Header Challenge: Literature

The header challenge this week is literature, courtesy of Dave.  I think the earliest form of literature would be those drawings on cave walls that described the hunt--which, of course, was a contemplation of man's place in the cosmos and the basic fact that, wherever that is, at the end of the day we need to eat.  Be as sublime as you want; dinner's at 5.

I have always loved graffiti--the artist's claiming of public space to express anything at all.  The immediacy, the passion, the haste all speak to the intensity of feeling, the passion for life coursing through the heart of the writer.  I love, too, that the wall is the wall.  Graffiti is for everyone, not the select few.

Years ago,  I used to drive around hunting for the stuff and taking pictures and talking to the writers.  Some of them resented me for appropriating their art.  That's funny in itself, because weren't they appropriating someone else's property to make their statement?  I did the same but with my camera and reporter's notebook.  Touche.  I think the real point is we are not the sole proprietors of our feelings any more than we are sole proprietors of the art we create.  Knowing that is power.  We can give it all away and be what it will.  We can continue the conversation.  We just can't own it.

The above image is a graffito painted on a legal wall in Bethel, Connecticut, in 1993.  Who did it?  Doesn't matter.  Just spend a minute with the thing.  See the faces?  Fall into this world. See what happens.