My Art is a Phoenix

And so it is that in the history of art,

the great work arises 

from the ashes

of loss, tragedy, and sorrow.

Art begins as an ache.

When was good art

ever made from happiness?

Who works when they’re happy?

So, this is our dilemma:

How to make art

and still know happiness?

To sit and contemplate

a leaf, a rock, a cloud,

it is possible to commune

with what is

without an intermediary.

Like pure cinema’s

return to its 

elemental origins,

such simplicity feels

nothing less

than avant-garde.

But this world is the history

of creativity.

Whether an artist or not,

all men and women

are entrusted with the task

of crafting their own life,

to make of it

 a work of art.

An artist is possessed

and completely diseased by

creativity and ideas.

For that, we are willing

to sacrifice everything.

There will be pain.

There must be.

Consider the grapes that need

crushing before producing wine.

The leaves that must endure frost

before generating their brightest colors.

How then, to live with pain

so it strengthens and informs

rather than

weakening and discouraging us.

Hurt brings awareness,

making us more present

to the beatitude

of the present moment.

Beauty is not

an object apart from us,

but a way of perceiving.

Is anything beautiful

if no one’s there to perceive it?

Is the sky at dawn spectacular

if we are fast asleep in our beds?

The world demands our attention

and beauty is spiritualizing.

That is how we take part in it.

It is connective.

Beauty is a calling

and can be 

a vocation;

Otherwise,

one risks becoming

a human Dickensian factory

run by a tyrant.

But the good news is:

nature is with us.

A bruise dissipates slowly,

like a spider un-building a web.

A cut closes up in a matter of days

without the slightest planning ahead.

Snip off the head of a flower, and

a new one explodes in its place.

A salamander grows back its tail,

unlike a nose despite one’s own face.

Rain evaporates back into clouds,

as an arrow’s origins are a quiver.

A liver can slowly regenerate itself

the way a finger pushes out a sliver.

Cells die every second or so

only to be promptly replaced.

A tree repeats its branches though

its roots down below go untraced.

Take note of the healing that happens

without effort, meddling, or intent.

The only vacuum that nature abhors

is the lack of faith in what to expect.

Therefore, my art is a phoenix.