 |
 |
Fascinating, Roger, & of great interest to me, as I have long wondered what I would mean by the term. On the other hand, I do seem to be trying to get away from self-knowledge into a space where things happen without the kind of self-regard that too often accompanies *my* attempts at it.... Doug On 12-Mar-06, at 1:46 PM, Roger Day wrote: > "Self-knowledge protects us from inspiration; inspiration, like sexual > desire, undoes us. For non-believers, inspiration is more like sexual > desire than anything else; a fascination, a fear, and something we > think of as having a secret solitary pleasure attached to it." > > umm. this is the opposite for me. All my recent poetry has been built > on self-knowledge, the results of analysis, the playing out of > metaphors gained thereof. > > Inspiration for me is a stone-cold killer. I have no emotion when it > comes. the less emotion the better. I view it as a third party, a dead > fish. If I do feel in that moment, or past the moment, then I know the > result is crap. If I have *any feeling at all for the subject, no > matter how personal, then I cannot become, be that subject. I have to > reduce the positivity to a minimum. This is true for me whether it's > poetry - a concentration state of epic proportions - or > drawing/painting. > > No matter my feelings for the subject, I have to lose it for the work. > It's a matter of shapes, landscape, metaphor, analogy, words. If I > have any pre-conceptions, a view of the I of the subject, a connection > with the subject, then the drawing/poem fails, descends into > sentiment, and I've been there but only deliberately. I hope. > > I can see parallels with Doug saying "lose the pronouns". I'm in the > business of distancing btn myself and the subject. A ship that lets go > the tugs, and enters the ocean. > > Anything that gets in the way only lessens the impact of the result. > > Roger Douglas Barbour 11655 - 72 Avenue NW Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9 (780) 436 3320 What’s received’s given out in smaller measure. The speaker as hearer comprehends what he can’t say, a music of what sounds him. Wayne Clifford