Wow this thread is beautiful. I do think that psychedelics lend themselves especially well to art, as well as insight and self-transformation (and good old fun, of course). Anyway, here's a poem from my very first psychedelic experience, on 2c-b:
Paradoxes = This Title is a Mask is a Mask is a Mask
The masks- I wear each mask according to situation
So who am I?
-but this stance is itself a mask
These words themselves are masks!
What is behind these words??
These words themselves are masks!
And these words themselves are masks!
And And And!!! Forever?
“Forever” is itself a word
What lies behind forever?
These words themselves are masks!
(Insane laughter?)
(Enlightened chatter?)
These words themselves are masks!
THIS IS WHAT THEY CALL A PARADOX
(these words themselves are masks)
THIS IS WHAT THEY CALL FUCKED UP!
THESE WORDS THEMSELVES ARE MASKS!
- i would describe this poem as "frustrated philosophical grasping." I'm a very philosophically minded person, and I often encounter paradoxes in my thinking - they used to frustrate me to no end, but I'm beginning to find an elegant, infinite beauty in them. When I began this poem one fantastic night, I was preoccupied with the idea of my personality, and how it shifts from one situation to another - as if I wear a new "mask" for each situation. I then tried to ascertain, what is behind all these masks? Here's where the paradox comes in: i was trying to discover the unalterable essence of my Self, what lies behind all the masks, but then i realized that the present self (me) was in fact another mask, all my questions resulted from this mask, all my preconceptions and new conceptions resulted from this mask, and therefore any attempt to get behind my mask was itself another mask.