Reflecting on the Performer's Touch

". . . Every man and woman on me, to destroy me, seeking their share without respite, without ever, ever lending a hand, coming to my aid, loving me finally for what I am so that I may remain what I am. They think my energy has no limits and that I should distribute it to them and make them live. But I have put all my strength in the exhausting passion to create, and for the rest, I am the most deprived and needy of beings." Albert Camus, 1952

I. Reverie

I am starting to see
the spells cast on me
start from myself

strange lighting
exotic smells
and delicious music

pouring from stages

set just above me

the vulnerability of performance
moments when I see you
tearing the walls in your chest
because you have to

like breathing

I can breathe with you
settled on the stage
abstractly transcendent

is it empathy
streaming from me
giving me chills
while radiating heat
all of the way down
to the floor below me?

or does it all
come from me?

somehow I'm contented
sliding in the sounds
sucking in sights

avenged by the air
we share in a small
crowded room

II. Lucidity

the crowd empties
leaving me vulnerable

I've known all along
from absorbing those songs
that I would write

but this connection between
performer and I - consumer
leads to a strange silence

I say next to nothing
and hope somehow that
my eyes will tell the story

the abstraction must remain
else too concrete the metaphor
collapses in duplicity

the desire to extend
beyond the division
of our roles
is pornographic

how dare I think
"I'd like to know you"
and consider breaking
the boundaries of artifice?

I am an artist

riding the waves

of my insecurity

III. Humility

my creative spirit

contained

(constrained?)
by the sacredness
of solitude

surrounded by artists
my desire expands
while I delve inward

create with me
like this today

I cannot reach out

beyond this

impasse

because I don't know
what my touch will do to you

(or what yours
will do to me)