Cymatics (or, thank you Zach and Jacob)

The study of Cymatics seeks to show us that there is more to sound than meets the ear. Sound-waves move and pulse and swirl and cause their surroundings to do likewise. By focusing the vibrations of sound on something like water or sand, you can actually see the sound move through the material, eventually taking a shape.
You change the sound, or frequency, and you change the shape.


I watched this:

..and in the last 45 seconds, I started thinking about Creation.

So sound has the ability to shape things, and to take shape, right? So every shape we know of, the circle, the star, the snowflake, has a cymatic twin - it's auditory other.


Imagine an alternate universe that looks like ours, but everything you see is actually just balls of sound arranged into representations of the physical world that we know. We have the physical ability to create a shape through a sound. We can, in essence, sing or play a cube, a sphere, a starfish, into existence..
















This sounds like Creation to me.

So when God says let there be "Light", what does his voice look like?
And when he says, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear", is He speaking the very shape of Sea and Land? Does his voice sound like dry land appearing and waters gathering? What if the thunder of creation is an ever-changing symphony of creative sound, pulsing through the formless and void, leaving trees and and seas and snowflakes and starfish in its footsteps?

Who knew Genesis 1 could be for Scientists... All this time I've been thinking it was for Artists and Botanists.

Tangent. Process. Renga.

I haven't said much lately.
This is mostly due to the unfortunate preoccupation of over-commitment, but can be partially explained by another writing project I've been working on which I'm excited to share with you - eventually.

But for now, I have an idea.
It's not original, but neither am i.
It is unique however, and so am we.

It's called Renga.
It's a traditional form of process poetry which is responsible for what we now know to be the Haiku, and this is how it works:

Person A writes a Haiku
(a short poem consisting of 3 lines with syllables counting 5-7-5).


Person B writes 2 addition lines of 7 syllables each to tag on the ending of the first Haiku.


Person C writes another Haiku, drawing primarily on the last 2 lines for inspiration.


Person D writes 2 more lines of 7 syllables..and so on and so forth.




And seeing how i only affiliate with quick-witted, well-learned, articulate and creative people, i think this could go somewhere..

Or it could just be me ending a post with 17 strangely organized syllables. Either way, I come out looking more inspired and poetic than i really am, which i'm obviously OK with.

therefore...

Fading yellow leaves
Form ranks in Color's last march
Against coming clouds


*idea taken blatantly and without apology from http://www.soulpancake.com/view_post/1498568/i-see-your-haiku-and-raise-you-a-renga.html (which is a great blog you should all follow)

*a sidenote about the necessity of storytelling

I'm not sure which day it is that you are reading these words and worlds - maybe it's October 21st. perhaps it's November 2nd. it could very well be June 14th..

I AM sure, however, that today is a very good day for making up a story.

Tonight, i watched a meteor shower, and in the too-dim-too-fleeting light of falling rock, i returned a question with an answer that never was until i spoke it.


mostly i don't know what i'm thinking about until i start telling a story about a make-believe place full of make-believe moments, and then and there, i slowly find out what's inside as i turn the pages in my mind and listen to my own self-revealing twists and turns..and then later i find myself remembering that story, and remembering some thing which never was..and then i know just what it was i was thinking about when i made it all up..and in that way, storytelling is like the string on my finger reminding me about what i'm hiding away in the crawl space behind my eyes..

and besides, listening to the words and worlds running between my brain and my heart is much more fun when to the sounds of imaginary pages being turned..or so says I, at least..

that's all.

chapter five: no one likes math

i went in to yesterday doing all kinds of counting - i counted miles and REMs and responsibilities and commitments and connections and pages..but not calories.
i definitely did not count calories (good thing too, cause those cream sodas were real good. and those donuts, too) ...

but sometimes i count and list and stack and order
when all i'm really supposed to do is watch, just watch. that's all.
it's really pretty simple when you take the math out of the equation.
(get it?... equation?... man, i'm good)


really, what i'm trying to say is if i hadn't stopped counting,
i would've missed a really great night.
[author's note: this will most likely be a recurring theme in these chapters]

And so, when the numbers stopped, i heard my friends laughing, moving forward onto a beach access road with fog falling thick enough to drink. And i heard Mitch's playlist, perfectly and appropriately narrating our respective adventures through blown-out backseat speakers. And i heard Tyler(the other one)'s tongue react to his experimental coffee drink brewed far too hot to the warm clink of the black and white sounds of the Gypsy Den piano. And i heard an accordion, a cowbell, and dancing. And i saw two men hang out of the second-story window, looking down at us, half swaying to the sounds from inside. And i saw them wave us up.
So up we went.

everything's ever only exactly as it's supposed to be.

