After this past spring and summer's (2007) reorganizations of, first, the aesthetics map, and then the ethics map, I saw an opportunity to better orient the axiological superstructure (the 3x3x3 cubic matrix that looks like a Rubik's Cube) in relation to the ontological base. The axiological superstructure is composed of the aesthetics, ethics and logic maps stacked in layers. As can be seen in the earlier posted photos of the 3d Poemworld sculpture, the aesthetics map was formerly the topmost, forward layer, with the logic map in middle layer, and the ethics map at the lower, back layer interfacing with the ontological base. Before the reorgs, for example, the "Love" set was at the pinnacle and the "Duty" set was at the foot interfacing with the ontological base. The new orientation switches the places of the aesthetics and ethics maps, leaving the logic map in place in the middle layer. (This is fitting enough because the logic map is the only part of the entire structure that remains unchanged. Include the poetics and only the aesthetics text and the logic map went through last year's metamorphoses and transformations unaltered.) Now, the new arrangement has the "free" set of the aesthetics map interfacing quite auspiciously with the ontological base while the elevated ethics is led with a freshly reemphasized "Equality" set at its apex, also quite appropriately.
To summarize, last year between late-March and early-August, Poemworld 2K, as I knew it, radically evolved. These changes in order include: the reorganizational convergence of the aesthetics map to a unique, "Love"-centered arrangement; the exchange in places of the prepositions in the "Independence" and "Autonomy" sentences of the ethics text (which may have foreshadowed the ethics map's fate); the thickening of the boundary line between the "Self" and "World" sets in the ontology, creating an ontological barrier between Self and World; the sudden transformational convergence of the ethics map to its own unique, "Independence"-centered matrix (which miraculously resolved some long-standing design issues with the ethics map while simultaneously asserting a fundamental and far-reaching reinterpretation of both the ethics text and map); a minor print format change in thin line thickness; and finally, the rearrangement of the axiological superstructure itself and how it interfaces with an altered ontological base.
I feel this is worth discussing for the following reasons, which are probably not exhaustive. First, I've been playing with/working on Poemworld since March of 1987, over 20 years. Changes over at least the last dozen years have been very gradual and local. I thought it would always be a work in progress that I would endless tweak it to my grave. But the stunning sudden evolution was not only an fair instance of poetic/artistic punctuated equilibrium, but it signaled the completion of Poemworld itself. In no uncertain terms, the work feels finished, or in a play on words, "I killed it." Poemworld definitely went out with a bang, not a whimper. Second, it is difficult to express the personal experience of these deeply transformative events. The closest I've come is describing it as an artistic epiphany resulting in aesthetic ecstasy that I've never experienced before. The interiority of the relationship between artist and creation over two decades is profound, especially when the work is one's own value system. Third, the "perfection" of Poemworld has now motivated me to push this thing out into the world and see what happens. Terry Eagleton has a splendid quote about this in his recent book The Meaning of Life:
Should the lonely Protestant spirit groping fearfully in the dark be a cause for concern for those who believe that life is what you make it? Yes and no. No, in the sense that making your life meaningful, rather than expecting its meaning to be pre-given, is a perfectly plausible idea. Yes, in so far as it ought to serve as a sober warning that to shape the meaning of one's life for oneself cannot be a matter of fashioning just any meaning that takes your fancy. It does not exempt you from justifying whatever it is that makes your life meaningful at the bar of common opinion. You cannot just say "Personally, I find that the meaning of my life lies in asphyxiating dormice" and hope to get away with it.
Stay tuned.
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