A still rising terror

Photograph by Matilda
Rilke had chosen as his own epitaph this poem:
Rose, oh pure contradiction, delight
of being no one's sleep under so many lids.

“I confess that I consider life to be a thing of the most untouchable deliciousness, and that even the confluence of so many disasters and deprivations, the exposure of countless fates, everything that insurmountably increased for us over the past few years to become a still rising terror cannot distract me from the fullness and goodness of existence that is inclined toward us.” 
― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters on Life: New Prose Translations

I can only guess at the nature of events that caused "a still rising terror" within Rilke, having read about his life which, in many instances could have silenced, and in some, almost did silence him completely as a poet. 

     And yet, he wrote these words, giving me hope when I am faced with exactly something similar, "a still rising terror", at something I cannot quite name, but feel the cold shadow of, hovering, clouding what could have been a sunny day. 

    For want of a better word, I will call it Guilt. But I know it boasts a long lineage, traceable most probably back to poor old Eve.

    So, here I sit, sighing into the fear, feeling dreadful because I do not fall under the masses who today surely deserve a holiday, and yet, in many instances, are out there, working because they "have to".  

    I have come to the conclusion, only one post back,Diagnosis: A serious lack of fun ,  that I am in desperate need of play, in order to kick start my dim senses, without which I cannot function as an artist. But I have unknowingly unleashed a war inside me, causing all sorts of synchroneous events to occur, designed explicitly to throw me off track, to get me back onto the straight and narrow. Reminding me that in this life it is work that gets rewarded and respected. Not play. 

    Which is exactly why I am where I am today. An artist? Yes. But with very little to show and a very long way to go. All because I have been falling into this pit more times than I care to remember. For a huge chunk of my life, I've actually lived inside the pit. Creatively lame, but working, and not for my own benefit, but out of sheer guilt. Some form of payback scheme. 

     The sad thing was that, like in most modern households, the estimation of the worth of a full time mother (can there be any other kind, with or without a career?!) and, in my case, being the bookkeeper to the family business, fell short by far to the slaving of the head of the household. Simply because his hours could be measured in money, and mine could not.

     It is an even sadder thing, that this mentality has been passed onto my children. As it most likely had been passed onto us from our parents growing up in the Great Depression of the 1930's.

     I have to end this inside of me. I have to break free or die as an artist. The irony is that what it takes to be an artist, is mostly simply that: VERY HARD WORK. But with this singular distinction: It carries no guarantee of being economically viable. I have to make this crucial distinction: to work at my art like it is all the effort and play I know it to be and to not measure its worth in fiscal terms. At all! 

     This morning Julia Cameron comes to my rescue with Chapter 11 of The Artist's Way. I quote excerpts from it freely as it applies no matter how you arrange these truths:    

- I am an artist. As an artist, I may need a different mix of stability and flow from other people. I may find that a nine-to-five job steadies me and leaves me freer to create. Or I may find that a nine-to-five drains me of energy and leaves me unable to create. I must experiment with what works for me.

- An artist's cash flow is typically erratic. No law says we must be broke all the time, but the odds are good we may be broke some of the time. Good work will sometimes not sell. People will buy but not pay promptly... I cannot control these factors...I have to free myself from determining my value and the value of my work by my work's market value. 

- I must learn that as an artist my credibility lies with me, God, and my work. In other words, if I have a poem to write, I need to write that poem - whether it will sell or not. I need to create what wants to be created.

- To a large degree my life is my art, and when it gets dull, so does my work. 

- As an artist, my self-respect comes from doing the work. 

- As an artist, I do not need to be rich but I do need to be richly supported. I cannot allow my emotional and intellectual life to stagnate or the work will show it. If I don't create, I get crabby.

- As an artist, I can literally die from boredom.

- What is more difficult and more critical [than responsibly meeting the demands of business ventures].. is to meet the inner demand of our own artistic growth.

Maybe I will "make" it as an artist, whatever that means. Maybe I won't. Maybe my children will someday be as proud of me as they are of their hard working father. Maybe they will never understand what it took to be what I am. I can no longer measure my worth by what I earn. It will take time, but I have something to show. And it will be worth it.

Matilda