Wednesday, July 4, 2012

chaos and idea

Sleep hasn't been coming easy.  I close my eyes and the floodgates open.  Phrases that do not seem to be my own relentlessly voice themselves without permission.  Images of unearthly creatures clearly take shape and then flash by:  Predatory multi-armed stick men wait and leap, a giant lizard creature with flaming nostrils slinks around devouring a coliseum full of people.  I open eyes.  Shift around. Sip some water.  Close my eyes and the line that forms between my lids is like a tightrope above an infinite chasm.

Yesterday I read about the Big Bang theory.  I read about the universe beginning from something called a singularity which was immeasurably small, dense, and hot.  One theory is that a singularity exists at the center of a black hole compressed by gravity into density that we could not even comprehend.  But this is a problem because it is also believed that once there was nothing at all.  No universe.  No singularity.  Just nothing.  Think of that.  I close my eyes and try to imagine nothing but my mind is in a perpetual state of explosion.  Fearful shapes are stepping out of the void.  How far down does that go?  If I keep my eyes closed could I be brave enough to watch?  I close my eyes and my physical being is a very thin blanket shielding me from existence.  Perhaps that is all there is.  A blanket and existence.  Or a blanket and nothing.  Or just nothing.

How far down does that go?  I don't know but I want to find out.  Maybe the roughest waters are on the surface and I am not yet skilled enough to move past them.  Maybe I have to swim through them.  So far it seems that art is the only thing that allows any sort of access into my own mind.  My own singularity.  My own void.  It gives me a certain degree of confidence and strength to close my eyes and proceed.  Or open them and proceed.  To navigate through the chaos that is the birth of an idea.  I close my eyes.  I open my eyes.  I close my eyes.  I open my eyes.