“Mortals, born of woman, are of few days and full of trouble.”- Book of Job 14:1

“How can you be an artist and not reflect the times?” -Nina Simone

“The job of the artist is to disturb the peace.” – James Baldwin

It is of a certain determination why it is artist become whom they are and what they will be defined as. It is this consummate balancing act to maintain the fire that is threatened to be extinguished in the mania of the every day. It is a fight to maintain the light–to illuminate the way for those that choose and chose to see and follow.

In the decision to write, to pour soul to paper, us of the dream ilk, provide light. We provide the map to the darkened and darkest selves we house form the word. Indeed, it is the job of those that create to inform the fellow of its creation and like to know what is is to see, laugh and love fully. The most important being to push to question, examine and keep what is sacred.

What we have now, deal with and imbibe now, is the desire to free all those that desire the light–this hope that persists in the midst of adversity. There are people, real people now whom  are in deserts bound on all sides that evoke only bitterness and apathy. The world has become so heavy to carry they cannot see what light is offered. All they see is the mirage oasis of peace, once reached for, they dissipate. At that moment, hopelessness sets in–here enters the job of the artist.

There is a duty ascribed to those of this guild of writers and dreamers. We have a responsibility to remind those that carry the world that there is  more to it than the ground  we are pressed toward or which we will return. It is in this harnessing of art as mirror, we reflect life in all its facets, whether dirty or clean. It is the palatable, tangible  art that emboldens the world by which it serves to arise and do better–which at times may seem impossible.

Artists, arise.