"When I paint, I liberate monsters . . . They are the manifestations of all the doubts, searches and groping for meaning and expression which all artists experience . . . One does not choose the content, one submits to it.
1927 -
Belgian Artist
Do you choose the content of your creative work? Or does the content choose you? This is probably one of those chicken and egg questions that we will never know the answer to. Most of the time my content chooses me. I sit down and start writing. I don't have a plan. And the content appears out of no where. Rarely, do I make a conscious choice about what to write.
Does your creative work liberate the monsters within your heart and spirit? For me it does. We all have a dark side whether we want to admit it or not. Most of us most of the time keep this dark side under control either through drugs, religion, sports, creative work or sheer will power. Yet I am amazed at some of the monsters that emerge from my writing. What monsters have emerged from your creative work? Here are a couple of my short poems.
Saviour
Sometimes while alone
in the corner of my cell
I have second thoughts
about the recent return of Christ
and how I could have saved her
from the outpourings of his wrath
if she would only have rocked me in her arms.
Nightmare
A hand reaches out of the closet
and slits the throat
of the young man with black hair.
We all fall upon his body
like scavengers picking tidbits
from the evening garbage.
I slurp his brains from my cupped hands.
(Quote source: The Painter's Keys)
