Isolation, longing, dreams and looking through doors
The first of a 3 pendant series of keyholes that I am working on, exploring isolation. I pierced the copper keyhole, etched the eyeball onto the bottom panel and then riveted the two together with countersunk sterling silver rivets. The eye was oxidised and then polished to bring out detail. The keyhole was also oxidised and then brushed with a steel brush. I weathered the copper with a few dents as well, as I wanted it to look old and somewhat worn.
Keyhole #1: The Watchful Eye
The eye is deperate and wide open. It wants very badly. I wanted the desire to be somewhat open to interpretation. Is the watcher locked inside and desperately wanting out? Has the watcher locked themselves in, and is wary and frightened of what may be outside of the door? Or is the watcher an outsider trying to get a peek of what may lie on the other side? Are they locked out and desperate to come in?
The keyhole is the way through the door, a road into a different world than the watcher. Where is the key?
As for myself, I don’t know which watcher I am, only that I am somewhere among them, perhaps even more than one. Peering through at the possibilities before me, sometimes trapped and frightened, sometimes defensive and resolute, often filled with longing…
I have been having dreams of flying. Of Paris for some reason, and airports. Obscure dreams of far off places. Blurry imprints of people on my soul that my mind grasps at , but slip through, evading clarity. The colour green? And a lurking feeling that follows me through the day, that these dreams are somehow important. A puzzle whose pieces slide away from each other until meaning is only implied, or felt, but not understood. They fill me with a longing, a sore heart…for what? I don’t know. But trying to shake them off doesn’t seem to work.
I am out of sorts again today. A tumult of emotions. I want it to stop – to find that tightrope equilbrium. Perhaps it has been too long since I have been to the shore, to let the waves lick my wounds, and the sand cushion my feet.
the feather that falls
from the sparse branches above
irridescent coal dull gleaming, a speck
upon the sun that spins and
flares in a tumble of dark whimsy,
hitches my breath
below the longing is thick
enough to hold this wish
aloft for longer than perhaps it should
before reaching the stability of grass, dirt
sandy red stones. and I am caught
there with it, in flight
looking out the window watching my descent
dreaming only of how to
return.