Here we go round the prickly pear

The sun rises as it sets
And dies as it resurrects.
My heart beats.

Does anyone else wonder if, in these times, art is superfluous? Of course, there are the arguments for it being the expression and even documentation of a culture, an outlet for creative energy and emotions we can't control otherwise. And, as always, there is the strong case for the search of goodness, truth and beauty in the world, with artistic expression leading the way.

When
Is Today.
When
Are you?
Are you,
Were you,
Will you be?

But I can't help feeling that maybe it's a bit wanton to be doodling various anime characters (though, whoever said that was art? ;), sketching out graphic novels and learning Tchaikovsky when

Silver chain across my skin
Binding time to sinew fast
Beat
fights
Beat
Blood,
And the second hand

America's economy is crumbling (yet again) and people all over are starving, being tortured for any number of reasons (Christianity, politics, sheer malice, etc), too desperate to continue life, too tired to enjoy life, or too angry or too bored or too confused to let other people continue enjoying life.

What are these never-ending shrines?
What are these rosaries?
What are these tools but to give a Face? Our
Monuments to shamed waste.

My dear friend had to separate with her fiancee, recently. Just after her grandfather died.

I watch my watch
Which 'keeps' this time
Faceless Time
Nameless Time.
(I fear that
Which I cannot name
And so I try
I name you time
And countenance your face
This watch).

It wasn't over anything stupid, like those random arguments that swell up into one enormous, dead absurdity. "Untimely matters," was what she said. Untimely.

Tomorrow is soon today, swans!

Have you noticed how, sometimes, the days go by so quickly? And then you wake up on Saturday morning and realize that the week is over? Or maybe it's Sunday night, and you are shocked to find that the week is beginning for the second time in two days. (It still feels like Tuesday! Monday!)

And the Next is Now, you alder trees!

Maybe art is our way of preserving moments. Why do we read books over and over? Why do we keep going back to a picture, photograph or not, and stare? What brings us, time and time again, to any song?

Why don't you hurry,
Why don't you flee?

Perhaps, for just a time, so that we can sink into another world, as well as be lifted above our own. For all the days that we feel stuck in a rut, where everything is so monotonous that it's impossible to grab a hold of any one moment, to pierce the fabric of the hour;

Flee
From
Time

novels, portraits, concertos, sketches, haikus, ballads, and all the sort give us something to cling to. Perhaps then they empower us to sort through the mundaneity of the daily, the minutiae of the second.

Because, quite honestly, I'd prefer to move past the prickly pears of the morning hour. ^_^