, “real” and “unreal,” meet and meld this is communion, our step away from, and towards, alienation. From Brihadaranyaka Upanishad:

“The human being has two states of consciousness: one in this world, the other in the next. But there is a third state between them, not unlike the world of dreams, in which we are aware of both worlds, with their sorrows and joys.”

This is Faith. Not fate, nor destiny, but Faith in the innocence and goodness of things as they were, as they are, and as they should be again. But Faith is not such an easy thing to maintain. I can see where the narrow minded reader may see in these thoughts a tilt, a certain “blinded optimism.” The more thoughtful, mature reader, however, should take from my accentuation of consciousness and harmony (in addition to whatever she may know of my psychological readings) my belief in the shadow existing alongside the light. The dark must exist with the light, the evil with the good, in order to form the whole of existence. We are forever in conversation, not dictation. But Hate is too powerful a foe for Love. How feebly Light acquiesces to shadow. Civility, humanity (community by our nature as humans), falters, hides, dies. The crystalline river, fathomless in depth, becomes blackened, polluted. It flows no longer towards Home. Faith is challenged by science, by desire, by evil, by fear. Faith is challenged by the situations of our own physical lives. The body strangles the spirit and we are left unwhole and jaded.

So what are we to do in the face of these powerful foes? What are we to do when we stare into eyes as striking and pure as that crystalline river and know that they deceive? When one speaks with words of love and promise, but when known to manipulate? How can I kiss away your pain if a pill can do it more effectively? How can I have faith in that which so mocks it? We can adore without faith, but can we love? Can we work?

When Faith submits it ceases to be Faith. Several years ago I wrote my undergraduate English thesis on the notion of hope in Waiting for Godot. In it Vladimir and Estragon exist, despite their poetic and philosophic aptitude, only for Godot, an abstract concept, a non-physical presence (leaving out intentionally here my analysis of the boy who sees Godot). As the world beats them down, as time whithers their bodies, the two representatives for humanity are left with nothing for which to live. Except Godot. And so they wait and they endure. They infuse merciless time with superficial trivialities—exercising, singing, gazing, fighting, dribble—all to wait for Godot, a being whom they have no true confirmation will come or even exists, but a being whom they know must exist. What of their Faith?

And so when we hold in our arms, feel against our physical bodies, that deceptive thing we do so because we feel its spiritual purity. We feel its hidden, un-matured presence somewhere in that dark passion. Through the passion we see the sorrow.  When our own blood boils just the same in the wake of a kiss we kiss again with the might of Mars, believing Venus to keep that blood flowing to the heart. We see the deceptive darkness of desire but we transcend it, not exploit it. Though we see not the pure unitive force, we feel it, we believe it, because if we didn’t what would be the point?

But is my feeling, my faith, simply my own naive passion? Am I making this all up because I’m passive and afraid of a cruel, crude, hopeless reality? Am I forming things from my own entranced adoration? Am I so deceived like that one who does in fact exist?