power

a glimpse of the summit

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I will make it.

I’m not there yet, I’m not nearly there, but something has arrived within me, ahead.

Certainty.

It’s hard to put the feeling of it into words, but it is deep, a plunging power of thrill, resolution, satisfaction and desire.

Yesterday evening as I wrote to a friend I recalled a theory from my research; in a moment, I could see exactly where I was, and exactly where I was about to be.

In the writing of one of my favourite mountaineers, there are sometimes climbs where this sudden advance knowledge arrives. It’s mysterious as it does not always occur. But when it does, it contains a thrill of power and hope which cannot be concocted. Even more mysteriously, sometimes it is this very power and hope which actually enable the achievement; without that vital last shot of energy, it might never have been reached.

It is also something to take care of. The thrill of certainty carries its own risk of intoxication by euphoria. The very relief can make one careless. The precious substance of conviction needs itself to be channeled into ways both focused and diligent, to enable it to fulfil its own promise.

Today: lists.

an act of daring

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What has it all been about, this summer, this piano playing, this renewing of an inner studio?

At the end of a summer holiday in my home country, which contained an inner adventure, I found myself absolutely renewed, expanded, with the kind of glistening clarity I could barely have imagined possible. Derisory concerns and pettinesses of worry had cleared completely away, as if a whirlwind had gone through my life and left only the most beautiful things, hope.

I was effervescing with the delight of it and wild with the power of myself that had been as if launched within the exhilaration. I was ready for projects, expansions, longings, dreams…

And I returned home to endless, continuous difficulty, disruption, demand, discouragement and dread.

Hmmm.

The last few weeks have consisted of repeated attempts to rediscover, retrieve, establish, rediscover, retrieve this substance of myself. I am accustomed to such dynamics but rarely have they been so ferocious. The other day I was despairing with my friend about the endlessness of it and when I saw her yesterday she had had a thought.

There is a situation I had not quite been addressing, something where the difficulty of the dynamics were risking inner collapse, compromise instead of conviction. It was easy to argue the validity of succumbing to the pressure. Any reasonable acquaintance would have commiserated with me and left it, disconsolate but rational.

My friend is not entirely convinced of the life-deciding legitimacy of what currently passes for reason.

This is what you need to do, she declared, and then outlined what felt like, in the circumstances, the most preposterous, vulnerable and socially unconventional way of relating to the circumstances.

And I knew she was right.

Suddenly I knew, this was what my summer was about: And this is how I will complete the work of it.

Now, alongside the sheer endlessness of the weariness, I feel a glimmer of excitement.

(And fear).

deplete, replenish

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In the struggle that is this perseverance to hold onto the self that is present in the piano playing, I find myself needfully sensitive to what enables and what undermines my ability to hold and extend this attitude.

It sometimes surprises me how much very small things can have a disproportionate power to boost or to drain. In these days of waking already a little on edge, my very ordinary morning rhythms have an almost mythic quality, so much do they stabilise me on waking. Likewise beautifully written texts, an autumn leaf in the sun, kindness whether to myself or witnessed to others, my favourite tea, perfectly brewed, candlelight.

Anything that jars me looms larger, as an enemy: a minor breakage, yet another lie ushered by a public figure, an angry voice, whether to myself or witnessed to another, not finding an outfit that expresses some highly precise inner feeling, taking longer than expected.

This sensitivity attracts old shame: ‘making a fuss’, ‘overdramatising’, ‘self-absorbed’. Yet it is an expression of something deeply mattering to me, of a kind of protectiveness of a treasure.

There is a high level of personal exposure in my life and artistic practice, modest as it is, in that I try to live very true to what is happening, not numbing myself with the usual hiding places. I can see from old seasons and many acquaintances, that much of life is often lived muffled, a blur. It is easy to lose oneself in Responsibilities, Children, Scrolling and Series.

The tools of my work are the very sensitivity I am protecting, to joy, fear, nuance, significance, tone, mood, gesture and language. And beauty, love, tenderness, mystery and grace.

It is good to remind myself, to strengthen up that I have chosen what I am doing and living, and I embrace the entirety of that choice.

Then also it is only wisdom to address the depletions and accentuate the replenishments, looking out for them as I live the day.

Sing

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You, faintly beating heart,
wounds louder than
your loves, your hopes
yet beating still, yes,
although your sounds are drowned in
work and fret

I hear your fleeting glimpse
I hear your leaping hope
I hear the strain of aching long ignored
I hear containment creak its last captivities

You, voice
in secret humming hopefulness, yet frail,
weak from your hiding places
convenience, old stories, loss,
the places you elude
a confrontation

You, whose voice, whose heart
I know has power,
I call you, whole,
to open up the gates of hell
unlock the brokenhearted
retrieve the lost and lonely

Sing with me, you of heart, of voice, sing!
Sing heart! announce the dawn!
Sing voice! stir the fires of hope!

Sing future into our beings, our fears, sing wonder!

Sing, sing, you, lover of humanity
lead us in your tender songs
Let our cries heal hearts,
our whispers mourn
our laughter triumph

We cannot live our sorrows alone
sing what you were made for
sing what you are made of

Note: this is a poem in progress. Sometimes when I am writing it is like the poem itself is struggling to be born through the still-existing layers of patriarchal culture, and postmodern ideology; the heart of the poem is there, doing its best to be born full and whole, but in fact by the time the heart makes it into the voice, it is bedraggled and bleeding, showing signs of struggle. So this is best seen then as a draft or pr/echo, and perhaps something more resonant and whole will come soon.