– a collaged thing.
As a practice, collage continues to unfurl itself in front of me. Arriving, in the form of language, one that bears many gifts– obscure but revelatory and belonging only to me. It is fraught with signs that expose hidden desires, symbols that conceal well-kept secrets, along with the soft sounds of the innermost of thought.
It further extends into my world as a sort of poem, the lines, a metaphor for life, as I do my best to meet its insistent demands. Each element is arranged in front of me in a way that contemplates this strange existence– the requirements of motherhood, the burden of survival, to answer the call to artistry. It is odd to also feel like the collaged thing– shifting around the scraps of your old self, tucked under a new, trying to imagine one of the future, working to bring into focus a life I can not see.
Taking a blade to exact the edges of my life feels necessary; here, I refine, reimagine, and bring a new thing into view, but it is often an encounter I would like to refuse. Please, not another self; I do not want to fragment her again, cut into it once more, rearrange her so often. I shudder at the unrecognizable moments, where I sense the chaos under my fingers and can not assert control of how and when it will come together, as conceived in my mind.
I need to wander, the same way I might walk away from the paper or canvas that is unwilling to reflect an accurate or complete expression. When pieces I remember carefully searching for, perfected the day before, have disappeared, when the corners have lifted, and I can see only smudge and error and imperfection. When it feels like I have lost track of the hours, the seconds and time has nearly run out. I must, and all I can do is make do with what I have in front of me.
What is there to do with art, a life from which you are trying desperately to cobble together what has been given to you? I know it requires tenacity, an endurance, a well I cannot always draw from, but I have no choice but to keep moving around its pieces. I am reminded of the work, akin to my life's constant dismantling and reassembly.
Appearing from the remnants, a thing unbroken. No matter the mess I make of the parts, they can be made whole. And for a moment, I remember that when it is all said and done, I will know what it means to endure and carve a life with my own hands. And I am more grateful than ever to be a collaged thing.
