A lot of artists say that they don ’ t want to explain their work . That they like for the interpretation to be up to the viewer and I get why . For me , this isn ’ t one of those times . I ’ m not writing this as a guide or as a means to an end but rather as an explanation of the road that got me here and hopefully not tell you what to think but rather what to think about . Not today and maybe not even tomorrow but hopefully someday you can put down your phone , close your laptop , take your headphones out and listen and look and think , better yet question and know , there ’ s never one right answer .
M
The idea of a catalyst was perplexing to me . I think that it drums up a number of initial thoughts and ideas but the more you think about it , is pretty brilliant yet even vague . At first it feels external and forceful , almost like you ’ re forcing things to happen . I wanted this poem to instead , evoke the feeling of a catalyst as being internal .
I thought I would start with a stream of consciousness dialogue around the idea of possibilities … and to be honest , the poem wrote itself . I found that my subconscious associates these ideas of possibility and catalysts with the following motifs :
Awareness Pressure Control Resistance Timing Letting go
The idea of possibilities came from the thought that in order for things to happen there needs to be an action and a reaction , much like a catalyst and in order for the action and reaction to take place , there needs to be an intersection of possibility .
Imagine , you ’ re in your car at an intersection . You can go straight , you can go left , you can go right or you can turn around . When we pull up to the intersection , we ’ re all aware of what our possibilities . The options are clear and when they ’ re not , the outcome is madness .
So here we are , we ’ re at a place where the possibilities are endless and there ’ s pressure . We have to choose and the tensions are building . The ideas inside of us are welling up . We have to let some out perhaps because we ’ re bursting from the inside , or perhaps to make room for the next one .
Now , we ’ re walking down a hallway of possibility . We can walk through this door and date this person . We can walk through that door and take that job . We ’ re aware the doors are there and we feel pressure to go through them , but we have control of which knob we turn . Other people may open up the doors but we ’ re the only ones moving our feet .
When I first started thinking about catalysts , I not only thought about possibility but I had a vision of a fire , however I was visualizing the fire as people and possibilities . The more people we surround ourselves with , the more fuel we ’ re adding to our fire and ashes are flying and settling around us , but we ’ re still resistant and burning . And there ’ s a choice , you can keep burning , fly with the other ashes or settle on the ground . I ’ d prefer to feel weightless and use the ground as my sense of awareness .
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