Three Pounds Of Cells

A Poetry Book Introduction "Once I knew only darkness and stillness...my life was without past or future... but a little word from the fingers of another fell into my hand that clutched at emptiness, and my heart leaped to the rapture of living." Helen Keller Our perceptions and interactions make us uniquely who we are. The moment we become aware, everything speaks to us - not only people but animals, objects, music and art. Poetry first spoke to me because I was a slow reader. Poetry was short. I could manage a poem in reading time at school, going over and over it. Rhymes and rhythms helped me overcome my difficulties. "The Cat and The Moon" by Yeats was one of my first loves. I inhabited that poem and it made me want to write poems too. It spoke of love, fear and hope, and of imagination. It showed how much of our own natures is locked up inside us - far more than we understand. How little we understand of ourselves. The brain is a great mystery. No use waiting 'til it's dead and dissecting it. We can scan it live, but we will not find the mind. The mind is an emergent property that is constantly changing, mapping our past and influencing our future. Just as the mind is an emergent property of the brain, might there be an emergent property of humanity? An emergent property of the universe? Might that property not be Being itself? Consciousness? And might that Consciousness be God? We live in this marvellous universe of matter, light and energy exchanges. We perceive light and sound but it is our minds that create art and music, language and poetry. What is it that makes humans spark with creativity? What is this need to make ourselves heard within the vastness? Where do we come from and where are we going? This collection of poems explores some of the things that have spoken uniquely to me in my life, people, places and art that have inspired me - not least the ever-changing sea. Light and music are my very first memories; disjointed, non-verbal memories encapsulated in 'Parameters of Perambulator.' But memories are selective, individual, inaccurate and I have the poorest memory. So what's really real? Dreams aren't real are they - or do all our experiences contribute to personal reality - even our nightmares? The human brain - three pounds of cells - is how we make sense of the world but I have always wanted to believe that we are parts of an emergent property, bigger than our limited perceptions. And when those perceptions are no more, I don't want to be consigned to dark silence. Scatter my ashes on the sea so I can sparkle and roar a while more.

Author: Oonah V Joslin

Publisher: The Linnet'S Wings (Press)

Publication Date: Oct 18, 2016

Number of Pages: 110 pages

Language: English

Binding: Paperback

ISBN-10: 0993049370

ISBN-13: 9780993049378