Beautiful Static

Beautiful Static is a poetry and prose book, an eclectic and impassioned gathering-- and chronicling-- of both relatable and revealing pieces written about love, loss, life, death, hurt, bliss, mental health, growth, existentialism, soulful connection, observation and the human condition, and all the gradients between. There are traditional poems and unconventional ones, various styles and quite a few haikus, as well, and the entire stream has a biographical flow: I kept the original order in which I authored the pieces, from my greatest love to my blackest grief-- milestones and moments were felt and forged into one piece at a time.The title itself, Beautiful Static, eventually rose to the surface after a long stare into both the depths and the reflection of my waters and is the meaningful product of hindsight, rumination and intuition. The idea being that static, or noise, or more specifically, the unheard, unknown elements of the human condition, are where some of the deepest, purest and most visceral, and particularly powerful emotions and thoughts reside. It is our silent honesty. The unspoken that softly hides behind or between the spoken, that which is loudest in weight but quietest in existence... So many human connections or moments are lost to the reality of this silence, or are afforded an existence because of it.These raw ideas and feelings, this ...static... is in the waves outside that which is actually broadcasted and shared, as it is imprisoned in solitude and secrecy, often relegated to pockets of self-doubt, shame, hesitation, hurt, confusion and loneliness... Sometimes it's simply unprocessed, unsorted and unknown, as a form of raw energy that may later become an apology, a profession of emotions or hurt or love or vengeance. It may become growth or a new boundary or self-discovery or something darker and more toxic, and it may be the makings of major life decisions or massive regrets or profound epiphanies. In a practical sense, we say one thing, but feel or mean so much more. Or we don't currently know the words, but we know the feelings, the "noise" inside.Sometimes this human static-- in all its forms-- seeps out in body language or escapes for just a moment in an expression or in verbal tones or cues, sometimes contradicting the spoken words it accompanies. In some ways, it is language in its infancy. In these veiled truths, there is much more, there is that which is muted and protected and unadulterated. I wanted to put that which feels untold into something told, something formed, something final, something heard.Art often serves as the emissary--the champion-- of these unsung thoughts. Music and poetry and stories and paintings and countless creations… are essentially outlets, manifestations, crystalizing them to form. It's humanity's cherished, transcendent overflow, spilling into saturated, rhythmic, relatable connection. It's why tales of love and pain from centuries ago can still command tears, why Picasso or Van Gogh's works are still palpable in the mind and heart and why that which is scribed, drawn, etched or created today can live on, as both someone's silence and their loudest essence. Dialects may change and languages die, but this static, these emotions and ideas, are ageless. We all understand this static when we see it, read it, feel it…This book was my static, my beautiful static-- all of the bliss and torment, the light and darkness, and frequencies and shades throughout-- designed to live on in silence, but also in ink, with the hope that maybe it helps the world understand their own or others' static just a little bit more, too. Thank you for discovering Beautiful Static!All the best,-bwSanford Read more