Subversion (of the heart)

And so I am pleasantly lost in Montreal. Where I never thought I could find my inspiration again.

Glenn Gould is guiding me back to my home, whether it be in the trailer in the glorious summer in Kirchheim or in my imagination.

I am afraid to touch the table or the chairs or the counter top because they may prove to be really there
I can hear myself sigh alone in the kitchen wishing I was somewhere else,
watching the days go by and the afternoon fade into evening
Riding a wave of time
days to weeks to the warmth of the evening air in July
I dare not share it with anyone lest they are disappointed with my greatest gift

A candle either side of me and the screen emitting its coloured light, Bach billows through the air pushing the particles before it, and
My hands, crouched at the keyboard are closed and like my affection, tired
A mite too weary is my positive goodwill, it is only this music
and the thunderstorm on the other side of the glass which
awake
Me from my feigned reverie of love and grace

I wonder how far I can stretch my dreams to fit my love
For now I can hold my head up high and plough through the concrete basin,
other people call my home
For now I can hold with the strength of ten men against a sea of despair and disbelief

Rarely do I live for now, though
Passing at all points in my past and future, I tend to live for when

(In a Bachelor apt on Av du parc, winter 2003)

Luscious life is Jen last February the drive down to N S, the stay at her parent's place in the dead of winter, the long days when we had nothing to do except coordinate life and the exhibition. The bitter bitter cold. The days when it was minus 20 and we walked down to the harbour and we met that man who invited us into his newly built house on the waterfront. I really felt like I saved her life that winter. That was a hard time for her. It was easy for me to give myself to her, so easily. It was almost what I was born for. A room for her, a shell where she could live until she recovered. She moved into me and spent her time in my energy in my head in my heart where there was more than enough love to cosset her, to hold her and reassure her of her own greatness and her own beauty. When it was time to go, she left. I was empty again. I was a shell once again and I had to rebuild my insides again. I had to rebuild the tissue and the skeleton. I had to rebuild the organs. Conjure them up from atomic particles and mould them in a new image. A rebirth. I rebuilt my body from conversations with friends who loved me. I transformed their words into energy I could use to make tissue and flesh. I am built of love. Love in all it's stages. From a child discovering the magic of their voice and their laughter. The uprising of emotions and power and self-awareness of adolescence. The disappointment of adulthood as life becomes at once both open to interpretation and against my will. Stages which took me years to experience, I built up with the help of my family and myself in a period of a few months. When I saw Jen again, I was not quite whole, but I was an adult again. With that intelligence I backed off her and pulled a curtain across the entrance to my soul.


(found on my desktop, late summer 2007)

One day my parents will die and my world will fall apart and I will realise that I can no longer afford to dream. That moment is now. I already see my memories of them. At photographs, at heirlooms and trivial momentos. I am here. Alone. Financial and emotional support was a gift in the past. It is time to make my life happen. I have waited for years to follow something or someone, something or someone I can believe in. Still I sit here, waiting for someone to show me a path. To show me my path. Perhaps I have found someone I can believe in. Perhaps I have found someone I can love and respect and trust to hold my head up when crises of money and other such burdens weigh upon my soul. I must trust what I know. I must have faith in myself. I know me almost. But do I love me. Well, almost.

(Aug 2006)

In the Eye of the Storm

Do you ever have that feeling when insolvency hits and you watch your savings disappear and depression hits you hard and fast and you wonder how you're going feel good about yourself again? You know that the only way to get out is to do something. MOVE. Don't stop moving until you accomplish something. Anything. Then life starts the ebb and flow again, away from stagnation, away from self-destruction. But for that time, when you can't take the mental pummeling that you give yourself and you feel helpless and worthless, and you watch it happen, then that's the real destruction. You stand there and watch and listen. You can't hear anything, because you're in it. You're in the middle. Rather, I am. And all is unfolding around me. My emotions like tornado winds are swirling around me, uprooting all manner of protections in their path. Whereas I, am rooted to the ground in fear, in trepidation, immobile. I watched it this morning, but I can't stand it for long. It's too powerless a place to be. Anger, frustration, fear, envy, jealousy, culminate in the storm and I look outside and it's a beautiful day. The kind I love. When its 28 degrees and the warm air greets you when you walk out the door. I smile at strangers as I ride past them. I feel alive again and unafraid. As long as I don't go back inside, because that's where the storm dwells. It enters my head when I'm sleeping and festers in my heart, when I surf the web. It unabashedly, stirs up past feelings of doubt and denial and challenges my every waking decision.
But I don't need this. I just need a little love, that comes from me.