searchingtoseeIn 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
The small things
Posted on June 11, 2012
The man with the magnifying glass… is a fresh eye before a new object [….] it gives him back the enlarging gaze of a child. With this glass in his hand, he returns to the garden, where children see enlarged. […] The details of a thing can be the sign of a new world which, like all worlds, contains the attributes of greatness.
Miniature is one of the refuges of greatness.
Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space
It is the task of the phenomenologist, and the photographer, to open our eyes. To shift our viewpoint. To make us look at the world from a different angle, and appreciate the small things. It seems, perhaps, that this is a task that has become more urgent in recent times. As the virtual possibilities of our world expand and distort, seemingly out of our control, there is a contrary need to find some kind of anchor or pivot point – to gain some perspective. And so we turn our gaze to what we know and to what is real; simultaneously precious and vulnerable, yet strong and vigorous.
Everything has its contrary point. If we find it we can see the world with greater clarity. To see the big picture, we have to look closer, find the detail. And maybe then the answer might have been there, much closer to home than we thought, in our own back garden.
The world carries on producing with overwhelming abundance every year, every season, every day, every minute. Maybe one day it will stop being so, but though the humble spider may seem to balance precariously on the petal of a flower, he finds sure footing there. He knows nothing of these concerns and will continue to strive to survive from one moment to the next. It is all he can do. It is all we can do.
To see the world in macro is to see up close, with a magnifying glass. Like a child playing detective the clues are there to be found if we look closely. Bachelard understood that in order to understand the big things, we must first develop the ‘enlarging gaze of a child’ and turn to the small things in which they find their origins. In miniature the world is the richer, more intense and alive. It is the nucleus, the centre of life.
Thus the beauty that nature’s bounty continually throws forth season after season, year after year can be found if we look in close. Herein lies the rich, ripe, brilliant, voluptuous, fullness of late Spring….
…. A fluffy downy feather in a child’s hand. Almost too light to hold.
A spider’s web sparkling in the moist air. Almost invisible.
A pendulous pair of ripening cherries glinting provocatively in the morning sunlight
Velvety-soft almond pods begging to be stroked
Tall camomiles standing proud and erect as their perfectly rounded golden pads strain towards the life-giving sun, petals dangling elegantly
And then there are the smells which carry on the gentle breeze: fragrant lavender, and most powerful the sweet honey-scented clover, whose heady scent fills your nostrils at every turn
As I wander the gentle murmur of busy buzzing insects contrasts with my lazy mood
The endlessly undulating folds of a full blooming peony
Oh and the poppies! So vibrant and joyful they punctuate the landscape with their translucent orange-red glow, their delicate, torn, paper-thin petals swaying gently in the breeze….
… Nature creates its own glorious poetry. If we look for it.
PS – I wish these had been taken in my own back garden, but they were actually taken near to the b&b we stayed in on holiday in Italy last week, where it seems the sun still shines occasionally unlike here!
© Emily Hughes and searchingtosee, 2012
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