Fluid Fragments

I guess I’m just hopelessly fascinated by the realities that you can assemble out of connected fragments.
—Junot Diaz

In the blue green vein of my subconscious—a cinematic impulse surges from my human hard drive—with nerve ending touch & eclectic sound. Continuity, cuts, cross cuts, jump cuts and fades stream on demand—scenes dissolve & roll with invisible credits. Hues shift, shadows elongate and delicious textures glisten. Easy to surrender to a silky montage of deeply saturated colors—dicier to disengage visions and visitations (explicit & subliminal) in black & white.

Leaping over time and whirling through space, minutes meld, seasons shuffle, lovers & others appear and disappear, while tangles of emotions mingle. Not exactly random connections, but fragments curated with smooth precision from within. I love to try to trick it (my subconscious)—alter the timeline, delete or drop in a sequence, gloss up the outcome—synchronize the flow.

Arrange whatever pieces come your way.
—Virginia Woolf

In phantom moments like the drip or zing of anesthesia lies the intangible zone where images emerge at an ever-changing tempo erasing interference. So I play my hand—knowing I might draw or deal a wild card. I light candles for the divine & bathe in a pagan glow, accept gifts from grifters, fall prey to dreamy drifters, befriend the lost and lose myself. I tie knots & loosen nots—and stroll in halls of mirrors.

In the fog with jagged edges, I like to investigate the sharpest angle of the truth. I like to join the cracks and melt the fissures—hypnotically weave distant past & future present. I like to arrange whatever pieces come my way (slices of permanent impermanence) in an exotic midnight landscape.

In the red alert of reality, fragments commingle at dizzying speeds in a constellation of directions. Some ricochet and sail right back, while others create crevasses—narrow and deep, long & wide. Assorted liars strut, conflate, and flaunt their wares—stockpiling—while ocean temperatures rise, wildfires ravage, floods engulf, and global boiling withers & destroys. (July 2023 the hottest month on record.) Civilian weapons multiply as fast as tragedy (US gun owners possess 393.3 million weapons), while preventions decline precipitously. Displays of hubris & power grabs proliferate.

Some things remain fragments, just the lyrics and melodies or a line or two or a verse.
—Tracy Chapman

And in a refrain of darkness & glory, we bid farewell to punk Irish singer–songwriter & activist Sinéad O’Connor. In 2020, while trying to relaunch her career yet stay near her son in an adolescent center, she wrote a haunting ballad, “Horse on the Highway”. Less than two years later Shane took his own life at just 17 while on suicide watch in 2022. (The New York Times 7/28/23)

Tonight I’ll dream we are in heaven.
Sitting underneath that apple tree.
Not being at sixes and sevens.
Just being with you being with me.

An intrepid truth-teller, may Sinéad ‘s music linger in a peaceful ether—for we errant earthlings to hold onto.

02/08/2020
the last time I saw Sinéad