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December 19, 2007
From Where Does the Product Emerge?
During this semester, I have developed two systems of enclosure through which I have come to experience and know poetry and poams. Both systems can be summarized in a visual representation. The first is a seed, and the second is a road.
The first system, the seed, gives explanation as to where a poam originates. The seed (like a thought) is planted in soil (like in the brain). To think on it (giving it water, time, light) will produce a kind of illumination. This illumination is what gives birth to a poam.
What happens when we neglect the thought? When we don’t give it the proper nutrients to grow and evolve into something else? Does the thought end? Where does it go? Does it die or whither away? Is it pushed further into the ground? Perhaps the seed (the thought, idea) is ignored, crushed or blown away but it does not end, it takes the place of something else. Perhaps it becomes someone else’s thought where it is planted and then enclosed in another person’s brain. It is possible that this person is able to give something or do something with this thought that we cannot. Its potential for blossoming is greater in a different place. This shows that meanings of poams alter with people and situations.
There are no set properties of this enclosure system. The possibilities are limitless, and in some ways, shapeless. Almost anything can be produced or not produced once a seed is planted. The flexibility, and possibly the uncertainty, of this system is what gives it greater potential to acquire more meaning. For me, it makes the impossible seem possible, and even rational.
What emerges from the seed is anything we want it to be. Isn’t this what art is? I was reminded of the possibilities of the products that grow from the seed when I saw reimagining art: finding art/poetry in math. I think this is a beautiful idea and I wish this idea of finding art in the most unexpected of places was something more people considered.
Posted by pbali at December 19, 2007 12:00 AM
Comments
This post is both elegant and significant, and I will say more later, but this blog and the others are (mostly) phenomenal, and I'm too pressed to write the lengthy comments right now that I will write during the break
--but I do want to emphasize this quote from your article in the link:
"That is, engagement in a task should be the result of a
desire one has, not a feeling of obligation. Being intrinsically
involved encourages us to creatively engage ourselves
and bring to light a problem that's worth addressing."
This speaks to (and from) the heart of the limited fork --and this spirit, this attitude, this oh-so-necessary perceptual growth has happened this semester --as your blog exemplifies.
Thank you.
(By the way, a movie version of your visual system of enclosure now inhabits my blog in the "Systems of Enclosure" post)
Posted by: thyliasm at December 21, 2007 02:09 PM
Actually, "Where Poetry Lives" is part of my "Conceptual Poam Systems" post.
Posted by: thyliasm at December 21, 2007 02:22 PM
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