And so, in the end, when the numbers stopped, I heard a great story.
I didn't hear a full night's sleep, or a shrinking list, or a finished book,
but I heard a great story.
(and a little mariachi, too)

*recently, when I'm not listening to mariachi, i'm listening to this or this or this.
**also, i got the photo from here

chapter four: home

*these are some types of homes
---------
my home smells and tastes like pumpkin bread.
it looks yellow and brown and orange and red. (the rhyming stops here)
it sounds like my parent's laughing beside Dress Shoes' rhythmic meeting of Hardwood Floor while my Old Piano sings along
and it feels like a little bit of light let in through partially closed blinds.


being home is
the right kind of catching up
followed by
the right kind of alone.

I'm gonna step outside a minute now..

..

So I was just laying in my hammock out back staring up at the clear, cold, blue sky changing frames from between the green birch leaves and branches hanging low and swirling slowly, thinking more about home, and God, and home and God, and the sky, and friends, and pumpkin bread, and then i came inside, noticing i had leaves in my hair and on the back of my shirt.
and i thought, "that makes sense".

...it's nice being home...

chapter three: on the airplane

"[ i closed the book with one hand, and, placing the other on top to keep it shut, i breathed out fully and easily, glancing around to see if anyone else had noticed.

my eyes flickered suspiciously from the book, to my empty cup, up to the head-rest currently ignoring me, to my sleeping neighbor across the aisle and to the right, and to dimly lit letters spelling, "n-o-s-m-o-k-i-n-g", before returning to the book again.

Here, i opened the book with one hand, and, after following the index finger of the other back to those words, i read and reread them until i knew they weren't going anywhere.

and then i asked the man next to me if I could borrow his pen to write these things down on this napkin (which was left over from the stack he had given to me earlier when i had spilled my water all over the seat dividing us) because i didn't want to forget what i was thinking about during the narrative briefly described above.]"

- an excerpt transcribed and revised from 'The Napkin in My Pocket'

*image taken from here

chapter two: colder wind

Dear Leaf, your time's come
fallen by a colder wind
than the one before.

- a haiku for the new season-


... here's to pumpkin flavored everything. God bless these days.


*currently listening to 'Beggar' - Achilles and the Tortoise

** image from Revivify's photostream

chapter one: tonight and this morning

As i begin this thought, it's 2:32 am, and i can't imagine a better time to think out loud (metaphorically of course..my roommate's asleep in the bunk above me and so i can't imagine him being much in favor of me saying all this out loud to myself right now)

As i begin THIS thought, it's 2:34 am (seriously, it took me two minutes to write that?), and i know what i need to say, but i'm not sure how i'll do it
- and with that, i welcome you to the blog of an external processor.

so here's what i'm thinking about tonight and this morning:

i'm mostly sure that i don't live enough of my days starry-eyed and awe-struck at the story unfolding all around me.


i waste far too much time with my face pressed tight to newly-fogged windows which separate me from objective, rational existence [which is more like a museum exhibit than a firework show.. and watching exploding fireballs is always a thousand times more fun than looking at wax figurines of our pre-human ancestors..except for dinosaur museums, which are always awesome..but that's for another entry]


And so i spend far too few moments
with the kaleidoscopic looking glass
which paints my perception
like imaginative
and thankful memory
being made.


Me: Tonight was an experiment in the imaginative,
and you know what?
You: What?
Me: That is precisely why i am writing these things at 2:48am (it's been 14 minutes...i'll save you the addition) and not some boring time of night like 8:31 or 10:14.

- tonight i sang songs and ate tamales and watched stars peek around clouds and praised God in silence and watched a fire burn with new friends while we made up funny roller derby athlete names (i.e. princess slaya', condoleeza slice, slamela anderson, mary tyler gore, & loco ono)

and THEREFORE

-tonight is a night worth remembering -

so here's to nights and mornings spent open and expectant.
I hope you have so, so many of them.


*[ sweet smoke art - http://helmo.fr/ongoing/smoke-/ ]

a foreward..

I'd like to start this blog with a promise:

I promise to be wholly inconsistent in my writing - to say far too much in one instance, and then to leave you verbally stranded in the next.

[If it helps you decide whether or not you will read this blog, I will provide you with this alternative comparison] ...

... I will most likely be an unhappy mediation between two unfortunate characters from the story of your last weird family reunion - the over-disclosing, oppressively informative aunt, and the reclusive, otherwise disinterested great-uncle who only speaks to you in passing to remind you that you're not as tall as your brothers are..I'm just saying...


So, that said,

consider yourself warned, internet, and stay tuned for Chapter 1...