...
Each creative act we perform is a God particle. We are complicit in the creation of
the universe. Matter without consciousness is raw ore. It is consciousness that smelts
that ore into beams and bridges, enduring alloys that shine with an inner light.
...
It is more than a little coincidental that the fall of our financial institutions and
the illusory nature of our wealth were revealed at approximately the same time as the
Large Hadron Collider came online. Money, like language, like up, down, top, bottom,
strange, and charmed flavors of quark, is a result of interactions, not fully realized
realities. As long as we deepen and honor our experiences in this world with an
audacious creativity and push our language to its utmost limits of possibility, we will
keep those black holes and bankruptcies at bay. Language extends our ability to exist
not merely because it envelops us, but because it is always in a state of potentiality.
Reality may prove to be a probability pattern, but without anyone to perceive and give
it value, it remains a pattern. It does not become a ship, an avocado, or a hand. It
does not awaken. It does not shine.
...
—Excerpted from
The American Scholar (Winter 2010 issue, posted 1 December 2009);
the 3300-word essay also appears with the abbreviated title of “Strange
Matter” in Olson’s collection Larynx Galaxy (Black Widow Press,
2012). Excerpt appears here with permissions from the poet and Black Widow Press.
Bio: John Olson
