What Lies Beyond, Part Five

Changes

Joan Ann Lansberry

May 23, 1998

A year ago I sketched this flower and pressed
the tiny buds inside my sketch book. I found it today.

Changes is the tentative title of this section, for that is time's theme. Ever that, but more so of late. Helina has found her own special love and will be beginning a new life with Shayna. They seem meant for each other. Both are inclined to a rich inner fantasy life and their worlds come together and merge with ease. In the beginning of June, they will move into a place of their own near here. Helina's three cats will meet the animal kingdom of Shayna's twenty-four felines, as well!

Fresh romance must be in the air, for today our friend Tyan visited with a eager sweetheart of her own. They were looking forward to a weekend filled with frolic.

Even the triad is experiencing major changes for Julia is re-entering the work force and will begin working as a security guard Tuesday!

I found the pressed flower and sketch when I opened the book to begin "Still Life in Yellows and Gold". I set up this still life in the sewing machine table yesterday and worked all weekend on it, so that the sewing machine would be available for use tomorrow.

Julia Cameron, author of The Artist's Way and The Vein of Gold in conversation with Samuel Bercholz, founder and president of Shambala Publications:

What Ms. Cameron is saying resonates deep within my heart's core. My romancing of the muse has all these spiritual implications. When engaged in the creative act, whether through poetry or art, I feel closer to the First Source, the Creatrix of all that is. Not all artists feel this way. We recently had occasion to visit with Gaby, a well-traveled, highly cultured woman who crossed our web-path. Gaby is also an artist. She spoke of having a "need" to create. She might have regarded my explanations of feeling "more connected" when creating as the ramblings of a childish theist. But in agreement, we both share that "need" to create, something we MUST do.

Julia survived her first night of work. She is sleeping now. We have the room darkened and are using the air purifier which also serves as white noise maker. She needs her sleep very much, but when she has had sufficient rest, Julia awakens with the cutest smile on her face.

So asks Peter Vokac on today's Community Front Page. It's the question of many timid art lovers who forage out into the world of culture. So often the modern sensibilities are lacking, and much of what's acclaimed is tedious at best. Twenty years ago, I questioned the things that were put before us in a Modern Art History class. Assemblages of garbage, tawdry or even ugly, were presented as things to be appreciated. The only thing to be said for such items, is anything in the real world looks artistic after looking at them...the cracks in the sidewalk, the pattern of smudges on your front door, anything! Virtue by contrast may have some eye-opening aesthetic, but does little to serve the cause of art.

I asked the teacher the purpose of all this. He said the raison d'etre of modern art was to make you question what art was. This left me rather unsettled. Left to our own intuition, we know what Art is. It must be beautiful and powerful in its communication. There must be rhythm, balance, harmony. There must be depth. There should be a hint of the deep underlying issues of what it means to be human, in a truly great work of art. It communicates "the universal", as Ms Cameron says. Art may explore painful truths, but always the essential dignity of humanity should never be threatened. It is a hatred of humankind to do otherwise. The 'artist' says all is ugly and insane. Perhaps that is that individual 'artists' truth. But it is not universal truth.

The news item that provoked this discussion concerns events at the Tucson Poetry Festival.

"No charges will be filed against a Tucson poet who invited the Vail Middle School choir to sing during a poetry reading parents called sexually explicit.

Pima County Attorney Barbara LaWall announced yesterday that 'Ann Nominus' did not violate decency laws during a poetry reading that involved children at the annual Tucson Poetry Festival April 3."

The Arizona Daily Star published her poem, ``[name deleted]'' so readers could determine its worth for themselves. It was a long, rambling disjointed incoherent piece that was hardly pornographic. The veiled references to sex were tamer than anything vividly portrayed on prime-time TV. It, however, was painfully bad, and the students left halfway through its reading, before singing the song 'Nominus' had invited them to sing. Some parents made a issue of it and called it pornographic because they needed a label to put on it. You can't sue someone for BAD poetry. Bad poets have a right to publish their work.

(Note of August 2002: I've changed the poet's name to 'anonymous', per her request.)

But the choir director should have seen the poetry first. Peter Vokac had this to say:

Goddess, save us from "modernity"!

May 29, 1998

James came home from work yesterday having heard and reporting unsettling news. Would there be war in South Asia? Two weeks ago, India conducted five underground nuclear explosions, despite disapproval from other countries. Their long-time bitter rival, Pakistan, felt they had to assert their strength against India, and Thursday, also detonated an equal number of bombs.

Fearful for what the future holds, I've been reading the news wires to learn of progress. The Associated Press reported the two nations are stepping away from nuclear abyss, as "Pakistan proposed yesterday that both it and India sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, while India suggested a mutual pledge not to strike first."

Still, so much damage has been done already. Both India and Pakistan are poor countries, yet their leaders spent billions of dollars for this display of muscle. Their people could little afford this. In Pakistan more than seventy percent of the population remains illiterate. Disease and malnutrition run rampart in these countries in which basic amenities as electricity and clean drinking water are a struggle to obtain. Many nations have joined in economic sanctions against the countries, which may add further to the poverty. Also, what harm have been done to their environment by all this nuclear testing? The immeasurable costs will even be felt on our peaceful shores.

We take the shapes and details of familiar objects for granted. Day after day, I've spent possibly thousands of hours sitting before my sewing machine., but had never really looked at it. This afternoon's quiet drawing become a meditation of discovery.

But I am at those locked rooms with my eye to the keyhole, and ever restless. Patience is not easy.

June 5, 1998