Tag: literary criticism
Morganatic-from Seamarks
The Sea came to us–from Seamarks
The Stone Steps of the Drama-from Seamarks
Thus spoke the Man of the Sea
The Secret Purpose–Seamarks continued
Albion Asleep-an artwork in progress
My art show goes up in a week and now the most difficult part has arrived–the Artist’s Statement. But in this odious task, which I’ve always dreaded, I may have a small advantage. I’ve actually been working on it since I began this series, some three months ago. I only need glean the relevant bits from my blog posts and tidy them up. Right.
Blake saw Albion (universal Man) held in deadly sleep, in thrall to satanic, scientific-materialism that separated him from Jerusalem, his emanation, and the Heaven within himself.
The Gnostics taught that soul is imprisoned in matter; that Gnostic experience is a return to Divinity through overcoming the demonic forces (Archons) who hold humanity in bondage to dense spheres of matter. These teachings informed much of Blake’s work.
His work also reflects the Neoplatonic doctrine that acknowledges the primacy of the spiritual world and sees nature as the “vegetable glass” reflecting spiritual truths. Post-Cartesian science that recognizes only natural phenomenon perceived by the senses as sole measure of truth is the fundamental error which precipitated Jerusalem’s’s fall.
Jerusalem tells of Los’s struggles with Urizen (reasoning power) to re-establish harmony among the four Zoas (universal, four-fold man,) and the building of Golganooza, Los’s great city of art and science.
…and fourfold the great City of Golganooza: fourfold to the north ,
And toward the south fourfold & fourfold toward the east & west,
Each within the other toward the four points: that toward
Eden, and that toward the World of Generation.
The Zoa’s correspond with the four Buddha families who inhabit the vast edifice of spiritual architecture in the Tibetan Book of the Dead.
…at the northern gate of one’s skull is Vajra, Dark green, snake headed, and holding a bell.
O you, the four female gatekeepers…
Perform the rites which obstruct the doors leading to rebirth from the intermediate state!
Like the Buddhist masters, Blake saw that salvation lay in the recognition that God, Angels and Demons reside in the mind. Christ’s resurrection was not a single event of time, unique to a single individual, but as expression of the universal Christ-spirit within. This interiorization of the mysteries is part of the evolution of consciousness and the realization of the Divine Human. For Blake, Jesus is imagination, and lamented “Abstract thought warring against imagination.” The tragic effects of Urizen’s reign were evident in the squalor and slavery of the London cityscape where was enacted the cosmic drama of spiritual redemption.
Los is the fiery, artistic genius whose task is to restore Jerusalem and re-establish harmony among conflicting aspects of Albion; an inner kingdom that has been usurped by the soul-denying power of Urizen. The soul divided into warring entities is a sign that Albion has fallen into a sleep that closes the doors of spiritual perception. Caretaker of archetypal images, and fluent in the language of correspondences, Los forges celestial links in his fiery furnace, and illuminates the inner, demonic specters that would banish Jerusalem forever.
Higgily-Piggily Mindscape-an artwork in progress
Here is a small study for a larger piece. I’m wanting to keep it lean, avoid accumulation of extraneous detail and focus on atmosphere, light and a general feeling of spaciousness. This one seems to suggest loss.
Shadowy forms step forward from the mists with a single swipe of the paint rag. They appear in my dreams silhouetted against ancient fires, as if to demand I attend to their their melancholy plight wandering the in-between.
The memory practice is working. I went from recalling no dreams at all, to writing 5 pages this morning. These seem to have associations with the art project, “real” life, and offer encounters with Asiatic shamans in crazy hats who get on my case for some vague act of forgetfulness.
The intent to work with the spontaneous flow of dream imagery-the attempt to bring unconscious content into the light of day-involves a confrontation with subject/object paradox. Who is doing the observing? Who is observed? Looking inward brings up thorny issues about perception and reality that artists have been struggling with since Cezanne, and which mystics have explored for centuries.
How needing of compassion are the ignorant and the deluded, bound in this confining dungeon of egotistical attachment and the subject-object dichotomy…
The Tibetan Book of the Dead
Blake saw his brethren bound in this dungeon, and sang of fallen Albion held in thrall to the satanic, scientific-materialism that set man apart from nature, charity and the Heaven within himself.
Them Spambot Babes
The initial excitement of seeing that I’ve accumulated another 5 followers of my blog today is quickly dampened when I find their blogs mostly free of content. Some consist only of fashion photos. Why they feel this subject is of interest to me is perplexing. My fashion sense has of late (and Lily might concur in this) suffered a tragic lapse into epic shabbiness and left my wardrobe in a woeful state of entropy. Perhaps news of my slovenly demeanor has reached beyond these shores, and even the fashionistas of foreign lands hope to rehabilitate my wretched wardrobe. I can only be touched by their concern for my well-being.
