on inspiration.

started talking to some friends about where our influences come from, and why we create the way that we create. looking at art, reading our writing, you can always see that there are various heroes voices coming through the cracks. we're not creating art in-character, and taking their voice and patching things together the way that we think they would. no, no way.

the best way that i can explain it for myself is through the way i found more strength in my poetic voice through hearing cedric's words in at the drive-in songs (later and more specifically, in mars volta tracks) and then reading burroughs' naked lunch. i didn't take any specific cues from them. i didn't see what kinds of words they took, i didn't follow their stanzas and replace syllables that fit. i found strength in their aesthetic. literally, and i've explained this several times to anyone who will listen, they made me feel okay to write the way i was writing. having a new voice is exciting, and innovative, but to be writing the way that i sometimes write and have no one able to understand it, to have comments like, "it just seems like you're throwing words at a board and seeing what sticks" is pummeling. so disheartening.

but when i got that form of acceptance through reading other people's art, to see abstractions that i have been drawn to, both internally and externally, it's like a new awakening. you keep going. you find your place. like being raised by wolves but happening onto a township of sympathizers.

but it's something inside of us that's arranged for inspiration both within and without. somehow during our creation as the person we are today, a decision was made within our hearts that we will find genius in various artistic aesthetics. whether it is raw realism, fully abstract perception, the old, the new, broken, rusted, minimalist... any of it. and when we have creative hands or voices, we are naturally drawn to that medium or that style. it's why we like the bands we like or the paintings we admire. even sentences spoken or sense of humor. it's what makes us laugh or shudder or dismiss.

if someone were forcing me to draw a still-life or photograph a portrait, i couldn't do it and be happy with it. i'd still see those products as flawed. no matter how high they ranked within that genre, they'd look the same to me. they feel fraudulent to me. as i'm sure masters in that genre would feel about things that i've loved, and things that i've created and had pride in.








i've found myself so uncomfortable in my own skin these todays,
want to pile my wardrobe in an oilfire.
i'm finding it so easy to ignore the tools of self-improvement.
shoveling spades of soil onto full-length mirrors.