Solve et Coagula

Dissolve and Bind, the reunification of that which has been dissolved.

I’ve been on a journey, a wandering trip through an unrelenting dark labyrinth. In the physical material plane, I traveled through the Far East, visiting the shrines and temples of Japan, the deep jungles of Borneo, Papua New Guinea, and Timor. I climbed to the top of sacred Mount Fuji and took elevators to the top of Taipei’s and Hong Kong’s skyscrapers. I swam in crystal clear island lagoons and dove into caves in less traveled parts of the Bismark Sea.

I traveled the labyrinth unable to find a path, unable to find my way to the wellspring from which freshwater flows, even if just a trickle into a moss-covered pool. I came back to my adopted land and spent time in the desert, asking for answers, walking for miles with my friend over chaparral-covered routes once traveled by native tribes and Spanish missionaries. I drove across the country, from one ocean to another, from the sun-drenched California beaches to the humid decaying marshland of the Carolinas.

The whole time, years, I’ve felt a disconnect, a disassociation, energy expended and diminished. For a while I wrote and wrote, I read and learned, I took notes, scribbled in journals, and drew pictographs. Everything I created was false. Everything I created was disconnected from the greater reality because I was disconnected, an imperfect mode of transmission.

I would sit down, and begin work, and nothing suddenly nothing would come. My focus, razor-sharp in my dreams, was scattered and dull. The best I could manage was a dull echo, a much-diminished transmission that failed to relay the message. My attention was wasted on trivialities, my aims were drawn towards ideas and expectations that were ill-suited, my path darkened and my goals confused.

Then I went home. Home to my homeland, the place of my birth, the place of my father's birth, the place of my grandfather's birth, and his father before that, as far as I can account. I slept in my father's room, walked the path of my ancestors, and I felt a spark inside my soul, a diminished flame that lay dormant for years, maybe decades, come alive again and begin to burn and transform, to fuel and elevate.

My trip, short as it was, nourished me and rekindled something in me that was dulled for such a long time. Most of all it cleared my sight, allowing me to see so much of what preoccupied me as minor and meaningless. Like a student who finally can understand a foreign text, I understood that I was walking the wrong path, and the farther along that path the deeper I found myself in the darkness of the labyrinth.

Since my return, I have written much. Poured out thousands of words, for the first time in almost two years. Chaotic, unformed, but fresh from a well of energy that I was unable to tap and often feared dry.

Is it good? I don’t know and I don’t care. It is mine, and mine alone.

So what is the point of this work, what is the meaning of this place? A stream of thoughts, emotions, ideas, and conversation. This is not a place for edited censorious work, but a place of raw ideas and experimentation. Sulfur, Salt, and Mercury. Here I will experiment. Some will fail, and most will fail, but I hope that out of the chaos, a nugget of gold can materialize.

Here, in this place, I will share my thoughts, I will throw coal in the furnace, engage in tessography, and transcribe oneiromancy. No longer concerned with product and profit, or the conventions of medium. I’ve wasted too much time walking in the wrong direction.

If you are interested in my thoughts, my opinion on art, literature, and curiosities I find intriguing you are welcome. For those of you that have supported me and for those who will support my work in the future I thank you, and I will share with you work ahead of time, before final publication, before it is released out into the world. It will be raw, it will be messy, and we can even talk about the process, but it won't be false, it won't be contrived.

So welcome, I’m glad you are here.