Learning to See, Learning Not to Shut Up

Daytime is for writing; my alarm is set; the evening hours pass quickly, and I dawdle, and soon (now) I reach the wee hours of the morning. I know this will affect my day, but I can't seem to turn off my brain, or turn it fully on, either. I am beset by insecurity; I feel dislocated, nearly dizzy, yet somehow eerily still, unmoving. She says there is still something missing. And she's right. But isn't that how I always feel, how it always is—as if there is something still missing? I am perpetually one revelation away from figuring it all out.

But what to do about that? I am full of revelatory moments, full of paying attention, full of learning to let life roll over me, roll through me. I know these things. I live them. In this, at least, I walk my talk. I am the living breathing unknowing. But how many times must I bite my own tongue just to remember the iron taste of my own blood? When will it be enough? At what point may I open my mouth and speak instead?

I think art changes people, changes people's hearts. That's what art is; that's how I'd define it now, anyway—at this hour, on this day. That's what it's done for me; art has changed my heart. But what about beauty? It is not always lovely, what I have to say, what I have to hear. It is not always even palatable. And yet. And yet. There are these things that need saying, these things that desperately need saying.

I know, and have known for a while now, that I can't shut up. Not to say that I haven't, because often I have, but that I mustn't. I'm pretty sure, too, that that's something of the job description of an artist: learning not to shut up, even if you can hardly breathe, even if there are tears streaming down your face, even if you are saying things no-one wants to hear.

Yes, I need to learn not to shut up. And it's harder than I thought it would be, especially for a girl who everybody thought would be a lawyer for her incessant arguing. But that's not me, not really, because I can't bend the truth, and I can't make a point for a point's sake. I am always seeking the truth. Concealing is not my profession; it is revelation. Sometimes I am pulled to call it epiphany, but it is less like something landing from above, and more like learning to see.

It's painful though. That's the part no-one tells you. Learning to see is painful. Because it takes a willingness to be ever-vulnerable, be always proven wrong. And when, if just for a moment, I let the defense clap shut, the fall is sharp, the waking stark.