My White Paper!

White Paper

I was walking on white paper.

However far I went, there

I remained, between the print,

Making no attempt to read, of course,

Part of the paper itself.

She was correcting proofs

With red ink. At a puff of wind

The paper stirred, and I saw

That she badly needed

A haircut. Miserable.

"I'll bring you fame!" I cried.

Then continued to walk

Until before me, I saw a book,

Unopened. A fossil. I stepped

Over it and, without a glance, moved on.

Shinkichi Takahashi's work can be translated in numerous ways. Writing in the Japan in the 1920's and 30's was an expression of the restlessness not only there but around the world as well. Dadaism, a form of artistic revolution, had developed around 1916. It was a form of protest against a Western Culture that had chosen war as their expression of power. The Dadaist used incomprehensible artistic and literary methods to shock or bewilder the public into accepting the value and essential goodness of humanity. Dadaist works forced the observer to question accepted realities and acknowledge the role of imagination and inner consciousness in this reality. Dadaism lead to the Surrealism movement of the 1920's. Takahashi's work is a combination of these two art forms. His work has a quality that extends beyond the boundaries of this reality and it intermingles with other aspects of consciousness in a free flowing expression of multidimensionality.

Reading his poem White Paper is a trip through the world of imagination and imagery. It opens a door of knowing within me that I closed long before I remembered what the door was used for. I locked that door and hid the key in the basement of my mind, because it was evil and I had to believe that only one reality existed in order to be saved from the curse of damnation. While the door was closed I watch and listened to a world that found peace in killing, love by manipulation and happiness by controlling. I was lost in a mystery where life was a limited commodity that had an expiration date clearly marked on its forehead.

Takahashi helped me find that key and I opened the door that released my imagination and creativity in this reality and underneath those priceless gifts I found the treasure of life. It was neatly wrapped in the white paper of my inner consciousness and I immediately began to walk on it. I walked in between the print and found other worlds, other lives and no hint of death. I began to read the print and I started to remember the paper as well as the print. I slowly felt the presence of a red marker I had left behind the door, but now it was a yellow highlighter that gently stroked the channels of my mind.

As I moved across the paper within me I saw my ego as it sat waiting patiently for a haircut on the doorstep of time. I called to it: "I'll make you one again," as I danced across the yellow lines of unity. I continued to dance as another door opened and a book, a fossil stood before me. The cover was perfect and the pages new; there were no sign of use anywhere. I slowly stopped dancing and began to read what I had written and immersed my self in its wisdom. The book was filled with white paper and page after page waited for me to read and walk through them. I opened the door of consciousness and my external awareness expanded in the process.

It's my choice to walk through time on the white paper of one reality and never read the print that explains the walk. It's my choice to use a red marker and cancel anything that does not conform to the accepted way of walking by a fragmented society. I can look and never read the book that I consider a fossil and travel through life looking for a haircut, when the book explains how I can do it my self. It's my choice to believe that war and fear turn into peace and love when all I think about is the fame I receive from the kill.

Takahashi opened a door for me and now it is channel of connection. I am aware of every page in the book and I'm reading page one, as I glance at page two. I see no end to the book or my walk through the vastness of consciousness.

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