searchingtoseeinterrupted
Posted on December 17, 2017
interrupted by a daydream, 2014
She tugged at her apron and bit hard at her bottom lip, watching as three drops of blood fell, staining the perfect blanket of starched white cotton.
The memory shifted into place: a bolt unlocking. She didn’t want it – not now – it was all too painful. Exhausting. But there it was, tugging at her. It seemed insolent to try to ignore it, or chase it away. The ‘kerchiefs, the pillowcases, always white, they were. White as those sweet little snowdrops. Ada had scrubbed them daily but the blood still came; first drops (just a few) and then they were sodden. She had tried to hide them, her ma, stuff them away under the bed sheets, in pockets, but Ada had found them. In the end it came in a torrent bubbling and spilling out of her; through her mouth, teeth and lips sticky and stained black-pitch, even her nostrils. There was so much of it. Later, she had looked at her waxen skin streaked with red and the halo of crimson which bloomed around her head and thought that they were like the tears her mother had never cried, which had built up inside of her. Tears of pain. She had kept it hidden for so long from everyone. All those months of coughing and wheezing and secrecy. She had nurtured her suffering jealously, an unborn child, hers to bear and hers alone. When the dam broke, Ada had been surprised and shocked by the force of it, this wellspring inside of her mother, tiny and fragile as a porcelain doll.
She shook her head, as if to try and scramble the memory. Knock it out of her.
Not now. Please.
*****
This is a short extract from a longer story which I am currently writing.
© words and images by Emily Hughes
the dreamer
Posted on October 16, 2014
‘interrupted by a daydream’, 2014
The Dreamer
by Rainer Maria Rilke
Dreams: as vivid in my eyes as orchids.
Like them brilliant and opulent,
like them drawing through the giant stem
of living sap the juices of their strength,
like them flaunting an absorbed life-blood,
revelling in the fleetness of the minute,
then, in the next, pallid as the dead.
And when, softly, worlds pass overhead,
do you not feel their winds, flower-scented?
Dreams: as vivid in my eyes as orchids.
Yep, still here, still daydreaming …
This is the latest image in my in defense of daydreaming series, which is taking me in interesting directions. You can read more about it and find all the images in my artfinder shop.
© images and content Emily Hughes, 2014
In defense of daydreaming
Posted on May 21, 2014
We are never real historians, but always near poets, and our emotion is nothing but an expression of poetry that was lost.
Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space
shelter me from the storm
lose me in the mists of time
Who gives a truer account of history? The poet, or the historian?
Thank you to Chris Bronsk and his excellent post repercussions for reminding me about and bringing me back to Bachelard’s The Poetics of Space, which I have always read and savoured as an unreserved celebration of the pure joy of intimate poetic expression. The power of the poetic image is something which transcends history, time and even language. It is able to speak directly to our consciousness without the need for translation or interpretation. Through poetry, we can connect with our past, and with our imagination. Bachelard believed that “for a simple poetic image there is no project; a flicker of the soul is all that is needed.”
I have always been a fierce defender of daydreaming, and make time for it every day. I believe it is more than ‘escapism’; daydreaming makes us more open to the possibility of poetry – both receiving it and expressing it. It gives us the opportunity to indulge our dreams, create and practice the possibility of alternative realities; to reflect, be brave and honest with ourselves, and speak directly to our weary souls which are generally neglected, bruised and battered by the necessary drudgery of the day-to-day. Indeed, Bachelard has also been linked with the surrealist project which advocated the practice of (day)dreaming, or dislocation from reality, as a deliberate political act. Ultimately though, daydreaming (the ‘irrational’ primitive realm of dreams, poetry and imagination) provides us with a counterpoint to rational thought, and can actually help us to live happier, more fulfilled lives.
Let us then safeguard reverie, as our rich inner lives provide a vital antidote to reality, and I hope that today you are able to carve out a little chink in your busy schedule for daydreaming.
© images and content Emily Hughes, 2014
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