Looking Outwards for Inspiration

Constantly looking inwards for inspiration is akin to digging for treasure and discovering a mass grave. And so I have been suffering the cliched, albeit timeless struggle of, How long can I indulge my dark side before it completely consumes me? Normally, I find it incredibly difficult and counter-intuitive to enjoy art and literature while I am trying to be creative - it is an exhausting and futile task, akin to swimming against the tide. So then, How to reconcile my love of reading, the enjoyment of observing and contemplating art, and the need to learn and expand my knowledge, with the want to produce original, uncorrupted art???
I have decided to attack this dilemma head-on. The other day I began this daunting task by tackling a not-so-daunting novel by Ayn Rand called Anthem, which explores the concept of the individual in a Dystopian future. This has inspired me to explore the theme of Dystopia and how I envision it.

...she disappears...

Soundtrack to My Demise (or What I've Been Listening to Lately): On An Upswing, Wishing for Summer...

2 TY SEGALL - MELTED I am a sucker for raw, reverb-heavy, fuzzy garage rock. With the bass turned up to its max and my headphones on, it feels like two boulders pummelling my skull from both sides, rendering me into a giddy, blissful state. The catchy melodies and sentimental, slightly off lyrics...sounds like summer: unwashed, reckless, up to no good, and not giving a fuck about anything.

"...talk talk it's all you do, so I never talk to you oh no....cause you're in my head so I never go to bed oh no...cause you, you are Imaginary Person, you're in my head but I am certain you are real..."

3 THEE OH SEES - WARM SLIME

In a similar vein - this album alternatives between making me bop and pony like an idiot, and disintegrating me into a meditative, thoughtful trance. It reminds me of a summer a few years back when I spent a couple of sick, doped-up weeks in Fresno, California, during a record-setting heat wave. The sweat evaporates off of your skin as quickly as it appears. Everything about my surroundings seemed ridiculous and surreal. It was an absurd and memorable experience. I kept a journal at the time, in the attempt to keep apace with my thoughts. I can't follow a single strand to the end - they all just get tangled into a giant knot. All of my writing is in alternating hues of neon ink - most likely due to the influence of a certain prescription drug known to cause hallucinations.

The five palm trees on the edge of the parking lot are five skinny punks leaning, hunched, cross-armed and mohawked.
Another tree has leaves large and glistening like so many metal chandeliers hung atop one another - a pyramid heap of kitsch discarded, dumped, glinting and giggling in the sun.
Flower heads bob lazy and drugged like sprung Jack-in-the-boxes.
The sun preheats the sky to a scorching blue. A hot wind scrapes the crumbs of baked foliage off of the surface. Worms grill on a cement hotplate, crispy and still twitching, and are scavenged by ants and birds.
The heat prickles beneath my skin. It bubbles and boils red and sore along the top of my arms, on the backs of my knees.
My bones, body agitate my skin, shake and rattle me. The old layer of flesh shingles off, weeks after my foundation shifted and cracked.

A New Beginning...

It is mid-July but last night I left a window open and an autumn chill snuck in. It brought a squirrel that ran haywire across the kitchen windowsill and knocked over a couple of empties. The noise woke me up too early. 
The cat is content on the warm place in the centre of the stove.
I have the window to the fire escape rigged so that it is always open a couple of inches. The constant flow of air masks the smell of natural gas that would otherwise fill the apartment since the pilot light went out a couple of months ago. I am too embarrassed to let my landlord in to light it. But not enough to make an effort at scrubbing the crust off of the burners and sweeping and washing the floors.
Half-awake, I turn on one of the other three burners to boil the kettle for tea. The cat is startled but doesn't jump down in time. The fur around her butt and tail are singed.
I try to console her but she wedges under the bed in the far corner where I can't reach.
Aside from the cat, I share my apartment with two cacti, a dressmaker, a record player, and a typewriter. If it weren’t for the murphy bed, I wouldn’t have a single piece of functional furniture.

Ghost Story: Part Three

Utterly deflated - I need new life. So I put a record on.
I shimmy my bones to the record playing. Close my eyes and feel it fill out my hips, my ass, my soul. Dance real slow. A cold beer in one, numb hand. A clove cigarette in the other. Slink around the apartment. Pause in the bathroom to tap the ashes into the sink and glare at myself in the mirror.

Swamp Thing

Born from the swamp, out of the sludge and mire.

She is radiant - glowing with something beautiful but menacing.

Another Work in Progress