ACTAEONIA
Dreaming of a dreamless dream,
searching for silences that can make me feel.
In the middle of nowhere, I surrendered
by doing things I denied to complete.
Thoughts, after thoughts visit my mind
They wear costumes, dressed as I want
But after we say “Hi,”
I become
part of their show.
Hour after hour, we keep on talking
about things that can’t been hold
Hour after hour, I keep on thinking
until I am unable to act anymore
Actaeonia is a creative expression shaped by my relationship with OCD.
I had OCD from a very young age, but the last three years, my breakdowns became more frequent: I remember myself last year when, for 5 months, I couldn’t feel the sense of the present in a way that I couldn’t bear being with even my close ones. It was like I was in a loop inside my brain where there was no solution or any kind of salvation.
It was the fear of an uncertain future, a specialization of a job I hated (engineering), a city I felt I was drawn to, a relationship I wasn’t in love with, like walls that made all these repetitive thoughts become bigger. For example, I remember panicking before I was gonna meet a close friend because I was scared of the thoughts that would come to my mind.
It was like I had built a prison that I couldn’t escape.
I chose to name it ACTAEONIA because I feel a connection with the myth of Actaeon: his death by his own dogs (for me, the dogs are my repetitive thoughts of an escape), the idea of always escaping, his accidentaly punishemnet by Diana (in a way that in our late capitalistic society choosing to be an artist is like a curse if you want to survive). Also, the structure is in the form of a Greek tragedy: there is a Yvris, Nemesis, and Tisis, but without a linear model.