Others seem to advertise dentists and food processors from the exotic paradise of Jakarta. While I don’t doubt such devices may make my modest culinary efforts more palatable, I wonder if they really hope I may travel to that exotic Indonesian archipelago to purchase one directly-or that I may visit the eager dentist after cracking my teeth on the unground remnants of the latest labor-saving gizmo.
I am saddened to discover that their blogs seem unsullied by the corrupting influence of humanity-that there appears no sign of actual human content at all.
Could these “followers” be the fabled spambots who infect the blogosphere with their vacuous sites in order to steal what meagre audience we real, earnest bloggers have?
Some seem tailored to my own interests. Others seem to feature computer generated poetry along with the earnest Gravatar of some attractive, female, aspiring writer seeking imaginary gain or some vaguely stated desire for my attention. I ponder the possibilities of such relationships. But then again, Lily might object to my courting spambot babes, real or otherwise.
This state of affairs seems to pervade the blogging experience more and more. It leads me to wonder what the future of blogging may be like when computer generated sites completely take over the blogosphere and all human error has been eliminated. They can then interact automatically with one another in binary code, multiplying endlessly, stealing each others automated audience without the need for such encumbrance as punctuation, grammar or spelling. All blogging could continue without making demands on our precious time and attention, free of obscure metaphor and existing in an unadulterated state. It would abide in the realm of Platonic ideas where everything is clear precise and soulless.
The Galvanized Emblem of McWhirr
“ Gusts up o 70 miles per hour are possible.”
The bland, melancholy voice on the NOAAH weather radio intoned the dread prophesy with all the passion of a jaded, Norwegian automaton.
Bagpipes wailed over the anchorage at sundown and the grim sight of the northern horizon almost made me cry. Clouds billowed white over the eastern Straits while, below, the horizon fell into the blackest gloom that ever haunted the nightmares of sinful, erring tars.
I had read in The Complete Anchoring Handbook that it all comes down to the right ratio of depth to scope of anchor rode.
50 feet times 5 make 250…good enough for a Coney Island swan boat.
I went below to lie on the pilot-berth. After a few fitful gusts, the wind fell into a tentative, uneasy calm.
Let’s see, 5 to 1 in 50 feet times…
“Have you paid out enough scope, lad?”
The bass tones welled from Old Hand’s bilges as from the aged, bronzed vessel of oxidized words.
“Captain?”
The angular form of Saturnius McWhirr was faintly illumined by the oil-lamp’s amber glow.
“I cast the anchor in 8 fath…” I stammered
“Avast, Ya greenhorn! You don’t “cast” anchors. This isn’t fly-fishing! My gorge rises at such lubberly misuse of sailing language.”
His wrath, like a line-squall, subsided as rapidly as it came.
“Did you know that to raise an anchor you must first let it go?”
“That’s true, sir.”
He always makes these pithy pronouncements like they were scripture. And, for McWhirr the act of sailing is a religious rite. He hails from Zoroastrian, Quaker stock and, for him, a ship is a vessel to carry his weary spirit ascending through the 7 concentric spheres of corporeality to the final landfall of essential being. He has seen the beatific vision reflected on the sea’s mirror, and it draws him ever northward in search of the true face of divinity behind the mask of appearance.
“Look at this arm.”
Like some cloaked tragedian in a nautical horror show, he furiously tore his sleeve to reveal the tattoo of an anchor engraved upon his sinewy fore-arm.
“I carry the fouled, cold-forged, emblem of hope engraved upon my soul.”
He leveled his eye at me as thunder rattled the wheelhouse windows.
“Have you any family, Mister Spencer?”
“Yes.”
“Do they weigh upon your heart; do you feel their woes as your very own?”
I was too unglued by his interrogatory glare to answer.
“Are you willing to set aside your pleasant, little cruise to do service if called upon?”
“I don’t know if I’d call it a pleasant cruise with this weather.” I said defensively.
“Would ya be able to leap into the maelstrom to save a foe?”
“If I had a PFD,” I answered lamely.
He fell into deep silence. His spectral image receded into the oaken bulwarks of unfathomable woe.
“Then you are no shipmate of mine,” Said the fading echo of his baritone.
From the infinite distance came a low, thrumming tone that set halyards frapping on the mast. The sound rose steadily to a piercing shriek-as if all the denizens of hell had let loose one frenzied howl of pain.
Old Hand skewed violently in the blast.
I rose from my bunk, put on my foul weather gear and ascended the foredeck.
Let’s see 50 x 10 = 500…that’s 10 to 1…for 85% holding power…
Not bad odds.
A View from the Wheelhouse 