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November Update

Greetings,

I thought I’d do an update regarding what I’ve been up to this month:

  • Poetry – I’ve continued to write poetry as and when it comes to me. My thanks to those who have subscribed and encouraged my writing with a like or a comment; it really means a lot. I am still learning as I go; it has been a great way to clear my mind, even if it can become a little gloomy or ranty, those are healthy emotions that are a part of my life.
  • Site updates – I have added some slightly more professional-sounding page overviews written in the third person for my pages. The original text was used was a quick placeholder that I planned to swing back to eventually and correct. I do need to some more tinkering with my art section, I’m still not 100% happy with it. I also need to add some information about my soundscapes/music; other than a simple link to Spotify, I’ve not really shared much about it. Just like writing, I have a passion for audio, but I lack confidence with my execution. Like with anything else I do, any insights, ideas or tips from you guys are always welcome.
  • World building – I have been expanding my Infinite Black Universe. You can now check out a little more progression with A Grey New World. I have a lot written, but it needs some polishing before I can share it. Other than poetry posts, I don’t believe any of the additional work I add to this site notifies the subscribers, so do take a quick wander around and let me know if anything is of interest, or if there is something you’d like to see more of.
  • Artwork – I’ve been adding more of my art to this site, as my primary means of creativity it is important for my mental health. Being able to share every facet of my work without restriction is quite freeing. While looking through one of my notebooks, I found a quote from Franz Kafka which reads, “A non writing writer, is a monster courting insanity”. Truer words have never been spoken, any artist who isn’t activly creating, is absolutely not fun to be around, we drink we get our selves into trouble and can generally run off the rails. So if that’s you, stop thinking about dollar signs and start thinking about creativity again, your mind will thank you.
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Once we were children

We never spoke apart from several letters,
Childish and hand scrawled, long before email,
Two young children, cousins, distant pen pals,
Living on opposite sides of the earth,
Recently we’ve reconnected,
And I’m constantly surprised at how,
Equally insane and completely alike we are,
Still living on opposite sides of the earth,
The probability against us physically meeting is 99%,
We’re both Grandfathers now, but we’re still kids,
I don’t need to hug him, although I’d like to,
But I can take solace in the fact that,
We are technologically inseparable now,
Two sides of the earth now tethered,
Two lifetimes connected as one,
Real family you just connect with,
And love instantly.

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Memories in Dream

I awoke early again today,
Better to be awake with some control,
Every face in my dreams was a ghost,
It was like a revolving door of the dead,
All dropping in to visit,
I am unsure why last night in particular,
I loved them when they were living,
Now gone, I wish they would stay that way,
Memory is a cruel passenger.

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Ice Castles

Humanity has placed creativity in stasis,
Imagination lost to technological prostration,
The slow deprogramming of individualism,
The slow programming of conformity,
A world where colour is no longer financially viable,
Home is a small safe white featureless existence,
Where we live laugh love,
Like a programmed flock of electric sheep,
A hive mind sharing one unspoken mantra,
Obey.

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Insurmountable odds?

I awoke at 4:00am with a worried mind,
Thinking about the future churns my guts,
I’m concerned I won’t have the strength I need,
To deal with the level of change required,
With age I have less will, I need less mental ‘weight’,
Navigating some days now is a real challenge,
I simply don’t have the energy or drive for much,
I feel constantly fatigued and yet I cannot sleep,
I’m running out of time, resources and loved ones,
Work seems over demanding with load increasing,
My mind keeps shutting down when I need it,
Like it has a constantly tripping surge protector,
But I don’t know how much of this is real,
And how much is my mind fabricating woe,
But it’s constantly on my mind, and it is exhausting,
Who knows if I will ever truly rest.

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Casting Shadows

Evolution is being witnessed by the blind,
We are transforming, digitising our souls,
We cast shadows without any light,
Told answers to questions we never learned,
We are the child holding a gun to our heads,
Unable to differentiate toy from weapon.

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Buffer Overflow

Today I feel completely overwhelmed,
Everything seems to have just come to a stop,
Like my brain has been writing data beyond its allocation,
I can’t think straight, I can’t process, my memory is lagging,
I’m trying to provide myself comfort in any way I can,
There were too many questions at once today, too many requests,
Like I had too many tabs open and loading on a slow connection,
The sound was so loud, overlapping sounds, laughter, voices,
All competing for volume, it was just too much,
I had to leave the city, I had to run, I had to retreat,
I needed calm, to find a little solace to get some work done,
I must do something to slow down this overclocked brain,
I’m back home in the country now and I have logged back in,
There are no sounds except birds and a distant garbage truck,
I may have to close my eyes for a moment and reboot,
I’m optimising my settings, trying to save them so I can focus,
But I fear my storage is also at capacity.

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The Ghost

She’s almost invisible now, as if spun from finest gossamer,
Haunting, somehow trapped within these walls,
Like an apparition lost in her own cold distance,
I see a sadness in her eyes that I cannot repair,
And feel a burgeoning sense of dread, fed by her despair.

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Reformatting me

Since I retired from actively working on other people’s projects a few months back, and have given myself some time to recover, by enjoying a break from visual creation, I can feel myself slowly starting to reawaken, as though the light that had been dulled is being rekindled. Most stress has been removed since the change. I do not work to a timeline, and I do not push myself beyond the enjoyment of creating my own work for my own purposes.

Over the years, I’ve had the pleasure of working with some very talented people, I’m sure some of them are probably pissed with my new found retirement/isolation and outlook, but hey, I gave bucket loads while I contributed over 30 years, there comes a time when you need to do your own thing, so I am, I’m now doing Dan things whenever fuck Dan feels like it, and it is good.

The combination of maintaining this website, while limiting social media interaction was just what I needed. Injecting energy into new hobbies and breaking away from art altogether has also been extremely helpful. You kind of burn out after a while and become jaded with everything you create; it is no longer fun.

I forgot that creating artwork was for my benefit, a form of therapy, which I will now continue uninterrupted.

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The Signal

The Signal (extended) (2025)

The threat is invisible, silent, and constant,
There is no escape, no running, and nowhere to hide,
The signal permeates every system, every cell,
It’s a new technological pandemic
The killer is digital and already within you.
Nobody can disconnect, and very soon,
All existence will be erased.